Living in a SATO home

The Service Manager / Building Manager helps you

• in administrative and financial issues related to the property (such as maintenance contracts and waste management)
• if the maintenance company has not responded to your request for repair work within a reasonable period of time
• any disturbance issues
• residential cooperation
• apartment repairs and inspections
• if you would like to renovate your home by yourself or make amendments or extra installations
• if you think there may be damage to your home caused by moisture or other defects or omissions that may pose a risk to residents or the property, please report this without any delay to the maintenance company as well as the building management company

You can find the name of your home building's Service Manager at OmaSATO or by typing your address on Contact details of your home building at Contact us page. The easiest way to contact your Service Manager is via OmaSATO.

Contact the maintenance company

• in all urgent cases, such as if there is a water leak in your home or in a communal area of your building
• if you would like to have changes made to the nameplate on your door
• if you would like to hire a car parking space or sauna turn
• you have forgotten your key
• if your home is too cold or warm or if the ventilation system is not working
• if you notice a defect or other problem in your home, the building's communal areas or equipment or the upkeep of the outdoor areas

In case of any emergencies regarding the functioning of a lift, do call directly to the lift servicing company (see the lift wall for contact details).

You can find your home building's Maintenance company at OmaSATO and by typing your address on Contact details of your home building at Contact us page.

You can order extra keys at OmaSATO (check the price on Customer charge list). When moving in or out, you must not receive keys directly from the previous resident or give the keys to the next resident. The maintenance company keeps a record of keys and will charge you for any missing ones. If you lose a key, contact SATO hastily.

When a tenant sublets the apartment to another person, we use terms subletting in part, subletting in full or temporary assignment.

Subletting in part

Subletting in part means a situation where the main tenant and the subtenant live in the same apartment. The main tenant assigns a part of an apartment rented by the tenant for residential use to another person against a fee or charge. Tenants may assign up to one-half of the apartment for residential use by another person without the lessor's permission provided that the subletting does not cause any considerable inconvenience or disturbance to the lessor. Subletting in part is not, however, allowed for studio apartments.

The main tenant is responsible for the apartment. When the tenancy of the main tenant ends, the subtenancy also ends.

Subletting in full

Subletting the apartment in full is not allowed. Airbnb and any other short-term renting is subletting in full and therefore a ground for rescission of the lease agreement.

Temporary assignment

A tenant may assign the occupancy of the entire apartment to another person temporarily for a maximum of two years if the tenant moves away from the town or city for work, studies, ill health or other corresponding reason. The main tenant remains responsible for the apartment.

You as the main tenant must notify SATO in writing at least one month before any temporary assignment of the occupancy of your SATO rental home.

At SATO we aim to reach a good balance between price and quality in the rents charged for our apartments. The rents of interest-subsidised and non-subsidised rental homes are determined on the basis of market rates and the rents of those financed on state-subsidised ARAVA loans on the basis of the cost correlation principle. In ARAVA buildings a rent equalisation model is used to determine the rents between the buildings.

Any long-term renovation needs are also anticipated in rents.

As of 1 April, 2023, our partner Ropo Capital Oy will be responsible for sending our invoices, processing payments and customer service related to payments. Due to this change, the bank account number and reference number for rent payments will also change. Read more »

We send all rented homes information about the rents for the next year by post. The letter will include a rent payment summary document that specifies all the necessary information relating to rent payments, such as the name of the lessor company, bank account number, reference number, payment date and amount of rent., its start date and more detailed information relating to rent payment (incl. bank account and reference number).

Please note that we will not send you a new rent slip every month. Instead, the rent payment summary will serve as the invoice for the entire year. We will only send you a new summary if any of the details change. All the information in that summary will remain valid until you receive a corresponding new summary from us (usually once a year).

Make sure you comply with the due dates and information (such as the reference number) sent to you by SATO to ensure your payment is made correctly. The due date for rent payments is the 2nd day of each month.

With e-invoicing you will receive the information required for your rent payments directly into your own online banking service (web bank) every month. You can then pay the rent via the online banking service. The advantage of e-invoices is that your rent payment information is always up-to-date and ready for use in the e-invoice. You can order the e-invoices via your own bank’s online banking service.

Remember to mark SATO-Konserniyhtiöt/SATO Oyj as the invoicing company ("laskuttajayhtiö").

Your lease agreement specifies the principles of rent reviews. Your new rent is affected by issues including property maintenance costs and market prices. Each rent review takes into consideration issues including each property's own maintenance costs, apartment-specific differences and the local rent level in the area. Rent reviews are also based on the terms and conditions of your lease agreement.

You should check if you are eligible to receive support towards your housing costs. To do this, you can use the calculator found on the Kela website. You can also fill in the benefit application form on the Kela site.

We can also agree under your lease agreement that any housing benefits will be paid by Kela directly to SATO. This means you will only need to pay the difference between the rent and the benefit to SATO.

SATO uses an electronic data transfer system with Kela regarding housing benefit issues. The system is used for all housing benefits. As a SATO customer you will not need to submit housing-related enclosures to Kela when applying for a new housing benefit or for benefit reviews. Kela will receive the necessary information electronically from SATO's information system.

Information transferred electronically includes information about the lease agreement, housing expenses and payment details for the payment of rent directly to the lessor. Kela will also receive information about any renovation or modernisation carried out on the property. Electronic data transfer helps ensure the information submitted to Kela is correct.

