Repair Services and Building-Manager Coordination

Apartment repair in Japan runs on two tracks, one for renters and one for condo owners, and each track has its own desk to call first.¹² Knowing which track you are on saves a mistimed contractor bill and a slow round of messages in Japanese.³⁴

Confirm current details with official sources

Procedures, fees, and requirements can change. Confirm current details at Japan's Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism (MLIT).

Overview

Most repair confusion in Japan is not technical, it is directional. Renters report fixed-improvement faults to the property manager or landlord, while condo owners take common-area faults to the building-management office and handle in-unit faults themselves.¹²⁴ The governing document decides the boundary in both cases, the lease contract for rentals and the building management rules for condos.¹⁵²

The two tracks in one paragraph

If you rent, your first call for a broken water heater or a dead built-in appliance goes to the 管理会社 (kanrigaisha, "property management company") or directly to the landlord where no manager is appointed.³⁴ If you own your condo unit, a hallway leak or an exterior fault goes to the 管理事務室 (kanri-jimusho, "building-management office"), while a fault inside your own unit stays your responsibility.² The 管理組合 (kanrikumiai, "management association") sits behind the condo track as the owners collective that sets the building rules.²

Rental Repairs: What the Landlord Covers

In the standard rental pattern, repair of fixed improvements and building-attached equipment sits on the landlord side. The exact line is drawn by the individual lease contract, so the pattern below is the default, not a statute.¹

Fixed improvements the landlord typically handles

Water heaters, built-in appliances, plumbing, and electrical faults are typically landlord-side repairs in the standard pattern.¹ The national standard lease contract is a model form published to prevent disputes, and its use is not mandated by statute, so individual contracts can allocate details differently.¹

Check your lease line before paying for a fixed repair

A general guide cannot override your signed contract. Read the repair clause first, then report through the manager or landlord desk so cost responsibility is settled before work starts.¹⁵

Tenant possessions the tenant handles

Tenant possessions stay tenant responsibility. Tenant-installed lighting and tenant-owned appliances are arranged and paid by the tenant.¹ This split mirrors the move-out rule: restoration, or 原状回復 (genjō kaifuku, "restoration to original condition"), covers damage from tenant intent, negligence, breach of due care, or use beyond normal wear, while aging and normal wear are treated as covered by rent.⁵

Who to Call as a Renter

The renter rule is short. Report first, then let the desk arrange the visit. Do not commission your own contractor for a landlord-track fault before reporting it.⁴

Call the property manager or landlord first

The first call for a fixed-improvement fault goes to the property manager (kanrigaisha) or directly to the landlord where no manager is appointed.³⁴ Property managers cover day-to-day management including maintenance coordination, rent collection, and repair-history tracking.⁴ The national smooth-entry guideline names landlords, agents, and management companies as the three parties in the rental transaction and provides multilingual checklists and model contract forms in 14 languages.³

The standard flow looks like this:

What to report and how the visit is arranged

A report identifies the faulty 設備 (setsubi, "building equipment"), the symptom, the unit, and when someone can grant access. The manager then arranges the visit, with emergency versus routine routing following the manager or landlord instruction.⁴ For overseas or absentee owners, managers handle maintenance and renovation payments through dedicated accounts and report through an owner portal, which is why the tenant-facing side stays simple, one coordination desk.⁴

Send a short Japanese-first message with photos

Keep the first message brief, name the equipment, describe the symptom, and attach a photo. Short written Japanese with a picture moves faster than a long English-only explanation at a Japanese-only desk.³⁴

Condo-Owner Repairs: Common Area Versus In-Unit

Condo repairs split on a different line. The building handles what is shared and structural, the owner handles what is inside the unit.²

What the building-management office handles

The building-management office (kanri-jimusho) is the desk for common-area and structural issues.² Building-wide management, long-term repair planning, and reserve funds sit at the management-association level under national mansion policy.² MLIT publishes a standard management-rules model, long-term repair-plan guidance, and reserve-fund guidance for management associations, with consultation windows for association operation and building-equipment maintenance.²

The triage looks like this:

What stays the owner responsibility

In-unit issues are the unit-owner responsibility in the standard pattern.² Management contracts may include a discounted-rate referral network for common in-unit repairs, but availability and rates depend on the individual building contract, not a national schedule.⁴

