“Can a foreign national apply for this one?” — an important question. We'd love to hand you only foreign-national-OK units from the start. But there are practical reasons we can't pre-screen them all. Here's the honest picture, and how we work.
Reason 1: Eligibility varies by unit and is often not stated
Whether foreign nationals are accepted depends on the owner or management company. Many listings don't say “foreign nationals welcome” — yet some unstated ones are fine, while some stated ones change at screening. Listings alone can't tell you for sure.
Reason 2: Checks are basically one phone call at a time
This information isn't centralized; we confirm case by case, by phone, with the management company or owner. This is one of the parts of our work that still relies heavily on phone calls and is hard to streamline. No system today shows every unit's eligibility at a click.
Reason 3: Checking every unit in advance takes enormous effort
Phoning every matching unit one by one costs a huge amount of time and labor — and by the time we finish, availability and eligibility may have changed (see Vol.16, on the market's real-time nature). “Check everything upfront and fix it” fits poorly with this market.
Reason 4: The answer can change with your situation
Eligibility often isn't a simple yes/no — it can hinge on your residence status (visa type), period of stay, employer/income, the guarantor company's screening, and whether you can communicate in Japanese. So checking together with your circumstances is the surest and fastest way.
- The moment you say “I'm interested in this one,” we immediately check eligibility with the management company.
- You get the latest, accurate answer, and we save wasted research cost — so we focus on speed and proposals.
- We confirm your individual conditions (residence status, etc.) at the same time, with no double work.
To make it smooth
- Your nationality, residence status (visa type) and period of stay.
- Your employer / income (or school name, if a student).
- Whether Japanese, English or Chinese is most comfortable for communication.
Summary
Foreign-national eligibility needs an individual phone check per unit, so checking everything in advance isn't realistic. That's why we check — pinpoint — each unit you're interested in once you contact us, which is fastest and most accurate. Thank you for your understanding. StandUp supports foreign residents' apartment search in English and Chinese.