{"id":164,"date":"2026-10-07T08:59:00","date_gmt":"2026-10-06T23:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.iiie-r5.com\/?p=164"},"modified":"2026-10-08T07:47:51","modified_gmt":"2026-10-07T22:47:51","slug":"room-hunting-then-and-now-edo-5","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.iiie-r5.com\/?p=164","title":{"rendered":"Edo Rent: How Many Bowls of Soba? | Room Hunting, Then and Now: Edo \u2464"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"Edo
Photo: modern Japanese coins (Franck V. \/ Unsplash). For illustration. The red stamp, which reads \u5e97\u8cc3 (tanachin<\/em>, \u201crent\u201d), is also an illustration.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

This is the English edition of our Japanese series \u300c\u304a\u90e8\u5c4b\u63a2\u3057\u4eca\u3080\u304b\u3057\u300d (Room Hunting, Then and Now). \u65e5\u672c\u8a9e\u7248\u306f\u3053\u3061\u3089<\/a> \uff0f All English articles<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last time we met the kushaku-niken<\/em>: six tatami mats in area, no bath, a shared well and toilet. So how much was the rent? I looked it up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

300 mon a month<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The official commentary of the Edo Culture and History Certification Test gives a figure for back-alley row houses: \u201c100 mon<\/em> per tsubo<\/em> per month.\u201d A kushaku-niken<\/em> is three tsubo<\/em>, so 300 mon<\/em> a month, or 3,600 mon<\/em> a year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rent in those days was called tanachin<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In soba, about 19 bowls<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Three hundred mon<\/em> means nothing to us, so let us convert it with a yardstick of the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Toward the end of the Edo period, a bowl of nihachi<\/em> soba noodles is said to have cost 16 mon<\/em>. The dates may not line up exactly, but borrowing it as a yardstick, 300 mon<\/em> is about 19 bowls of soba.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If we suppose a bowl of stand-up soba costs 500 yen today, 19 bowls come to 9,500 yen. That is rent of under 10,000 yen a month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is another yardstick. Shinpan Edo no Kakeibo<\/em>, supervised by the historian Isoda Michifumi, estimates the rent of a kushaku-niken<\/em> at around 4,875 yen a month in today\u2019s terms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The number moves with the conversion method. But whichever yardstick you use, it stays \u201cvery cheap.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A
Then: an alley of wooden houses in Kyoto (Photo: David Emrich \/ Unsplash). For illustration.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In a carpenter\u2019s household budget, about 8% of income<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

How about compared with income? A household budget for a carpenter\u2019s family survives in Bunsei Nenkan Manroku<\/em>, written in the Bunsei era (1818\u20131830).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The daily wage was 5.4 monme<\/em> of silver. Working 294 days a year, annual income was 1,587.6 monme<\/em>. Of that, rent was 120 monme<\/em> a year. That works out to about 8% of income.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This carpenter\u2019s home was \u201ctwo rooms of four and a half mats,\u201d larger than a kushaku-niken<\/em>, and still that was the share.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Japan today people often say rent should be no more than 30% of take-home pay. By comparison, rent in Edo was a light burden.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is a reason it was cheap<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

If you are feeling envious, remember last time. About 10 square meters, no bath, shared toilet and well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cheap rent is cheap for a reason. That was true in Edo and it is true now. When you compare homes, look not only at the rent figure but at what that amount includes. Not that we needed Edo people to tell us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"A
Now: things to check before you take the keys (Photo: Jakub \u017berdzicki \/ Unsplash).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A note on sources: I confirmed these figures through an article presenting the certification test\u2019s official commentary, an article presenting the book\u2019s content, and explanations that cite a dictionary of historical prices. Rents varied by period and place, so please read them as rough guides.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Next time: the landlord. In Edo, the \u201clandlord\u201d did not actually own the building.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Looking for a home in Sapporo?<\/strong>
Message us on LINE: https:\/\/line.me\/ti\/p\/u2qP4VZ5ZU<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Please note:<\/strong> Lease contracts and the legally required explanation of important matters (j\u016by\u014d jik\u014d setsumei<\/em>) are provided in Japanese.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rent for the smallest Edo row-house unit was about 300 mon a month, roughly 19 bowls of soba, and about 8% of a carpenter\u2019s income.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":162,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-164","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iiie-r5.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/164","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iiie-r5.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iiie-r5.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iiie-r5.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iiie-r5.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=164"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.iiie-r5.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/164\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":284,"href":"https:\/\/www.iiie-r5.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/164\/revisions\/284"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iiie-r5.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/162"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iiie-r5.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=164"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iiie-r5.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=164"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iiie-r5.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=164"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}