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¥900,000 is almost exactly what I spent on average over a 5 year period from 2007-2012 living in rural Japan (Shizuoka prefecture). A couple of caveats: I was
by mikekchar 11y ago
¥900,000 is almost exactly what I spent on average over a 5 year period from 2007-2012 living in rural Japan (Shizuoka prefecture). A couple of caveats: I was single at the time. I had subsidized housing (worth about ¥250,000 yen a year). I didn't have a car. That was the money I spent, and I made considerably more than that so was able to save quite a lot. However, I was very comfortable with that level of expenditure and I can't think of anything basic that I lacked.
I think you would have to budget fairly tightly and it would be pretty easy to get into trouble. Especially in the north where you have to pay for heating it might be dicey. But it's not impossible to live relatively comfortably. I ate out a lot and drank expensive beer a lot. If I cooked more at home, ate more fish and drank shochu I could have saved more money. Getting rid of the TV (and thus the monthly NHK bill) would be fairly substantial.
I have a lot of single friends in the area who make ~¥2,000,000 a year and they are absolutely fine on that salary. It's a different lifestyle from what people in the west are used to, but I wouldn't say they are less happy.
- adrianN 11y agoWhat job did you have during that time? Living in rural Japan sounds like a pretty sweet deal to me.
- S4M 11y agoFrom what I know, you can get a job as an English teacher pretty much everywhere in Japan if English is your mother tongue (I haven't done myself that but my wife is Japanese so I spent some time reading how foreigners can work in Japan).
- mikekchar 11y agoI was teaching English at the time. I'm currently in the same area programming on contract. It is quite wonderful. To be honest I'm hoping to expand and hire people, but haven't got everything sorted out yet. It occurred to me that it might be possible to find good people who want to live in rural Japan :-). Probably won't get my act together for another year or so...
- adrianN 11y agoWrite me an e-mail when you do, please: adrian_neumann@gmx.de.
- mikekchar 11y agoSent you an email. If you don't get it, check your spam :-)
- minikomi 11y agoCurrently living in Tokyo (8 years) .. Interested in hearing from you when you have something more solid worked out!
- mikekchar 11y agoI'd be interested to chat anyway. Please send me a email to my userid @gmail.com. I'm especially interested in people who are already in Japan because part of my delay is that there is a capital requirement for sponsoring visas. I have work available for the right candidate(s). I'd be happy to provide more details privately.
- e12e 11y agoThings must've changed a bit since I spent a year in Fukoka in 97/98 while in secondary school, if people can live comfortably on 2M JPY/year. That means I should be able to easily save up enough to stay comfortably in (rural) Japan for the length of a tourist visa without any problem! Please do send an email (see profile) if/when you're interested in expanding -- it would be great to be able to move to Japan! :-)
- archagon 11y agoOut of curiosity, are there any such rural areas with an expat presence?
- mikekchar 11y agoVirtually every rural area in Japan has expat English teachers. In my immediate area there are probably 10 or 20 people who are native English speakers. I think that's typical. I tend hang out with Japanese people since I speak Japanese and my wife is Japanese, but it's not terribly difficult to get by without much Japanese language skill, especially if you are young.
- stevetrewick 11y agoFor context, ¥900,000 is about $8,000
- GreaterFool 11y agoI agree ¥900,000 is not much and it would be very hard to live on that money. They say though it's the income of the poorest. So I'd hope a typical family would do better.