Leaving Japan has a dozen moving parts, but two of them have hard deadlines and real money attached: your apartment's notice period and your deposit refund. Get the notice period wrong and you'll pay rent on a place you've already left. Get the move-out inspection wrong and you'll watch your deposit shrink for reasons that were never really your fault. Neither problem is exotic — they're both written into your lease, and both are manageable if you deal with them early rather than in the last frantic week. This guide covers the notice you owe your landlord, what a fair deposit deduction looks like, and how to get back as much of your money as the contract allows. For everything else on your way out — visa, taxes, utilities, pension — see the full leaving-Japan checklist.
The 解約予告 notice period: check your contract first
Almost every Japanese residential lease requires 解約予告 (kaiyaku yokoku), written advance notice that you're moving out. The most common requirement is one month before your move-out date, but a meaningful number of contracts — especially with certain management companies — require two months. This isn't a formality you can talk your way around; it's a contractual clock, and it starts the day you submit notice, not the day you decide to leave.
The number is sitting in your lease right now, usually in a clause labeled something like 解約 or 解約予告. If you don't have the contract handy, ask your management company (管理会社) directly rather than assuming it matches whatever a friend's lease said. Notice periods vary by landlord, not just by region, so don't guess.
The trap: if you give notice late, you owe rent through the end of the notice period even if you've already flown home. A one-month clause means one month of rent from the day you notify them — not from the day you actually vacate. People who wait until they've booked their flight to tell the landlord often end up paying for an empty apartment for weeks after they've left the country.
Work backward from your flight date using your contract's exact notice period, and build in a buffer. This is exactly the kind of deadline the departure-timeline tool is built to keep in front of you, since it's easy to lose track of while you're also closing out work, visa, and banking tasks.
How to give notice, and the move-out inspection
Notice is normally submitted in writing, using a 解約通知書 (cancellation notice) form your management company provides — some accept email or an online portal, but many still want a signed paper form. Submit it by the date your contract requires, keep a copy or confirmation, and use the exchange to lock in two things: your official move-out date, and the appointment for 立会い (tachiai), the move-out inspection.
The 立会い is where a representative from the management company walks through the unit with you after you've moved everything out and cleaned it, and decides what — if anything — gets deducted from your deposit for damage. It's the single most consequential appointment in this whole process, so don't schedule it for the same day as your flight. Give yourself room in case it runs long or surfaces an issue you want to discuss on the spot rather than by email from another country.
The 敷金 deposit and 原状回復: what you can and can't be charged for
Your 敷金 (shikikin, deposit) exists to cover unpaid rent and damage beyond normal wear when you leave. Japan's 原状回復 (genjō kaifuku, restoration) guidelines draw a fairly clear line: ordinary wear-and-tear and sunlight fading are the landlord's responsibility, not yours. You shouldn't be billed to repaint walls that simply aged from normal living, or to replace flooring that wore down the way flooring does over a normal tenancy. What you can legitimately be charged for is damage you caused — cigarette burns, pet scratches or odor, large stains, holes in the wall, broken fixtures. That distinction is the entire basis for negotiating any line-item you disagree with at the 立会い.
It's worth remembering this is the same deposit system in reverse from when you moved in — you can read how 敷金 and 礼金 worked when you moved in for the other half of the story, including why 礼金 (reikin, key money) was never coming back. If you're curious what a comparable move-in would cost today, a Japan move-in cost calculator shows the same up-front numbers from the other side of the transaction.
The cleaning fee and 敷引き reality
Don't expect a full refund by default. Many leases include a 清掃費 or ハウスクリーニング (cleaning fee) that's either a fixed amount written into the contract or a standard deduction taken from the deposit regardless of how clean you leave the place. If it's spelled out in your original contract, it's very likely enforceable and not worth arguing over — professional cleaning between tenants is standard practice, and this fee simply prepays for it.
In parts of western Japan you may also see 敷引き (shikibiki), a portion of the deposit that's non-refundable by contract from the start, independent of any damage. If your lease has a 敷引き clause, that amount was never coming back — it's not a deduction you can dispute, it's a term you agreed to when you signed.
The practical takeaway is to separate what's negotiable from what isn't. Cleaning fees and 敷引き written into the contract: not negotiable. Damage charges for normal wear: worth questioning. Knowing which is which before the 立会い saves you an argument you can't win and focuses your energy on the one you can.
How to maximize your refund
- Give notice on time, in writing, and get confirmation of your move-out date and 立会い appointment.
- Clean the apartment thoroughly before the inspection — a genuinely clean unit gives the inspector less to point at, even where a cleaning fee is already fixed.
- Photograph the condition of walls, floors, and fixtures right before you hand back the keys, so you have your own record if a charge is disputed later.
- Push back, politely, on any line item that looks like ordinary wear-and-tear rather than damage — cite the 原状回復 distinction if needed.
- Accept that 礼金 is gone for good — it was never a deposit, so there's nothing to recover there.
Refund timing: keep a bank account open
The deposit balance is typically wired back by bank transfer, and it can take anywhere from a few weeks to a couple of months after you move out. That gap is exactly why keeping a bank account open for the refund matters — a lot of people close everything on their way to the airport and then have nowhere for the transfer to land. Leave one account open, tell your management company which one to use, and confirm the receiving details before you leave rather than trying to sort it out from overseas.
This is informational only, not legal advice — leases and local practices vary, and your contract is the final word on notice periods, cleaning fees, and deductions. When in doubt, confirm directly with your 管理会社. If something in your situation doesn't match the general pattern here, the FAQ covers some of the more common edge cases.