Dealing with a shady resident agency

Last night my husband went to the resident agency to pay the rent and was handled by the president of this small company. The president was rude and referred to my husband as "san" instead of "sama" as well as telling my husband he shouldn't be there late (even though the door was still wide open), and that he should have exact money, I don't remember my husbands exact words, but there was an instance where the president told my husband to "get it himself" although I don't remember what this was in reference to.

Note: My husband is Japanese, so this isn't a matter of racism.

When my husband called the agency later that night to complain about the ill treatment he received, his phone call was given to the president himself. Instead of the president apologizing, he instead calls my husband a fool for having come 5 minutes after they closed (again, the door was still open, so my husband wasnt aware that they had been closed), then the president has one of his employees get on the phone to handle the issue. The employee then proceeds to tell my husband thats he's wrong!

What kind of business is this?!

Today, my husband called the landlord of the apartment we're staying in, and the landlord basically says we're a "nuisance" and deserve to be treated in such a way!

My question is; what can we do to take legal action against the agency and the irresponsible landlord?

Now my husband wants to move out this month because he's afraid if we stay nay longer, they'll end up charging us a lot when they assess the apartments condition, even though the apartment is as clean as it was when we moved in.

Note: we've only been here since November 2010. We're located in Toride Ibaraki.

what can we do to take legal action against the agency and the irresponsible landlord?

You want to take legal action against them because they were rude? Isn't that a little extreme?

Now my husband wants to move out

Good idea.

i want to take legal action because his attitude was aggressive, rude and irresponsible. not sure if your japanese or even live in japan, but here you pay A LOT of money to the agency just to move into the apartment (commission fee), plus key money, cleaning money, and insurance... for what? to be treated like a dog in the end? and then when my husband tells the landlord we'll just move out; the landlord laughs at him and says ''i doubt you have the money to do that.'' So yes, this needs to be made into an issue, and others need to know about what type of people they may end up dealing with if they rent from these people.

where i come from we contact better business bureau and have personally owned businesses fall under a government/state penalty, however, this is japan and things are different which is why im asking what it is i can do without having to pay money to a lawyer.

useful info would be very helpful to anyone who can answer. thank you.

You don't have any kind of case based on them being rude (while not nice, it's not illegal)- first I would take photographs (with time/date stamp) of every square inch of the apartment, and move. That way if they try to hit you with outrageous cleaning/repair fees you have backup. There are laws in place to say you cannot be charged for things that fall under daily wear and tear to prevent agencies and landlords from ripping tenants off.

Japan does have a consumer affairs bureau, similar to BBB I think, but not sure if it covers rental agencies- you or your husband should look into it online by searching Japanese sites, you might get better information there than here about any recourse you have and what people have done in the past.

take legal action for that? ridiculous, you're out of your mind for thinking bad customer service warrants legal action..this is not the usa.

however - if the agency fails to act on legitimate, documented requests to improve the apartment building/fix damage, you may have a civil case if they fail to respond to the complaints for longer than a set period of time.

you'll need to contact a lawyer for the exact details.

IMO it's not worth the trouble. i hope you took photographs of the apartment when you moved in, if not you can expect to be gouged when you leave.

Elizabeth,

I sympathise with your husband for the uncomfortable experience, and I am sure you two are still in shock since this was just a night before. Their attitude must have been nothing you can describe in words.

However, calling someone "san" or implying they won't have change ready when you show up late is not really what one can call "rude." It is not first class service but it is, in fact, quite an every day attitude.

Again, I am sure there were rude attitudes that you haven't been able to express, but if you're going to take legal action, you need to be able to express them.

May I also suggest that you can always talk to your local shohisha center. Also, city halls often provide free law consulting service.

Thank you to the last two posters.

I guess legal action isn't a good choice of words, as opposed to just wanting to expose their crooked business and nasty demeanor towards their "customers."

As for what these two men said, there were many more remarks outside of what I wrote, and I basically skimmed over the small details, after all this is an experience my husband went through and Im only relaying the message and trying to help find a solution.

Anyhow, the suggestions from the last two posters are a good place to start. I dont think people should say malicious things without thinking there wont be any consequences, so going to city hall might be a good start.

When you "skimmed over the details", was there one that maybe we about being late with the rent money?
They would not have rented to you in the first place if they had this negative impression of you at contract time, so you have obviously done something they find seriously unacceptable.

I don't know why the owner would possibly think you are a nuisance. Suing him will certainly prove him wrong. Not.

I skimmed over the details about what the landlord said to my husband, if you clearly read what I wrote then you wouldn't need to reply with your thoughtless comment!

I didn't come here to get anyone's opinion on the matter, especially since there isnt enough info to begin with to JUDGE the situation. i came here to get an answer to my question on where it is i could go, which is WHY details are being skimmed.

