moving money in advance of our arrival

[beanhead]

besides fund fees, what other ingrained financial notions do you suggest I should disabuse myself?

Not related to investing, but if you get a credit card here, most act like charge cards. They need to be paid off in full each month.
If you actually want to use the credit function (not recommended), it is called a revolving payment.
Many cards also have a yearly fee, so look for a fee-free card. Yahoo and Rakuten and Amazon all have good options.

[beanhead]

Should i wish to generate investment income for daily expenses, what would be the best choice?

I don't think there are too many people on this forum who are doing this. Most seem to be still in the acquisition phase, with just a few retirees.

As mentioned, putting these stocks or ETFs in a NISA would mean no tax on the dividends. But the amount is limited. 1.2M for yourself and your spouse is 2.4M per year. Even at a very healthy 5% dividend, you are looking at just 120,000 yen per year of income.

So, you are going to have to pay some tax on the dividends (20.3%). Japanese stocks or REITs would be less complicated from a tax perspective than US dividend stocks such as Coca-Cola or AT&T. All of the Japanese brokers have screening tools where you can screen by dividend return. All in Japanese, of course.