I have been out of my apartment for nearly 2 months but I still haven’t received the money my landlord owes me. I am dealing directly with the landlord and there is no agent involved.
I need to apply some pressure to the landlord now to return the funds or else, but I need a little help with the or else part.
The reason he gave for the delay was that they needed to check how much repairs to some floor boards would be. They finally came back to me with a crazy quote and I asked to see documents showing the costs he is proposing. It’s been 2 weeks since that last message.
Any advice in terms of threats I can make?
4 comments
Return the rent? Are you talking about the deposit? A lot of people don’t get that back at all (I got some back twice and was surprised).
2 months isn’t long at all. But if it continues get some free legal advice – your idea of asking for quotes of costs is a good one. He’s hoping you either give up or don’t ask questions.
https://corporation-lawyer.biz/fudousan/column/post287
Above is the first result I found on Google for getting back a deposit, so a similar situation. Basically would involve you sending an official letter (to create a paper trail) demanding repayment, followed up by suing in small claims court as necessary. In either case probably best to talk with a lawyer.
You could also call consumer affairs, as they appear to receive calls on similar situations.
https://www.kokusen.go.jp/soudan_topics/data/chintai.html
Asking to see the quote he got is a good idea. If he refuses to show you then he’s added his own premium to the cost, most likely.
Honestly, I don’t know how landlords get away with this in Japan. The law is in theory on the tenant’s side but it never seems to really work that way in practice. Anyway, at that point you can play this one of two ways.
The first is to be your friendly neighbourhood Ned Flanders, deeply concerned that your kind landlord may be being ripped off by unscrupulous flooring companies. Make an independent enquiry with a different flooring company. Go back to him with that quote and tell him, you innocent summer child you, that you’re worried he’s being ripped off because hey diddly ho, here’s a local company offering a much more reasonable price! This is what a friend did when he got a quote in the hundreds of thousands of yen when leaving his apartment. Magically, the invoice was significantly reduced and he was told the previous invoice had been “sent in error”.
Or, you can play hardball and tell him that you’re going to raise this with either the housing standards bureau in your area or escalate this to a 民事裁判. My husband has done this after leaving a previous apartment and being slapped with a ridiculous reparations bill. After threatening to escalate, suddenly he was told that there were actually very few reparation fees at all and got most of his deposit back.