The Monday Read: Hobbling Around

RetireJapan Monday Read logo and illustrative photo of newspapers and coffee.

Welcome to The Monday Read, RetireJapan’s weekly collection of content, musings, and links related to personal finance and life in Japan. Well, I am still lounging around at home being lazy this week, but due to go back to work tomorrow. The knee is surprisingly good -mostly pain-free unless I forget what positions are unsafe, […]

The Monday Read: little everyday joys

RetireJapan Monday Read logo and illustrative photo of newspapers and coffee.

Welcome to The Monday Read, RetireJapan’s weekly collection of content, musings, and links related to personal finance and life in Japan. Photos cannot do justice to the sky we had on Saturday. It was breathtakingly spectacular. And gone in a few minutes. Noticing it, and taking a moment to appreciate it, was a tiny everyday […]

The Monday Read: Miyakojima

RetireJapan Monday Read logo and illustrative photo of newspapers and coffee.

Welcome to The Monday Read, RetireJapan’s weekly collection of content, musing, and links related to personal finance and life in Japan. Spent the last four days on Miyakojima with my wife. It was my first trip to Okinawa Prefecture, and I was very pleasantly surprised. Miyako is great. Small, sleepy, not too many tourists (compared […]

The Monday Read: Big Dog

RetireJapan Monday Read logo and illustrative photo of newspapers and coffee.

I’m close to the end of my Europe trip, and it’s been great. Not only did I see all the people I needed to see, but I also got to do a lot of thinking. (was not able to do… any of the work I was planning to, but this should not be a surprise […]

Should I pay off my mortgage early in Japan?

Photo of apartment buildings in and property Japan.

A lot of advice in English recommends paying mortgages off early, and many people dislike being in debt and aim to be debt (and mortgage) free as soon as possible.

But this is not necessarily the best option in Japan.

The Monday Read: Sakura

RetireJapan Monday Read logo and illustrative photo of newspapers and coffee.

The cherry blossoms hit Sendai a few weeks early this year, but they are looking great. Had some wonderful weather this weekend although I only managed to grab a few minutes to enjoy them. It’s been BUSY, so much so that I missed both my goals this week and paid the penalty (see below). Will […]

The Monday Read: March Madness

RetireJapan Monday Read logo and illustrative photo of newspapers and coffee.

March this year has been really warm and the pollen so far has been dreadful. My younger granddaughter (4) is suffering terribly with congestion and painful eyes. But the weather has been really nice. Walking/cycling to work as been really nice these last couple of weeks. How is your March going? For me it’s one […]

Discussing Inheritance

For the first time ever, my wife and I discussed future finances with her parents, such as inheritance, estate planning and their will.

The Monday Read: Year of the Bunny

Happy New Year! I hope you had a fun relaxing time over the last couple of days and that you are looking forward to The Year of the Bunny 🙂 I’ll be doing a planning blog post soon -have all sorts of things I want to get done this year, many of them involving RetireJapan. […]