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Loyd Moved Out Of America To Japan

Michael Machida Career Search Consultant Tokyo, Japan

Let me tell you about Loyd. Not because he’s some superhero, but because his move to Japan was chaotic, weirdly human, and — spoiler — it ended well.

If you’re thinking about making a similar jump, this might help.

So, Loyd is from the U.S. He wanted out. Not the “I’ll travel Tokyo for two weeks” sort of out — he wanted to relocate, start over, escape the political noise back home, and build something new. Sounds romantic, right?

Well, the reality slapped him in the face the moment he tried to answer three questions everyone forgets to ask before moving:

How do I get a visa, where do I live, and who will actually hire me?

Let’s start with the visa. Big headache. He figured — wrongly — that landing a job would be the easy part and the visa the paperwork after.

Nope. In Japan, unless you’re teaching English or have super specific skills, companies expect you to be either highly specialized or already have a working visa.

Loyd applied to a ton of jobs — tech startups, marketing agencies, even a few multinational firms — and either got ghosted or a polite “we can’t sponsor visas right now.”

He spent nights on message boards learning terms like “Certificate of Eligibility” and trying to parse immigration policy like it was a foreign language (which, ok, it kind of is).

Housing came next. Tokyo is expensive and confusing.

He tried to rent a normal apartment — and learned that most landlords prefer Japanese guarantors, full-time-employed tenants, and a deposit equivalent to a few months’ rent.

There was the classic share-house route (which was fine — lots of character, tiny showers), but he wanted a place he could unpack and call home.

The biggest shock? Realizing that even if you have a job offer, the job’s HR may not help arrange your apartment.

So he found himself couch-surfing, sleeping on a futon in a friend’s tiny one-room, and paying a ridiculous amount for a single bed in a guesthouse. Not glamorous.

Third, the job market. Loyd could code — not a genius, but solid — and he’d done remote work before. But interviews were... uneven.

Some companies loved his international experience.

He had an interview where the hiring manager asked him in halting English about a technical problem and then switched mid-conversation to Japanese — and Loyd just smiled and nodded, which, looking back, was not the best strategy.

He left interviews deflated and confused. The “which companies hire foreigners who don’t speak much Japanese?” question became a mantra.

He learned that certain sectors were friendlier: tech companies with global products, English teaching, tourism (pre-pandemic), and some international trading firms. But those roles were competitive, often expected prior Japan experience, or required more Japanese than Loyd had.

After about six months of this half-hopeful, half-exhausted routine, he almost gave up. He’d run out of savings, missed family events, and was questioning the whole move.

And then — random, small miracle — he heard about TheJEGroup!

TheJEGroup! is a Tokyo-based company that specializes in helping global job hunters. Think of them as matchmakers plus legal guides plus the friend who knows where the good ramen is. They don’t just send you a job listing and wish you luck.

They helped Loyd with the whole messy pile: refining his CV for the Japanese market (shorter, clearer, more achievement-focused), prepping him for interviews (how to answer cultural fit questions, how to ask about visa support), and most crucially, they connected him with companies that had a history of sponsoring visas and hiring English-first employees.

What TheJEGroup! did that mattered: they separated the noise from the signal. Instead of Loyd blasting resumes and getting nowhere, they set up every interview based on their in-house databases of employers who are open to hiring international job hunters.

TheJEGroup! set up interviews with companies offering visa sponsorship.

Housing? TheJEGroup! had partners — real estate agents used to working with foreigners who didn’t have guarantors or years of Japanese rental history.

They found Loyd a modest but sunny apartment close to the train line he needed.

Not luxury, but where he could finally unpack and stop living out of a suitcase. They also gave him a heads-up about utility setup, how to get a My Number card, and how to sign up for health insurance without an interpreter.

Tiny things that feel impossible when you first arrive, but which suddenly become manageable.

The job itself turned out to be at an English-friendly, mid-sized international tech company in Shibuya.

The role matched his skills, offered a competitive salary (enough that he could finally put money in savings, not just eat), and — crucially — the company sponsored his visa.

The onboarding was thoughtful: a buddy system, English documentation for the first month, and language classes subsidized by the company.

Within a year, Loyd’s Japanese was better; more importantly, he felt like he belonged. He could afford a bike, take weekend trips, and after two years he could even invite friends over for a small, terrible attempt at Thanksgiving. Happy chaos.

Now, is TheJEGroup! a magic wand? Yes! They assisted Loyd to obtain a new role in Japan.

What TheJEGroup! did was take the wild unpredictability out of the process and replace it with route markers. It was the difference between walking in a fog and following a clear path with a flashlight.

If you’re reading this and thinking “that’s exactly me” — tell me. What part scares you most? The visa forms? The rent contracts? The idea of going to an interview with two words of Japanese and pretending you’re fine?

I want to hear your mess. Seriously. Drop your experience below — the weird job rejections, the landlord horror stories, the little wins.

Alright, that’s Loyd’s story. It’s messy, human, and—if you ask him—worth it.

He’s not a poster child for bravery; he’s just someone who got tired of waiting and decided to try, failed a bunch, but eventually found the right help.

If nothing else, it’s a reminder: moving to a new country isn’t a leap so much as a series of small steps, and sometimes you need a hand to find the next one. What was your hardest step?

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