In about a year I will be moving to Japan to teach and was planning on using my hard earned money to purchase an Evo I will be 19 by the time I go and was wondering what the insurance would be like in Japan. I will only have about 3 grand a month spending money so im hoping insurance isnt a killer.

!!!HwAnG!!!

 

all i have to say is, it is going to be hard to travel to point A to point B

 

Why do you think it will be hard to travel from point a to point b? Do you mean as it will be hard to travel in immensly crowded streets or the fact that I will not be able to afford the insurance thus making it difficult?

I plan on teaching away from Tokyo, somewhere up north or perhaps down south in Kyushu.

 

I have heard it is outrageously expensive to own a car in Japan. Not just insurance, but tax, and paying for parking. Research it before you get your hopes of an Evo to high.

 

Sorry, off-topic kinda, but your ONLY 19 and are you saying you will earn enough to have $3G's in spending money just teaching???

How is that so? hmm makes me wonder...

 

Teaching english in Japan pays well, they pay for my air fare there and housing accomadations. Since I lived there before I can speak Japanese so that is a helper

 

Did the law changed in Japan or something?
I remember a couple of years back that most people did not buy insurance on their cars, and it is legal to be not insured. Maybe that is why insurance is so expensive, since the pool of insuree is small.

Some people crashed their cars and ended up buying another one.
Hence, those people had to pay off two car loans when they only have one to drive. The scrapped car loan was still being paid for.

 

So dipper your saying that it would be legal for me to drive without insurance? If so then that is the best news I have heard all day

 

That is what I am saying. But laws changes, so maybe some of the guys in Japan from this forum can confirm this for you as to the current law.

 

God forbid you hurt someone else in a car accident. Keep in mind it pays both ways and there it's there to pay other people's cars damaged by the insured party as well. Insurance on something expensive when driving with other expensive things is always a good idea.

 

You do not have to pay for insurance when you buy a car.

That's because every car that is road-legal has passed through the shaken inspection and tax, which also includes basic liability insurance. You have to do this shaken every two years, or if the car is brand new, you don't have to do it for 3 years, then every two years after that. The general cost of Shaken is about $1200 USD.

Depending on where you live, you will have to pay $50 to $700 a month for parking. You have to have the parking spot and the paperwork for it, or the dealers cannot sell you a car.

Gas is about $3.50-$4.00 a gallon.

Every "expressway" is tolled. It usually costs about 2000yen per 100km of travel on them. That can change a bit depending on the expressway used. Local roads are free, of course, but travel time can be quite slow. Taking local roads to get out of Tokyo, for instance, will cost you about 1 hour per 20-30km of travel. If there is a serious enough traffic jam, figure about 1km every 10 minutes or so. It sometimes can take 2 hours to cross from one side of tokyo to the other. (internal tokyo, not suburb sides).

If you do not have any additional insurance on top of the liability, you will be personally liable for any additional claim in case of an accident. The base liability does not cover much, and it will not cover any damage to your car. Insurance companies work different here than in the states. They generally find all parties at least partially responsible for an accident, no matter the circumstances. So on a $40 grand total bill, even though you weren't at fault, you could still end up paying about $4000 *out of your own pocket*. This is why most drivers in Japan have some sort of additional insurance to cover such eventualities. And it will happen.

Statistically, if every car in Japan was put on the road at the same time, on every road in Japan, 30% of the cars would fall off into the sea. Really. There is 127 million people in Japan, a country with roughly the land mass of California. 75% of that land is unusable mountainside.

Paul Hansen

 

Damn, it costs alot to own a car in japan.

 

Japan sounds like no fun... cost of living is high and traffic is horrific....too many people...etc.

 

However, somehow they make some of the best sport cars, animation, video games and other high-tech gadgets