Im not here to play forum flame wars with whats more than likely a know-nothing teenager whose never lived here and has probably never rented from people to begin with.

and for anyone else reading this: Im not here to flame war so please don't leave annoying comments on this thread. Thank you :)

and by the way, we've never been late on the rent FYI. So stop assuming facts and trying to heat this thread with childish replies.

No, there is not any legal action you can take against this company in this instance.

The rest of this is opinion, so you can stop reading now if you fear it will upset you, but that is not my intent.

None of this is meant to get your goat or start a ''flame war'' as I have no interest in provoking you.

The name of the forum is ''living'' though, as in ''living in Japan'' and it is a public forum, so people might extend unwanted advice or opinions because they may see aspects of a situation that you have overlooked or were not aware of. You, in turn, are free to ignore them.

1) Your gut response to some sort of conflict or disagreement in Japan should never be ''legal action.'' It really is true that it is best to try to discuss things and adopt an attitude of in terms of demeanor and words that indicates that you are trying to understand the situation from the other party's point of view.

2) It is *possible* that the agency has some sort of Yakuza ties, maybe a couple of steps removed. During the bubble years the Yakuza were heavily involved in real estate, and I am sure that some involvement remains. (I have met a number of older Japanese who generally view people in the real estate industry as being people to be very wary of.) If you have any feeling that this might be the case, you might want to cut your losses and find a different place to live. Be prepared to have to give notice/pay a few months of rent, depending on the terms of your contract.

2) That being said, it is most likely that in this case it is just that the agency is run by a businessman who is more numbers oriented than people oriented. And remember, the main customer for the agency is the landlord, not you. When you are a prospective tenant, you will be treated the best you ever will be by the agency. Once you are under contract and have paid your key money, etc., you are an income stream. Staff at a good agency will still be polite to you, but if you feel they are worried you might take your business elsewhere, they are not too worried about that.

3) I am not sure what happened in the office, but if the company was closed, it was closed. Just because the door wasn't immediately locked at 5:00 on the dot or whatever does not mean that they were prepared to conduct business. When a company closes for the day, things are put away, the money is locked in the safe, many of the staff may have already left, etc. As you mentioned, only the company president was left, and he may very well not be used to dealing with tenants directly anymore. Since the office was closed any cash on hand would already be locked away, so I can understand the company president expecting your husband to go find change himself. The office is not a retail outlet in any case, and may not be able to make change easily even during business hours; if you are going to pay the rent in cash, bring the exact amount.

What I really would recommend is setting up a monthly transfer from your bankaccount. That will make the agency the happiest and will minimize the amount of face to face dealing you will have with them. I would bet most of their tenants pay that way. If the extra fee is a burden or you don't have a bank account (and we have alll had times in our life when money is tight, so this is not a dig at you), that might explain why the owner said something along the lines of ''I doubt you have the money to move.'' That comment itself is so far out there, it kind of tells me there ispossibly something about your husband's appearance or conduct that might not engender a lot of respect from the company president or landlord.

4) At whatever point your husband realized that he had come into the office after business hours, he should have apologized profusely for his cluelessness and offered to come back another time during business hours. Your husband was causing meiwaku. (I wonder if he is kind of young, because he should know this stuff, and his getting that upset about ''san'' versus ''sama'' seems like he might still be a little insecure about his status as a shakaijin). Instead, he took a ''customer is always right'' attitude, which was the wrong thing in this situation. By apologizing and offerring to come back later, he allows the other side to adjust their response to whatever is best for them (it might be that they would rather have the money now for sure instead of waiting for your husband to come back another day, so the other person might be gracious and say, ''No, it is OK this time, but please try to come before 5:00 in the future,'' or if it is really inconvenient to accept the money after hours they can say, ''Yes, please come back tomorrow.'')

5) I can't imagine what your husband expected by calling later that same day, after already being told that the office was closed and after having dealt with the president of the firm himself. Bothering people on their off hours just because you are upset is not going to get you any kind of apology, and this kind of reinforces my suspicions that your husband is kind of young and inexperienced. And then calling the landlord to tattle about being treated rudely? All the landlord cares about is getting the rents from the agency. He pays the agency to deal with tenants and has no interest in getting involved in some minor tenant dispute. He probably has a long relationship with the agency and is happy with their service. Why would he take the company president to task because one of the tenants feels they weren't treated with enough deference? Sorry to be blunt, but your husband was being the very definition of a nuisance in this case.

This was not meant to upset you, as I have no reason for wanting to do so. I hope you find a few nuggets of insight among all the blather that might help you.

By the way, I am a teenager typing this in my parents basement.

ok, thank you, ill show him this.