I promised my Japanese wife that we would stay in Japan all our lives. We didn't plan on her dying in January this year. I will keep my promise to stay here and maintain her family grave. It has only been seven months and already its hard. Hoping that I deal with this better as time moves on.

Thank you for making this video. I have lived in Japan for 34 years. I am still working, due to retire from my job at a university in 4 more years. My initial goal was to return to my country, Canada, but over the last 25 years, cost of living in Canada has skyrocketed. I doubt I can even buy a small home there anymore. So now I am seriously thinking of staying in Japan. The points you raise are very important.

Excellent summary Ben, and very important that everyone thinks about it in time to prepare for whichever way they go. I don't have any positives to add - I think you covered all, but I have quite a few negatives: 1) Possibility of armed conflict in the region - random missiles being lobbed overhead, and the likelihood of a move to invade Taiwan don't leave me with a warm fuzzy safe feeling tbh. 2) Probability of another mega-earthquake/ nuclear accident. I don't share your confidence in the government response, specially if it hits a more densely populated part of Japan and the infrastructure damage is greater. Even though, theoretically Japan should be better prepared since 3-11. What-ifs include your house being reduced to rubble and you getting a delayed and small insurance payout that leaves you to sort out new accomodation in your 70's or 80's in a tight housing market because so many people lose their homes at the same time? Not fun, even with advanced Japanese. 3) Lack of community. I know you covered social networks a bit, but looking in more detail: if you don't have a big enough circle of similar people here for the long term, living near enough to you to physically meet, if your neighbourhood is not friendly, or you even have downright hostile neighbours, this will start to matter more and more as you become less active, or don't have cash to splash on getting out and about. For me, one of the big negatives in Japan is their concept of community. It doesn't mesh with mine, and I find it inhospitable. I'd like to be in a place where people invite each other round, where people are readier to share aspects of their life with others, where it's easier to make new friends (to replace those who leave or drop out of circulation). 4) Language barrier in old age - imagine your grasp of Japanese getting poorer in your twilight years. I feel I have navigated reasonably for the last 25-odd years, but after traipsing round government offices and the pension office recently, it really doesn't seem set up to be easy to understand bureaucracy, even for native speakers. I see a lot of discombobulated-sounding older people in the offices. And I don't see any signs of improvement over the past 25 years to be honest. 5) Food security - I know you mentioned it, but I don't see Japan adapting either to the labour shortage, or anticipating the growing crisis of food production. And we have seen that it can worsen not just steadily, but in a matter of days or weeks. The older you get, the more complicated it is to make all the arrangements involved in a radical change of country. It's not like arriving in your twenties with one suitcase. 6) Value of yen - for all the demographic negatives, I see the value continuing to decline, and I believe that yen saved here are going to continue to fall relative to other places, meaning like you say, better to make any move sooner rather than later. 7) Infrastructure - depopulation is going to mean that being old will need to be done somewhere urban enough to be able to be confident the transport links and health services will continue. That counts out vast swaths of cheaper parts of Japan to live. But even in a major city, I would worry about the falling quality of care in understaffed care homes as the labour shortage bites deeper. And this is bound to push up the price of later years care. 8) Housing - second all you say, so you need to make sure you have your own place to live, in a place that you feel at home, and has all the right services, and plan for this far enough in advance that you have it in place by the time you are ready to retire. As a Brit like you, even without considering the terrible immigration regime making it very hard to import any non UK citizen family members, just considering the economic factors on their own mean I have pretty much written off the possibility of return to the UK, even supposing it suddenly morphed back into a welfare state. So, if the negatives bother you, definitely start planning where you want to head to, and see what you need to do to make it happen.

Thanks for some great insights.

Congratulations on your very productive output of videos - keep it coming!

Well done! Thanks for sharing...

Thanks for your advice 🥰

Currently getting everything together for my PR application. Hoping to stay here until the end of time!

