Job Discussion Forums

[shadowsinner]

hey guys,

theres something i want clarified. if anyone of you work for eikaiwas and live in one of their apartments please reply. or if u know something abt this reply also.

i've been told that an apartment will be arranged for me at the cost of 65Kyen/mth + about 6Kyen/mth (utilities). i've been told that the contract for one of these ecc apartments is that the minimum stay in them is 4 months plus the first prorata month.

now my question is, why on earth can't i give one month's notice like everywhere else and leave the premises? why do i have to stay there for 4-5 months? why do i have to stay there at all? i'm not even there, and i've been told that i can't bail out on the housing. like, i MUST stay where they tell me, and this is before i've signed anything! and does utilities include landline phone? it's a bit hard to pay utilities, split between 3 people, when god knows who's making what phone calls on the phone!

how do you guys all manage?

please let me know.

[PAULH]

[shadowsinner]

does utilities include phone?

no, 6K... means 6,000yen/mth for utilities

[Apsara]

In my experience utilities do not include phone in those agreements, but your situation may be different.

When I lived in a share house with a landline phone we kept a notebook with dates and durations of calls, but that was fraught with problems as you can imagine. I imagine people in the house will use their cell-phones mostly- my husband and I don't even have a landline in our house.

If your school sets those restrictions it will be hard for you to get out of the place without paying the amount specified, and you will be causing yourself a lot of stress if you try to fight it- if it were me I would take the route of least resistance and stay in the house, then if I really wanted to move out, do so when the 4 months was up.

Assuming you are going to be arriving in Japan and settling in, why not take advantage of the situation to scout out the best options for yourself while having somewhere reasonable to stay- your other options when you first arrive are to shell out hundreds of thousands of yen for key money, deposit, agency fee and furniture if you want your own apartment, find a gaijin house, which in my experience are almost universally dirty and noisy, or pay high rent for an apartment with a company like Sakura House.

[Glenski]

NOVA charges about 70,000 yen for rent plus utilities for each person in its apartments, so 65,000 plus 6000 for each person is close enough to match. That basically means you could each take long hot showers and use tons of water for laundry and leave the lights on 24 hours and still only pay a pittance for utilities.

As for needing to say for a minimum of 4 months, that must be an ECC policy, so you take it or leave it. Leave it, and you have to fork out 2-5 months equivalent in rent as key money just to move into a totally unfurnished place of your own (no light fixtures or appliances) and end up paying more for those utilities on your own.

[Canadian_Krista]

I just got hired at ECC as well-something I found out at the recruiting session is that while you must stay there for 4 months (before you can make use of their out-clause), if the agency they are using owns other apartments and they agree to transfer you, you're free to go to any of those. You just can't switch between agencies for 4 months.

[wangtesol]

Maybe you can try asking the teachers branch union at ECC under the General Union...

http://www.generalunion.org

[shadowsinner]

[luckyloser700]

ECC and some other eikaiwa companies want you to stay in their apartments because they're attached to the teaching positions. The key money and other deposits have already been paid by the company so they don't want to dump the apartment and let you go on your own if there's a chance you might bail on your contract in 4 or 5 months. Once you do that, the company has to pay the up-front money all over again so that the next teacher can have an apartment set up for him/her before arriving in Japan.

Usually after 4-5 months of employment, when a school feels comfortable with your performance and believes you're not going to jump ship right away, the company will ease up, let you find your own place, and drop the apartment attached to that position. If it's close to re-signing time, you'll probably have to wait until you do sign that 2nd contract before you can get your own place.

[shadowsinner]

yeah i gathered that was the case. i don't think the eikaiwas actually pay the key money... they have arrangements with agencies instead. we pay higher rental in lieu of key money.

but i still wonder whether i get a lock on the bedroom door...

[yamanote senbei]

Eikaiwas generally like their teachers living in teacher housing because it makes startup easier, it allows the company to make a certain profit off the rent each month, and it makes it difficult for teachers to quit early. If they quit or are not renewed, teachers are evicted, in most cases illegally.

[Glenski]

[gaijinalways]

The eikaiwas get a good relationship with the rental agencies, of course, and they may receive some kickback as well .

[luckyloser700]

Let's say, for example, an eikaiwa company pays the start-up costs for 4 apartments that they will rent to 5 employees for 50000 Yen each even though the regular rental rate for any one of the apartments is 35000 (this is just a simple example). Let's also say the start-up cost for each apartment is 4 times the monthly rent (which is often the case). That's a total start-up cost of 800000 Yen for all of the apartments. Now, let's say each month the company uses the 15000 Yen it charges beyond the regular rental rate for each apartment to pay back (to itself) the start-up money it has already spent. That's 60000 Yen per month. It would take 14 months before the company could make back the 800000 start-up money. This is just two months longer than an average one-year contract period. In reality, the company would probably charge a little more than 50000 per month in order to make back their start-up expenses in 12 months time.
But, what happens if one of the 4 teachers quits early and goes home without giving much, or any, notice prior to leaving. If the company can get someone to fill in quickly and take over the apartment with only a one-month gap in occupancy, the company will only lose 15000 for the year as far as the apartment situation is concerned. The company will, of course, have gains and losses in other areas. The company will, given this situation, break even at best. To make a serious profit, they'd have to charge such rediculously high rents that nobody making 250000 Yen per month would want to live in one of the apartments and thus, wouldn't work for the company.
These companies are gambling all the time on whether they can keep teachers in the apartments all year round. We all know the world isn't perfect for anyone and teachers do go home early. Often so, and without much notice, leaving their companies holding the bag on the rent situation.
And, for those of you who would say that the eikaiwa companies have some kinds of deals with rental agencies or apartment building companies that get them out of paying high start-up costs because they can provide lots of tenants, think about this: why would a rental agency or building company feel more confident in renting apartments that will be occupied by foreigners than they would in renting apartments to your average hard-working Japanese folks? We all know how much Japanese landlords love renting to foreigners. If lots of apartments were sitting vacant, I could see rental agencies or building companies doing what they had to do to fill apartments. But, every building I've ever lived in or visited another foreign co-worker/friend at was usually full with mostly Japanese people.
NOVA does try to fill 3-bedroom apartments with 3 teachers and charges pretty high rents, but given the high rate of employment turnover at NOVA, they probably aren't making any real profit from any kind of apartment scheme. NOVA Probably uses whatever extra money it pulls out of its teachers to cover losses in other areas. I doubt that extra rent money will help them cover the huge loss they reported this month.

If you have a strong argument to show that these eikaiwa companies are actually making a decent profit off their apartments, make it here. No more weak assumptions from those who are unable, or just too lazy to explain why they are stating those assumptions.

[Hoser]

For my previous apartment, NOVA charged 70,000 each for a 3 person apartment. I talked to the landlord and he said that the apartments cost 120,000 per month. So almost 100,000 profit per apartment per month sounds like a pretty good deal to me. It's quite a scam if you ask me. They pay you your monthly wage and then you immediately hand 1/3 of it back to them. Talk about getting teachers to work for you for minimum wage.