Moving to Japan for 1 year

[lynnie81]

will be travelling to Japan (through my company) next month and I am planning to stay for 1 year at least.
The client is located at Akasaka, Minato-ku, Tokyo.

I will be travelling with my wife.

Please help me out in knowing the cost of living, vegeterian food and other challenges I will be facing over there.

Which area I should live in so that the apartment will be affordable.

Please suggest.

[synthia]

I assume you are being transferred by your company. You are going to need company help with finding an apartment and a great many other settling-in issues, unless you speak Japanese. Housing is very, very expenisve and fairly difficult to find. Someone for you company will have to contact the appropriate offices to set up billing for your utilities, get you a phone, and get you settled in.

Where are you moving from? If you are coming from a country with relatively low living costs, you will find Tokyo extrememly expensive.

[LostInTokyo]

Hi, my company is also transferring me to Tokyo and I'm on the apartment hunt as well. I've been using Ken Corp and there are all sorts of apartments in different price ranges. The above poster is correct though, housing is expensive, especially depending on where you live. Hiroo/Azabu/Ropongi areas, which are largely expat, prepare to pay more than some other areas in Tokyo.

[larabell]

Have your realtor take you outside of the Yamanote loop. Oops... you said Ken Corp. I don't think they even acknowledge that anything exists outside of the Yamanote loop. In my area, there are two buildings side-by-side, built from identical plans. One is managed by Ken Corp (or at least it was when I was looking). One was, at the time, managed by Tokyu Community. For identical 93 m^3 apartments with mirror-image floorplans, Ken's price was 400,000/mo and Tokyu charged 230,000. If either of these places were located in Roppingi or Hiroo -- 600,000/mo easily (a Ken Corp person actually showed me one before I managed to convince her that I wasn't interested in living in the very center of Tokyo).

Unless you're allergic to public transportation or plan to party every night, there is no reason to rent a place inside the Yamanote loop -- let alone Roppongi, Hiroo, or Akasasa. You'll get more space for less money if you get out of town a ways. But you'll have a tough time getting Ken Corp to take you out that far. It cuts into their bottom line.

(BTW, the furthest I could get Ken to take me was Nakano. I'm still in Nakano, but definitely not in the Ken place. It's a nice neighborhood.)