We have chosen Japan to retire early in and we moved here in January this year. As an early retiree (I just turned 39) I think it’s the perfect place but I can see the challenges of becoming older here and not sure it will continue to be the place for us once we approach older age. But for now it’s perfect for us 😊 For us we are using the Designated Activities Long Term Sightseeing visa which gives us a years visa (6 months plus 6 months extension) which we’ve been told we can keep applying for as long as you continue to qualify. Which if you are retiring shouldn’t be too difficult for most to have the right amount of cash.

Excellent video. My 91 y.o. father lives in a nursing home in Japan and I'm so grateful he's able to live out the rest of his life there, where he has family support, receives excellent care, and his care costs are less than half of what he'd have to pay here in the U.S. As for me, I had a dream of retiring in Japan, but without fluent language proficiency and no support network, it would have been too difficult.

Good point highlighting that one is no longer allowed to stay in Japan with spouse visa, if the spouse passes away.

Thanks for the info and it is very useful

Regarding AI, we’ve noticed that even dealing with complex contract language or government documents has become tremendously easier with the increasing quality of translation programs.

Hello, I’m Canadian and have lived in Japan since 2011. I fall into the category of wishing to leave, but since I’ve been away going on 14 years, real estate in Canada now is completely unaffordable plus securing employment in Canada will also be very difficult since I am approaching retirement age. I was on the PR track leading up to Covid, then the pandemic changed everything leaving me unemployed for 2-3 years. I just secured a new job this spring, but it may be too little, too late. I’m now looking to retire in a country with a lower cost of living. Further motivation to leave Japan is not meeting a compatible life partner here and finding developing friendships extremely difficult.

Very clear video, btw. I agree with most of your points. It does look to me as though older people in general are keeping more active these days, not only in Japan. And you seem to be rather optimistic about the shift to renewable resources, as you put it.

Reason 3 is highly underrated. + #4 makes it a no brainer.

Thank you for this. These are the scary questions we must all ask ourselves. I think getting to our last years, as in getting ill, immobile, losing our faculties is hell wherever you are. Slightly less hellish, I guess, if you have friends and family. Personally, I think that is the key. I will live wherever I have friends and family.

Very legitimate questions we are or shall be asking ourselves when having leaved in Japan for quite a long time. I agree that residency status combined with ownership is a must if you plan to stay in Japan to avoid any uncertainties besides, "if and when" you are able to secure a loan, those are still very reasonable in Japan . Being in Europe for the Summer, indeed cost of living is on another level compared to Japan. Even when looking at the rest of Asia, i think Japan and Tokyo are quite undervalued.

Excellent Summary. A1-9 all great pts. D1-Language (written/spoken) is critical and a showstopper IMO. As I recall you passed the JLPT1 test, a grand accomplishment most foreigners won't ever get a sniff at. You are set. My Japanese spouse could certainly cover for my social blunders, but in the end my approx JLPT3 level of proficiency would be C- survival level acceptable in Japan. Doable, but improvement - I'm sure - is faster when living 365/365 in Japan. I'd also miss my kids alot in the US if I was all in 365/365 Japan. Keep up the good videos, I'm sharing your inheritance info with the better half. She owns a home there and we visit 3-4x/yr. Interesting that there is no joint property ownership allowances in Japan, so I'm told. Makes for transfer of spouse to spouse property more complex.

I have lived in Japan for 22 years and am retired. Living and working in Japan has been easy, mainly because my Japanese wife handles all the bureaucratic stuff. With the slumping Yen and our investment income coming from the USA, we have gotten into a high Japanese tax bracket. Health insurance for me and my wife is also astronomical and they just created a new monthly health insurance surcharge. I suppose we are rich but I sure don't feel like it. I look at all these Japanese who drive Mercedes and Porsches and I think "How do they do it?" Truth be told, I can get by in Japanese but I have never reached a comfortable level of fluency. All of my friends here are really my wife's friends so I have to be careful what I say. I would like to experience living in another possibly cheaper country like Panamá. But my wife doesn't want to leave Japan. So I think I am stuck here. I sometimes feel like the Tony Last character in Evelyn Waugh's "A Handful of Dust."

