Overall this was a great experience. We stayed with three adults and two small children, and this was a really good place for kids. It’s a three story house—on the first floor is the toilet, shower and clothes washer (no dryer) and one bedroom, second floor is the kitchen and dining/living room, on the third floor there are two bedrooms. The kitchen is very well equipped; we cooked all our meals there every day. The furnishings are basic so we didn’t have to worry about the kids breaking anything, and there are lots of parks and playgrounds nearby. All the neighbors have kids too so no one minded the ordinary kid noise. Really recommend for families. But this is not the place to stay if you intend to have loud drunk parties at night—it’s a quiet, residential neighborhood. Nakano is very convenient to downtown Tokyo, and it’s the place to be if you are a fan of manga. There are nice restaurants around Nakano station, cheaper and less crowded than downtown.
But there are a few drawbacks. For being in a residential area, it’s surprisingly noisy. You can hear the neighbors and there is a lot of street noise. Buses and ambulances go by very frequently, and every time a bus goes by the whole house shakes. The house is rather far from Nakano station. There is a bus, but it’s only convenient on the outbound trip; because of the one-way streets, on the return trip the bus stop is quite far away, almost as far as just walking from the station. Because of all the narrow one-way streets, many taxi drivers had a hard time finding the house. Even though the house is large by Tokyo standards, it’s small compared to the US. There is almost no closet space, and no place to put clothes or big suitcases.
Yasu was a good host. The house has all the charm and the inconveniences of life in the Tokyo suburbs. You will really get to see what ordinary life in Tokyo is like.