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Question # 32. Is car insurance expensive when teaching ESL in Japan?

by BBelew57 on June 13th, 2007

I wasn't in Japan for more than a few months when I decided I needed a car.

Through a friend or a friend of a friend, I don't remember, I was introduced to a used-car dealer, Mr. Honda…no relation to the Honda Motors.

We talked. He smiled. In the end, he sold me a car…a Honda Civc, 1980 I believe.

Then about a month later, to my utter amazement, he showed up at my front door. "How's the car doing, Bill?"

I couldn't believe it. A used car salesman showed up at my door a month AFTER the sale to see how things were with my car.

In the 20 some years I lived in Japan, we, my teachers and I, bought more than 50 cars from that man. Some of those cars were sold to Russian sailors who came to Niigata to take cars back to their home country - but that's another story.

Mr. Honda also sold me car insurance - I think I paid 40,000 - 50,000 yen a year. Every year he showed up a couple of weeks before the premium was due and asked for a renewal fee…that kept going down. In the end, I paid something like 22-23,000 yen a year for insurance.

Once I crashed a car in the mountains, lost it on the ice. Another time, someone ran into me. Mr. Honda was there in an instant. He calculate on the spot whether it was cheaper to pay for the repairs or let the insurance cover it for me, despite the raise in premiums.

My car insurance in America is much more than I ever paid in Japan AND I have to do it all myself here.

What everyone needs who buys a car and insurance in Japan is a Mr. Honda. A Honda Motors car won't serve them too badly either.

Do you have a car dealer that you can trust in Japan?

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POSTED IN: ESL