Inversions Change Everything!

極月 (gokugetsu: last month of the year, December)     extreme + month

Invert this, and the meaning changes entirely, as does the yomi of each character:

月極 (tsukigime: monthly)
     month + to reach an extreme

We’ve switched from an on-on combination to a kun-kun construction. As it happens, 極 has a host of kun-yomi, including -gime.

This word appears here as part of a larger term:

月極駐車場 (tsukigime chūshajō: parking lot rented on a monthly basis)     month + to reach an extreme + to park + car + place

And here it is in a sentence:

私は月極で部屋を借りている。
Watashi wa tsukigime de heya o karite iru.
I rent a room by the month.

私 (watashi: I)
部屋 (heya: room)     section + house
借 (ka(riru): to rent)

One seldom hears a statement like this in Japan, because people typically rent apartments on a monthly basis, so there’s no need to say so. By contrast, 月極駐車場 is a common word, because parking lots have all kinds of arrangements, including charging by the hour.

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