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If you’ve ever been to an Ikea store, you know how this sprawling space has just about anything you can imagine for your home. The Swedish-based retailer, and its build-it-yourself furniture line, have developed a spirited fan base over the years. From viral videos of how to build a bed frame out of Ikea shelving units to plain furniture pieces that can be transformed into showpieces, Ikea is a cultural phenomenon.
The company is taking these concepts and expanding them to the tight real-estate market of Japan by offering a tiny apartment for rent for the tiny price of 99 yen (or about 86 cents) per month.
Located in one of the busy neighborhoods of Tokyo, this diminutive dwelling (an architectural style known as “kyosho jutaku” in Japanese) makes use of vertical space to get the maximum room out of the sparse 10 square meters, or 107 square feet, available. You can see in the recently released floor plan for the apartments how the design has a split-level layout to provide the main living space on the first floor and the sleeping quarters upstairs (which is really up a stylish ladder).
On the first floor, there’s a desk, mini sofa, bathroom, kitchenette and even a washing machine. Lighting is attached to the furniture to alleviate the need for lamps that take up valuable floor space. Ikea Japan will provide specially-made furniture, including bookshelves that extend almost up to the second floor to make sure everything fits perfectly in the tiny apartment.
The cozy bedroom on the second floor of the loft comes furnished with a comfortable bed, a full set of dressers to store your clothes and other necessities, as well as decorative accessories, to make the place feel like home.
It really does look like a pretty cozy spot to sleep and enjoy a book.
In order to qualify for rent one of these new apartments, applicants must be a member of the free Ikea Family loyalty program. Renters will need to pay for their own utilities, according to Insider. Considering the rent is so affordable, that seems like a fair deal and given the size of the pad, it’s tough to imagine the power bill being too high.
A full video tour of these new Ikea Japan tiny homes was released by the company on YouTube, featuring a life-sized version of Ikea’s popular stuffed shark toy, Blahaj. The tour is a little quirky, but you get a real sense of what this home is like.
Insider reported only one of these apartments is available to rent for a short-term lease through Jan. 15, 2023, and Ikea Japan is taking applications online.
Does tiny apartment living sound like a good time to you?
Correction Dec. 3, 2021: The original version of this story misstated the square footage of the apartment. We regret the error.
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