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Comment by woutr_be | Hacker News Reader

Cliche answer; but depends on your lifestyle and what you’re willing to send.

I just spend a month in Tokyo, my serviced apartment was around $2,700. Daily lunch via Uber eats was between $12 and $25.

Going out for beers would be from $5 to $11. Eating out also just varied, but usually eating at local restaurants was probably around $15-$20.

Public transport was pretty cheap, usually between $3 and $5. Took a taxi late at night a couple of times, averaged around $25.

(This is all with the current exchange rates)

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I don't know what I expected but I'm surprised that besides the apartment that sounds a little more expensive ($2700?) it's pretty much western europe prices, say Amsterdam or something like that

Tokyo always has a whole range of prices for everything. I recently stayed in a brand new serviced apartment in Tokyo for one month for $1700. And that was for 50m^2 for 2 people. Smaller, or longer stays, is cheaper. Renting a similar unfurnished apartment with a normal 2 year contract could be less than half of that price.

A quick check looks like $80/night is about the minimum for renting a serviced apartment in Amsterdam. I recently moved from Japan to Europe and everything except groceries feels 1.5 to 2x more expensive.

> I recently moved from Japan to Europe and everything except groceries feels 1.5 to 2x more expensive.

Ah groceries are on the rise here too; in part due to rising prices of e.g. meat due to factors like avian flu and more awareness of living conditions after "exploding chicken" (broiler chicken) tanked the prices as low as €3 per kilo (with liquid injections etc). Dairy products are up as well, cheese has gone up by 2-3 euros per kilo, butter by another euro, etc. I think milk is subsidized though, it's been fairly consistent.

I definitely didn’t try to watch how much I spend, or even tried to eat at local places most of the time, so take it with a grain of salt.

He definitely added an extra zero by mistake. Honestly sounds a little high still.

It is definitely a little high, and I have no doubt you could live way cheaper. You could probably rent an APA hotel for less than $50/night, eat more local for $5/meal.

Yeah right now the most expensive part of a trip to Japan is the airfare. That might set you back $2700.

Nah $700 per week for an apartment, I'm assuming it's in a good area of Tokyo, sounds about right. You can get that high in other western countries without the service part.

Japan is significantly cheaper than many western countries.

(I work in Tokyo, btw.)

Just curious: how did you find your serviced apt? Is there an aggregator for Japanese ones?

I personally used https://www.metroresidences.com/

Thanks!

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