Term	Meaning
共用部分 (kyōyō bubun, "common area")	Entrances, halls, exterior, and shared equipment2
専有部分 (senyū bubun, "individually owned unit interior")	The inside of your own unit2
修繕積立金 (shūzen tsumitatekin, "repair reserve fund")	Monthly reserve collected for building-wide work2

Costs, Referrals, and Move-Out Boundaries

Cost follows responsibility. Landlord-side faults are landlord cost, tenant-possession faults are tenant cost, and owner in-unit faults are owner cost.¹⁵² Any ambiguity is resolved by reading the lease contract or the building rules first, since signed contracts govern as written.¹⁵

Situation	Who arranges	Who typically pays
Fixed-improvement fault in a rental (water heater, built-in unit, plumbing, electrical)	Property manager or landlord14	Landlord, per the lease contract1
Tenant-possession fault (tenant-installed lighting, tenant appliance)	Tenant1	Tenant1
Common-area or structural fault in a condo	Building-management office2	Building, via management funds2
In-unit fault in a condo	Owner, via building referral where offered or own contractor4	Owner24

Who pays for what

Where wording is ambiguous, the restoration guideline serves as a discussion aid rather than overriding the contract.⁵ Existing signed contracts govern as written, so keep the written lease or building rule as the binding line.¹⁵ This article carries no priced fee table because the topic is responsibility allocation, not an administrative fee schedule.

Referral networks and own-contractor cases

Tenants arrange and pay their own contractor only for tenant-responsibility items.¹ Condo owners may use a building-contract referral for common in-unit repairs where offered, or arrange their own contractor, with any referral discount set by the building contract.⁴ Higher-end buildings sometimes add a cultural-translator role at the management desk, but that is a building-level amenity, not a right a resident can assume everywhere.

Good to know

Report the fault before arranging your own repair

Calling your own contractor first for a landlord-track fault is the most expensive misstep in this topic. The manager or landlord desk coordinates landlord-side maintenance, and self-commissioned work can complicate cost recovery.⁴ Report first and follow the desk instruction, even when the fault feels urgent.

Confirm cost responsibility in writing before work starts

Never assume the examples in any guide match your contract. The standard contract is a non-mandatory model and individual leases differ, so the written lease or building rule is the binding line.¹⁵ A short written confirmation of who pays, before the technician is booked, prevents the common deposit-deduction argument later.

Keep the Japanese-first message short and photo-backed

Long English-only repair requests stall at a Japanese-only desk. The national guideline treats multilingual support as a facilitation program with 14-language checklists and model forms, which means Japanese-only operation remains the default desk.³ Practitioner managers market multilingual and round-the-clock support as a differentiator, which points the same way.⁴

Know where this guide stops and a dispute guide starts

Contested cost recovery sits outside a coordination procedure article. Contracts govern as written and ambiguous wording is negotiated against the guideline, so a genuine dispute over who pays belongs with the lease paperwork and a legal-bureaucracy procedure, not with a second call to the repair desk.¹⁵

See also

• How Renting Works in Japan
• Move-Out Procedures: Closing Utility Accounts
• English-Speaking Service Providers
• Aircon Cleaning (Eakon Kuriningu)
• Handyman (Benriya) Services
• House Cleaning Services

References

Footnotes

1. 国土交通省. 「『賃貸住宅標準契約書』について」. https://www.mlit.go.jp/jutakukentiku/house/jutakukentiku_house_tk3_000023.html ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰ ↩¹¹ ↩¹² ↩¹³ ↩¹⁴ ↩¹⁵ ↩¹⁶ ↩¹⁷ ↩¹⁸

2. 国土交通省. 「マンション政策」. https://www.mlit.go.jp/jutakukentiku/house/jutakukentiku_house_tk5_000040.html ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰ ↩¹¹ ↩¹² ↩¹³ ↩¹⁴ ↩¹⁵ ↩¹⁶ ↩¹⁷

3. 国土交通省. 「外国人の民間賃貸住宅への円滑な入居について」. https://www.mlit.go.jp/jutakukentiku/house/jutakukentiku_house_tk3_000017.html ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶

4. Housing Japan K.K. "Tokyo Property Management." https://housingjapan.com/property-management/ ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹ ↩¹⁰ ↩¹¹ ↩¹² ↩¹³ ↩¹⁴ ↩¹⁵ ↩¹⁶

5. 国土交通省. 「『原状回復をめぐるトラブルとガイドライン』について」. https://www.mlit.go.jp/jutakukentiku/house/jutakukentiku_house_tk3_000020.html ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸ ↩⁹