Refrigerator buying advice under 35000 yen

14 comments

1. Check your local recycle shops. They’ll have cheap ones for you.

2. The recycling shops like Treasure Factory will deliver inside your house and even setup the refrigerator (for a fee of course). Its still cheaper even with the fees to buy it second hand. I bought mine an year ago and it arrived in pristine condition and has been working without any issues. Any brand like Panasonic, Hisense is good enough. For 35k yen you might get a really amazing fridge upwards of 250 litres as well. They give a 6 month warranty too.

3. Recycle shop is the way to go. Buy a dead man’s fridge.

   I think the vast majority of fridges are made in the same factories in China so whether HiSense is better than Haier or Sanyo etc i dont know. Our Sharp one works fine

4. When I first moved here I ordered a large second hand fridge off Rakuten – shipped from Hokkaido to my door in Tokyo for 3 man. Had a slight ding that you can’t really notice and 8 years later it’s still going strong.

5. Buy whatever is most energy efficient of a necessary size from kakaku.com. It is most likely the only appliance that will run 24/7 in your apartment, so energy efficiency is really important. You will probably have a hard time finding good deals on second-hand fridges anyway and with current/theoretical winter electricity prices the price difference between new and second-hand will be offset in 2-3-4 years.

   In that price point, there is not much of a difference between brands quality-wise. Even big domestic brands in that price category will slap their brand on the OEM model, which is probably designed and made by Hisense or Haier.

6. If you live near Zama, you can take mine for free. Just come and get it.

7. I’ve had that Hisense fridge for a year and it’s been fine. It’s ample for one person and a little snug but workable for two people.

   Recycled ones will also almost certainly be fine if you want to save a bit of money and don’t mind doing a little more work shopping around.

8. There’s one on Rakuten (as of about 2 years ago when I got mine) for 25000 that is about shoulder height and includes a small freezer. Not palacial or anything, but plenty for 1 person.

9. Buy on メルカリ. Plenty of bargains on there for an old fridge. It’s a fridge. They don’t die after a year. We mastered the basics of cooling decades ago. If a fridge doesn’t last 10 years you’ve been ripped off.

10. Yahoo auctions.

    Japanese love to get rid of basically new stuff.

11. Can’t speak on their fridges but I have some Hisense electronics and they’ve all been working well for years.

12. I have the fridge you linked.
    I bought it because the db was low.
    It’s not that bad. It’s quiet except for when the generator goes. The click is loud. But no worries.

    For the price I think it’s good!

13. Find the cheapest one on Amazon that’s the size you like. That’s what I did, it came bundled with a laundry machine for a discount.
    It’s hard to make a refrigerator bad, so as long as it doesn’t have 2 starts, you’ll be fine.

14. Bought one in 2017 from a recycle shop and still no issues. Altogether I bought these used:

    – microwave
    – ricecooker
    – washing machine
    – fridge

    One of the buttons on the microwave broke, otherwise all are holding up just fine.