Tervetuloa!
So you find yourself searching for an apartment in Helsinki, perhaps with the clock ticking on company-leased temporary accommodation and limited or no Finnish? You've come to the right place! This guide will introduce you to the foremost real-estate search pages in Finland, and (hopefully) give you the rudimentary vocabulary you need to find your next home.
Rental Websites
From their homepage, click on "Vuokra-Assunot" or "rental residence" to search for rental apartments. "Haku" means search.
Vocabulary
Since Vuokraovi have the largest site, here's the rental vocabulary as it appears on their "Vuokra-Assunot" page.
- Vuokra-Assunot - rent-residence
- Maa: country
- Alue: Region
Helsinki is in the region "Uusimaa".
- Aluetarkennus "Focus region"
- Kaupunginosa: town part
Eg "Ullanlinna", "Ruoholahti", "Kamppi", "Kallio"
- Postinumero: post number
The lower numbers are usually more central - central downtown is 00100, Ullanlinna is 00130-140, Ruoholahti is 00180, etc. 001XX, 002xx, and many 005xx are central. Searching for "Helsinki 00180" etc in google will give a map of the region covered by the postcode, if you're unsure.
- Asuntotyyppi: apartment type
This is pretty redundant if you're looking in central Helsinki, it'll be a "kerrostalo" - an apartment building
- Huoneidne lukumäärä: room quantity
- yksiö - studio
- kaksio - two-room apartment
- 3 huonetta - three rooms etc
- yli - "over" - more than
In Finland "rooms" doesn't include the bathroom, or generally the kitchen even if it's a separate room. So a kaksio generally has a bedroom and a living room, and three room apartment usually has two bedrooms.
- Vuokra: rent
- Asuinpinta-ala: apartment area
- Rakennusvuosi: building year
There's strict legislation here about building mainentance, so every so many years an apartment's plumbing must be checked and overhauled if necessary. This means older apartments often have better plumbing than 15-20 year old apartments. The really old apartments up to the 1920s are the really beautiful "Jugendtalo" - solid masonry walls, tall ceilings, but maybe old wiring and illogical layouts such as separate WC and washroom etc. Anything between 1960 and ~1985 tends to be the same boxy style - lowish ceilings, long rectangular windows etc. Very modern buildings, after ~1990 tend to have their own saunas built into the bathroom.
- Asunnon ominaisuudet: residence features
- parveke: balcony
- sauna (own) - more common in modern apartments
- Assunon kunto: apartment condition
- hyvä - good
- tyydyttävä - satisfactory
- väittävä - passable
- ei luokiteltu - not classified
- Taloyhtiössä: ~'building cooperative has'
- sauna (shared)
- hissi: lift
there's usually a segregated common time, and you can book a weekly time slot for a fee payable to the building cooperative.
Searching Vuokraovi
The Aluetarkennus "Helsinki" covers the entire district and not just the city, the four sub-options "Helsinki, etelä" etc are for searching within Helsinki-the-city. "Etelä" is south - from north of the city center downwards, "itä" is east (allegedly the bad part of Helsinki, but cheaper), länsi is "west" - Lauttasaari and the other islands, as regions north west of the city center, and that leaves "pohjoinen" as north - from above the city upwards. If you're looking for central accommodation you probably want to focus on "etelä", but many other regions are well connected by public transportation.
You can get by selecting a region or regions of the city, eg "Helsinki, etelä", numbers of desired rooms, and a rent-range.
Searching Oikotie
- Huoneluku - number of rooms
- Maakunta - region (Helsinki is in Uusimaa)
Click "Laajennettuun hakuun" to go to the advanced search, where you can narrow down your search to the region you're interested in, eg "Helsinki, etelä".
Searching Igglo
From the home page go to "Vuokrapalvelu" or rental service.
- Hae Vuokrakoteja - search for rental homes
- Tarkempi haku -advanced search.
Typically there's never so many apartments listed that searching for "Helsinki" on the basic search becomes overwhelming.
On the advanced page you can specify the areas you're interested in - select "Uusimaa" in "Maakunta", "Helsinki" in "Kaupunki" (city) and the regions your interested in under rental ranges under "Kaupunginosa". These will then appear under "Valitsemasi alueet" - selected areas.
- Vuokra - rent
- Huoneita vähintään - number of rooms (at least)
- Koko Helsinki - all Helsinki (regions)
- Heti vapaa - immediately free (vacant)
- Hae - search
- Vapautuu - date of vacancy
- Koti on jo vuokrattu - home is already rented
Finnish rental shorthand
- Xh - X rooms
- k - kitchen
- kk - kitchen
- kh - bathroom
- kph - bathroom
- wc - bathroom
- vh - walk in closet
- ak - alcove
- s - sauna
- suihku - shower
Other useful vocabulary:
- Esittely - viewing (time).
- makuuhuone - bedroom
- olohuone - living room
- keittiö - kitchen
- baarikeittiö - bar-kichen
- avokeittiö - open kitchen (ie, part of the living room)
- kerrosselite: on which level of how many levels, ie 1/6 - first floor of six
- vesimaksu: water payment (in addition to rent)
- keskusta - city center
Comments
Furnished apartments are rare, and are usually for more short-term rental. All apartments come with a cooker and a fridge-freezer, but usually not anything else, including light fittings. Most bathrooms are plumbed for washing machines - there should be a tap at about waist level, and another tap-like pipe without the spigot lower down for drainage. Baths are uncommon in very old apartments or newer apartments, they seem to only feature in apartmets from around the 70s.
If you found this guide lacking in some respect, please feel consider registering at wikidot and making improvements.
Happy hunting!