We use Ropo Capital as our legal debt collector. If your rent is unpaid, Ropo Capital will send you a payment reminder. If you fail to pay your rent despite of the debt collection, there may be filing for an application for a summons with a District Court.

If you want to discuss your payment situation, please contact Ropo Capital's customer service: Ropo Online Service or tel. +358 9 4246 1304.

If you live in Helsinki, you can contact the City of Helsinki housing advisers in problem situations.

In apartments that have a broadband connection operating over the telephone network you will need a VDSL2 modem. You must get your own modem.

If the apartment has data network cabling, you will not need a separate terminal device. To find out if this is the case, check if the apartment has a data socket with an RJ45 connector in one or more of the rooms. The apartment may also have an apartment distributor cabinet in which you should select which data socket in the apartment is active. Then connect the data cable directly to the data socket equipped with an RJ-45 connector.

To use the cable connection, you will need a cable modem. Connect the modem to the aerial wall socket and connect the computer to the modem, preferably using a network cable. If connecting a TV set or digibox to the same aerial socket, you will need to use a splitter to divide the signal between the devices.

When registering your broadband connection, it is a good idea to ask Telia for advice if you are uncertain about the technology used for your home's broadband connection.

To access cable TV services, you will need a digibox or digital TV that is compatible with cable distribution (DVB-C). Residents can get their terminal devices from whichever supplier they wish. Cable-ready digiboxes and digital TVs must also be tuned into the new TV channels.

The quiet-time policy must be followed between 22:00 and 07:00, and this is when everyone's right to a peaceful night's sleep must be respected.

Do notify your neighbors well in advance if you are planning to have a party in your home or do something noisier than normal. Make sure you do not cause any unreasonable disturbance to your neighbors even when you notified them in advance.

If you experience disturbances in your home, we recommend acting like this:

• Try to discuss with those concerned. Your neighbor may not necessarily know that their music or movie sounds can be heard so clearly next door.
• If the neighbor does not change their behavior despite your discussion and if you are continuously disturbed, you can file a disturbance report on the basis of which SATO can take official measures to restore residential peace in the building.
  File a disturbance report in OmaSATO »
• If the disturbance is serious and if it takes place during the quiet-time policy hours between 10 pm and 7 am in particular, please do not try to sort them out by yourself. Instead you should contact the Police to calm the situation down as soon as possible. It is very important for the police to also receive information about a possible crime as soon as possible. You can reach the police by calling 112.
  More information about the Finnish police »

Please take note that SATO does not automatically get informed by the police about the disturbances made streight to the police, and note that the general maintenance of order is ultimately the authorities' task.

SATO does not release the name or other information of the informant forward. However, if the disturbance is so severe that it leads to a police report, police and judiciary can require the information. Luckily the residential disturbance situations rarely escalate to that, and are usually resolved relatively easily.

Please take note that SATO does not automatically get informed by the police about the disturbances made streight to the police, and note that the general maintenance of order is ultimately the authorities' task.

SATO does not release the name or other information of the informant forward. However, if the disturbance is so severe that it leads to a police report, police and judiciary can require the information. Luckily the residential disturbance situations rarely escalate to that, and are usually resolved relatively easily.

Safety is a right and obligation of all of us. An emergency plan has been drawn up for every SATO building, including yours. Make sure you read it to prepare yourself for a variety of situations that may take place in and outside your home.

The emergency plan of more and more SATO buildings is now available online. To find your building's emergency plan, enter your street address on Contact us page. You will find a link to the emergency plan under Building information.

If the emergency plan for your building is not yet available online and you have not seen the plan on paper, contact your building manager for a copy of the plan. The building manager is obliged to distribute the emergency plan on paper to all the apartments in the building.

We keep the emergency plans up to date so we recommend that you take a look at yours at regular intervals.

You can reserve a car or motorcycle parking space from the maintenance or parking company. You will need to pay a fee for the parking space and make a written agreement. Visitor parking spaces are only intended for residents’ guests.

You must never – not even for a short period of time – park your car in emergency access routes. The emergency access routes are marked with signposts in the outdoor areas.

At times demand for parking spaces exceeds the number of spaces available, in which case you will not get a space immediately and will be placed on a waiting list. We rent parking spaces primarily to those residents or commercial space tenants who live or rent commercial space in the same building where the parking space is located. If there are parking spaces available, we can rent those also for residents and tenants who live or have commercial space in other SATO buildings.

In principle, you can only have one parking space at a time. However, if there are parking spaces available, you can also rent another parking space.

Storage units for residents

The apartment-specific storage unit is a good place to store items such as seasonal clothes and travel cases. It is not a good idea to store anything valuable in the storage unit as this may attract burglars. You can avoid basement burglaries by fitting the unit door with a sturdy lock and blocking the view into the unit. For fire safety reasons, it is prohibited to store any flammable liquids, gases or explosives in the storage units. You can store a maximum of four car tyres in your apartment-specific storage unit.

Storing outdoor and baby transport equipment

Most of our houses have storages for both the outdoor equipment and baby carriages.

Please keep your baby transport items in the space reserved for them. If you cannot find the baby transport storage room, ask your home building’s maintenance company where you could store your pram or buggy safely.

Looking for a larger storage?

SATO also rents out larger storage spaces for residents and B2B customers. And while our home buildings have excellent locations, so do our storage spaces!

Interested in renting a bigger storage space? Contact our sales team.