By Dako A 401(k) is an American object. It lives at an American custodian, follows American rules, and reports to the IRS on American forms. Ask most people in our position what happens to it after a move to Japan…
By Dako & Jay Nearly everything we own has both our names on it. The checking account, the savings, the taxable brokerage. The retirement accounts are the exception, and only because the law insists they belong to one person each.…
By Dako Somebody in a forum thread will tell you Japan has an exit tax. Somebody else will tell you the US has one. Both are right. If you’re a household like ours, one American passport, one green card, a…
By Dako Somewhere in the back of my head, for years, lived a comforting sentence: there’s a tax treaty, so we’ll be fine. Move to Japan, split our lives across two countries, whatever. The treaty would catch us. Recently I…
By Dako On paper, we’re the prepared couple. We have a trust. The wills are signed, and so are the powers of attorney. I’d filed “what happens if one of us dies” under handled, the way you file a fire…
By Dako The word usually arrives in a sentence that also contains a deadline. Some office on the Japanese side of your life, a city hall, a bank, a legal affairs bureau, asks for a US document, and then adds…
By Dako & Jay We have a FIRE number. It’s in dollars, because every account we own is in dollars. Two 401(k)s. A taxable brokerage of US-listed funds and US stocks, a traditional IRA, a Roth, an HSA, a high-yield…
By Dako For a long time I filed the green card question under “not urgent.” We haven’t decided whether we’re moving to Japan, splitting the year, or staying put. So the card just sits there, doing its job, waiting for…
By Jay Let me describe my role in Japanese government offices, because “survival guide” implies more heroism than I can honestly claim. Dako walks up to the counter. Dako talks. The person behind the counter talks back. Papers appear, get…
By Dako The dual-base dream has a specific shape in our house: cherry blossoms and my parents’ kitchen for part of the year, our life in the US for the rest. Somewhere along the way of imagining it, the unromantic…