Taxes are bound to increase here as labor shortages increase and services are cut. Also, the inheritance tax scheme is a real disincentive to staying.

Good analysis. Although I definitely can eat healthier in Sydney, I’m staying here and cook my own meals before Japan embraces lighter food alternatives. Am renting and this is a worry for sure. But definitely better than “look at the app” response from Sydney bus drivers when asking wheee to alight

Very good vid to a niche proportion. I got my so Australian citizenship this month so I’ll see what happens. I still like Japan. I live in my own world.

Thank you for the video. Currently living in the States and my wife (whom is Japanese) wants us to retire in Japan...possibly in 4 years from now. So I have that long to learn the language so I'm not so isolated. The spouse vista is a useful piece of info, was planning on just a spouse visa guess I'll have to rethink that. You've been there long term, I wonder what the terms are for someone moving there at retirement age and whether the healthcare system would still apply to me. A lot to figure out. Again I thank you for the video !!

For me right now I’m already stationed here in Japan and I’m hoping to move forward to become a contractor seeing as that leans in my favor for staying in Japan seeing as my heart points me here. 僕の日本語は少しずつで増えるけどたくさん知りたい事がある。Like there’s so much more for me to learn and a bonus reason is also to move forward with my fiancée no matter where we go realistically. I’m not a perfect planner and yet somehow I get things done despite how difficult. 😂 I just wish my passport would arrive after these past 3 months. 😢

Hello from California. May I ask - what are the requirements for a US citizen to retire in Japan (Kyoto prefecture). What agency can I contact for information? Appreciate much any info you can share. By the way, dear Retire in Japan, you should try to stay in a nursing home in Canada or in the US and see what you would get for your money and how you would be treated. Remember, the US has over a million deaths during Covid, a great number of them are nursing home residents. You can be brutally abused by people who are native English speakers or who can speak English well. The worst loneliness is when we are treated as a ‘client’ who generates money for the nursing home and not as a human being, an elderly with a whole life lived who still has feelings and fears and wishes. One cannot evaluate a country’s nursing home and elder care system by itself, that should be done by comparing with that of other societies.

Competent government & good natural resources??? Both those reasons seems very far stretched. The government in over 200% of GDP in debt and the government keeps wasting money on things that will never ever work. Also, Japan and people in Japan keep wasting natural resources and won't utilize almost any of their geothermal resources. Also, you forgot the major risk of more major earthquakes that will keep hitting Japan as a major risk.

I am a Japanese American living in the US but have always had a strong connection with Japan. I speak Japanese but my reading has declined significantly over the years. I would love to retire in Japan and I am hoping they will make it easier to do so in the future!

Just started my research journey about the prospect of retiring in Japan. I'm 48 and live in the US now as a relatively high earner (around $260k USD a year) with a Japanese wife and teenage daughters. We're all bilingual and have experience living in Japan, so language or other cultural barriers are less of a concern. I'll be on the lookout for more resources about finances and finding my magic net worth number to figure out at what age I can most comfortably retire with dollars doing most of the work for me.

Having lived in different countries, I can easily agree with your 9 positive reasons. I find it tough to make friends and paperwork can be complicated. Also, a lack of diversity can be a drawback.

My projection Japan economy will improve over time within 5 years, more investment inflow, excellent workforce, women too joing the workfore such as carpenter, chief etc, GDP will be improving, look at the Japanese stock index, all up 25% in the last 8 months, building a solid economics foundation and fundemental, yet good control on inflation and growth, nowhere in the world can mimic it appropriately.

hello from your new subscriber!! thank you for all the videos on investing in japan. any idea why rakuten securities keep transferring few hundred yens to my rakuten bank? is it due to the money bridge sweep function? what exactly is that money?

Currently in London on a sabbatical, converting yen to pounds, and yes the difference in the cost of living is shocking.

