Who furnished apartments actually suit

The heavy part of renting in Japan is often not the rent. It is day one: buying a fridge, a washing machine and a bed, coordinating three delivery windows, and disposing of all of it two years later. Furnished erases that entirely.

Which is why it works. But “furnished” is an unregulated label, exactly like SOHO, so the same word covers very different things. Of the 44 rooms listed here, 10 are furnished, one is appliances-only, and one carries goods left behind by the previous tenant. Those are three separate products.

The three kinds

1. The package. A standardised set let as part of the property: fridge, washing machine, microwave, bed, table, chair, curtains, lighting. Contents and layout are close to identical room to room. Most of what circulates in Tokyo as “furnished” is this, and it does what it promises — you can live there from the day you land.

2. Left in place, as-is. The previous tenant left things and they are still there. This means “you may use it”, not “the landlord provided it.” Listings sometimes distinguish it explicitly, with wording along the lines of left in place, as-is.

3. Built-in fittings. Houses and converted spaces where fitted shelving, counters or commercial equipment remain. There are fewer of these, but for someone looking for a place to work, this is the type with the biggest upside.

Telling them apart is easy: does the listing sheet itemise the contents? Packages always list them. If it says “furnished” and lists nothing, suspect the second kind.

Where it goes wrong for people who work from home

Here is the real point. A standard furnished set is assembled around eating and sleeping. There is no desk in it.

Where something counts as one, a dining table is not a surface for eight hours a day. Wrong height, wrong chair, and you clear it every mealtime. Fine for a week. Noticeable by month three.

Then there is the less obvious problem. A furnished room often has no room left for a desk of your own. The walls are already taken by the bed, the storage and the fridge, and counting the floor plan, some rooms have no remaining wall long enough to put a desk against. In an empty room that space would have been yours to allocate. Here it has been allocated already.

So if you work from home, the question is not really “furnished or not.” It is “furnished, but can a desk still go somewhere?” On listings where the sheet draws the furniture in place, you can read that off directly.

Who it suits

Suits you if you expect to move within one or two years / you want to live there from day one / you are not shipping furniture internationally / you would rather not accumulate possessions.

Does not if you are staying a while / you work in your own chair at your own desk / you already own furniture / you want to decide how the room is used.

People who work from home straddle both lists. They want day one solved and they want their own desk. The practical middle is appliances-only: the fridge, washing machine and air conditioner — the genuinely annoying purchases — are handled, and the furniture is left to you. There is one such room in the current listings.

Sometimes there is tax on it

Residential rent carries no consumption tax, and furniture, carpets, lighting and air conditioning let as an integral part of the dwelling are covered by the same exemption.

But where those fittings are made the subject of a separate letting with a charge set separately, that charge is taxable. If your quote carries a distinct “furniture rental” or “appliance use” line, tax applies to it. Level that out before you compare monthly totals against an unfurnished room. The wider move-in picture is in What you actually pay to move into a Japanese rental.

Four things to ask before applying

1. Is there an itemised list? Do not sign on the strength of one word
2. Who repairs it when it breaks? Usually the landlord for packages, usually you for goods left in place
3. May I dispose of what I do not want? With left-in-place goods you are sometimes asked to restore them at move-out
4. Is it billed separately from rent? If it is, that part is taxed

Terms vary by property and landlord, and tax outcomes turn on individual circumstances. Get professional advice before committing.

Every room below states its furnishing status in the terms table — furnished, appliances-only, or left in place — so you can tell which one you are applying for before you apply.