Creepy catch behind this $1-a-night hotel stay in Japan

A Japanese hotel has found a strange use for its unpopular room 8, which guests can book for about a dollar — if they agree to be filmed the whole time.

A hotel room with a nightly rate of $1 sounds too good to be real.

This Japanese hotel is real — but the rock-bottom price tag it comes with an unsettling request.

The owner of the Ashai Ryokan in the popular coastal city of Fukuoka has found a novel way to get guests into the hotel’s under-booked room 8.

He’s offering it for ¥100 a night ($1.36), if guests agree to be live-streamed the whole time they’re in there.

The hotel, which is dubbed the One Dollar Hotel, has a YouTube channel set up specifically to broadcast the goings-on in the room.

The Asahi Ryokan, also known as the One Dollar Hotel, in Fukuoku, Japan.

Inside the novel hotel. Picture: One Dollar Hotel

Owner Tetsuya Inoue, 27, said he had been looking for a “new business model” to reinvigorate the “very old” hotel, which he inherited from his grandmother.

“Our hotel is on the cheaper side, so we need some added value, something special that everyone will talk about,” he told CNN.

He said he got the idea when a British YouTuber stayed in the hotel and livestreamed the stay.

The idea is once the YouTube channel clocks 4000 viewing hours, Mr Inoue can start earning money from ads.

Mr Inoue said the room was mostly popular among young guests who were travelling on the cheap and didn’t mind the invasion of privacy.

Mr Inoue himself appears on the 24/7 livestream from his during times the room isn’t occupied.

There are some ground rules, however.

Firstly, “lewd acts” in the room are banned, and only visuals are captured, which means no audio recordings.

The owner livestreams himself from his office when no one’s in the room. Picture: One Dollar Hotel

Guests can turn lights off and the bathroom is out of view of the camera. There is also a small, hidden area where guests can change their clothes out of sight.

Guests are also encouraged to keep private, sensitive information, such as their passports and credit cards, out of view.

Other than that, if you don’t mind the audience, the room offers a ridiculously cheap place to stay in Fukuoka, a city on the northern shore of Japan’s Kyushu Island, and a spot CNN named one of its must-visit destinations for the year.