Reason #1 Having a Japanese wife. The best reason to retire here, to acquire a damn good woman in your life. 😊

I want to watch your video about healthcare. I can't find it. Don't see a link to it.

I have lived here since I retired from the us military. I became a permanent resident in 2014 but my wife divorced me a year later and I’ve been living alone ever since. My son is here and so I stayed in Japan because I wanted to be close to him but now I’m 55 and my Japanese unfortunately isn’t good. I’m planning on making my move back to the states, my main reason for wanting to leave is because of my own government and how the U.S taxes it’s citizens and even forces our banks to give up our information to the IRS. Wish this would change but unfortunately the politicians in America could care less. Greed!

Yes, I agree with your analysis, and thank you for reminding us about the Visa situation. When you said you spent 4 weeks in a hospital last year, do you have any idea how much that would cost here in the US? Yikes! It's the #1 reason for bankruptcy here. (And probably homelessness) Let's keep an eye on AI. I can't see past the event horizon on this. Will money even exist? Education? Purpose? Maybe the governments of the world will come to their senses and shut it down. Or maybe it's too late for that already.

Ben, with reference to applying for PR status, is there an upper age limit like Australia, where it is 45?

I did know an English gentleman who lived for decades without knowing the language. His end of life in the Japanese hospital consequently sounded like a bit of a nightmare.

I think people are fearing the demographic decline too much. I grew up in a country which went from 52mln to 42mln people in just 20 years and it wasn’t that bad. Although I agree that Japan needs to invest into improving labor productivity I am sure it will be fine. I am surprised about the “resources” argument. Japan doesn’t have any meaningful quantities of any natural resources. Almost all the energy and minerals are imported. There is not much potential for solar and wind due to the geography either.

What kind of visa does one need to retire in Japan? What are the income requirements?

You didn't mention earthquake. I am retiring in 2026 and plan to live there 3 months per year using just a tourist visa (visa free actually), and use the other several months to travel. Planning to buy a small apartment for that purpose.

Reason 10 - The rest of the first world is... not doing too well. This is unfortunate but true. Japan looks increasingly better by comparison in spite of its (many) shortcomings. Regarding language, the new generations are more versed due to internet exposure.

You are ramping up the videos recently. For us we are 1/2 the yr in JP and 1/2 other for now. One more negative that would hold us back committing to JP 100% other than family is taxes. Big increase 30% cap gains (20% + 10%), depending on your retirement income and what country you are coming from (where as US is tax free up to a certain amount for cap gains and social security). Perhaps you could say that it would then be a “wash” with cost of living differences and tax. So in that case it comes down to quality of life which JP has the edge in. Or just continue to choose multiple places thru the year :).

Is it possible to retire to Japan like American move to Portugal after 60?

I'll be here till the end, but I heard that nursing homes are really expensive.

Hoping to stay here for good, but need to reskill and move into a career with a salary that will allow for that. I definitely want to avoid returning to the UK at all costs, though, so hoping this reskilling works out!

I think staying here is a good idea. What about the increasing tax burden from demographic changes?

Maybe one day I will need care and then there won't be enough nurses in Japan.

Im turning 40 next year. I have just bought a house and am eligible to apply for PR soon. Im hoping that the government in Japan will change from the LDP who just provide resources for their elderly voters. I hope more women and young people get involved in politics and that they help families and encourage people to have kids, companies to increase wages and to allow more immigration.

The best reason are stonks : v

8 yrs here and with my (Japanese) wife we want to get out asap . I agree with most of what you said but not with the responsible government. Japan’s politicians are bred to do 2 things: keep their party dominant and follow the US (meaning consume their surpluses, vote aligned on the international stage and ofc provide military bases). As such, none of the really important decisions such as moving jpn to net-zero, modernizing the educational system, boosting natality (recently done but too little too late) are taken which makes the long term for my hafu child a no-no.

You are making it now. You won’t up back and live in IK anymore?