1.      1^st step, Before we looking for the properties, you could inform us some of your basic requests and your preference, for example, your working places locations, which kind area you prefer and the reason, you want furniture or without furniture, your budget range and so on. By knowing more details of your requirements, we can help you to view the properties much more meet your needs and satisfy you a lot.

2.      2^nd step, After we knowing your preference of the residence, we would arrange several properties which meet your needs for you to view. And choose a date which both good for you and good for the proceeding of renting.

3.      3^rd step, When would be efficient for you to view the properties before your moving date?

4^th step, After we contacted all the landlords and arranged the viewing things, we would send you a txt massage of the meeting place address, we would put it both in English and Chinese. You can choose to show the address to the driver, and then he can help you to make the way there.

5^th step, then when you see the properties here, and you may find something that little bit different from what you expected. And we’ll try to explain a bit of them.

*The fridge in the sitting room, some time you see a big fridge in the sitting room, and the kitchen is so small that you can not put the fridge inside. To me, I’m little bit surprised that many of my clients are so aware of the fridge in the sitting room. For my point, I think it is acceptable and not a big deal, but it might be very wired by an expat in Shanghai , to this, I only can say that we would try harder to find some solutions for it, but it’s just the way it is here. People think it’s ok to have a fridge in the sitting room.

 

6^th step, what kind of service and fees included in the rental?

*Monthly rental fee

*Management fee( generally, it is included in the rental fee)

*Tax fee (if you need Fapiao, the landlord should pay the tax to the government, then he would add the tax fee, and generally it is included in the rental fee)

*Club membership card(some compound has club house, and they provide free membership cards to landlords, then the landlords might help you to get membership cards by free. But it depends on the compounds and the landlords)

*Broadband internet fee (This is not included generally, a 2G broad-band internet could cost you 1800rmb a year, or 150rmb monthly.)

8^th , What you can ask for if you are interested in this property.

*If you want to bring your own furniture later, or if you don’t like some furniture in the property, you can ask the landlord whether he can move the furniture out of the property. Because sometime the landlord don’t have extra apartments for putting these furniture, which means he might not be capable to move out the furniture, you might only can put something you don’t like in a corner of the property. But anyway, you can ask the landlord whether he can move them out if you need.

9^th , How the whole market works?

*The local agencies, There are more than 1000 local property stores in Shanghai , generally, if there are one or more compounds located in a certain place, then you can see 5 or 6 stores around these buildings, especially those high-end compounds. In another word, the local property stores are just like grocery stores, they open stores at every corner of the city.

*In Shanghai , we have 5 to 6 super-big local real-estate companies.

*What these local property stores can do for you?

*The international companies, MNCs in Shanghai ,

*The English-speaking property agencies for expats,

10^th , What about the leasing term?

*Generally, landlords accept at least 1 year leasing contract, you sign the contract once every year, because for the next year, landlord would negotiate with you about the monthly rental fee again.

*Serviced apartment might accept short leasing, like 3months,6 months. But serviced apartment would be a bit expensive for most people.

*What can we do if we just stay for less than one year and also we want to sign a contract with landlord? For this, we can technically solve the problems by the following procedures.

 

11^th , Leasing Contract

*Contract Language, some contracts are in Chinese, some contracts are both in Chinese and English. But due to the law, all the contracts (no matter English or Chinese) would be translated to Chinese, and then the judge would judge the contract by the Chinese words meaning of it.

*Depositing contract, Sometime, the landlord is not in Shanghai , and he wouldn’t come back to sign the leasing contract until you pay the depositing fee to him. So at that time, you can choose to sign a “depositing contract” with the agency, which means you give 1 month rental fee to the agency and let the agency keep the depositing fee until you successfully sign the leasing contract with the landlord.

*What kind information you should check before you sign the contract?

*What kind of information you should provide to the landlord and agency before you sign the contract?

*Who should sign the leasing contract?

12^th , Contract payment

*Generally you can choose to pay 1 month depositing fee, and pay 3 months rental fee every time, or you can choose to pay 2 months depositing fee and pay 2 months rental fee every time. Both are acceptable here.

*Sometime, you can negotiate with the landlords that you can pay 1 month depositing fee, and pay 2 months rental fee every time. But it depends on whether the landlord accepts it.

 

13^th , What you should do if the contract is signed by your company and landlords.

*You could ask the landlord to give you the Fapiao of the leasing contract, many companies need fapiao as a certificate to pay their employees rental fee.

*You might need to bring one financial person from your company to sign the contract with you. The financial person probably is a Chinese person, and he or she can read everything on the contract and help the company to sign the contract.

14^th , Can you take back the depositing fee if finally you don’t sign the contract with the landlord?

*Before you sign the contract, if the deposit is going to the agency and be kept by the agency, and you’ve already sign the “deposit contract” with the agency, yes, you can take it back if you don’t sign the lease finally.

15^th , How much commission fee you need to pay for your service?

*Generally, the whole Shanghai market accepts 35% of 1 month rental fee as the commission fee from tenants.

*If your budget more than 10’ 000rmb, probably you don’t need to pay the commission fee to the agency. Because the property rent for more than 10’ 000rmb is not easily rented out, so if someone would like to take this property, the landlord would like to pay more to get the deal. So you might not need to pay the commission.

*Why some English-speaking agency tells you that you don’t need to pay the commission fee even your budget is not high,

16^th , Can you choose to do the self-help property search on the internet yourself? Yes, you can choose to do the properties searching yourself, but there is some information we want to inform you.

*If you use the internet in English, there would be very limited and very high-end properties shown on the screen, you get many properties rent for more than 10’ 000rmb monthly, you almost get no properties rent less than 7000rmb every month.