Do I have to file at home while living in Japan?
It depends on residence, not on address — except for US citizens and green-card holders, for whom the answer is yes regardless of where they live. We settle the residence question first, because every other answer follows from it.
Is there a treaty between my country and Japan?
Possibly, and the version in force for your year is the one that matters — protocols and multilateral-instrument positions change what a treaty does without changing its name. We check it against the authority rather than a summary. Where no treaty applies, domestic relief takes over.
I own property in Japan. Where is the rent taxed?
Rent from immovable property is almost always taxable where the property is situated, frequently by withholding on the gross amount, with your home country taxing the same income and giving credit. A net-basis election, where one exists, is usually the difference between tax on profit and tax on turnover.
Will tax be withheld on my pension if I retire in Japan?
Usually yes, at source, once the payer knows you live abroad. Pensions paid to someone outside the country are typically taxed by deduction at a flat rate applied to the gross payment, and that rate is the domestic one unless the treaty in force for your year provides a lower one and the payer has the paperwork to apply it. The deduction is made whether or not you end up owing that much, which is why the paperwork matters more than the arithmetic. Tell the payer your new address and status before the first payment rather than after several have gone out.
Is my public pension from home taxed in Japan or at home?
Potentially in both, and the treaty decides which one gives way. Government and public pensions are often dealt with separately from private and employment pensions, so two payments arriving in the same month can follow different rules. Where both countries tax the same amount, relief is normally given as a credit on the residence country's return rather than by the source country standing down. The practical work is identifying which category each of your pensions falls into, because that determines both who taxes it and what the payer should be withholding.
Do I have to file in Japan on a pension paid from abroad?
That depends on where the non-permanent and permanent resident distinction places you. For an initial period after arrival the foreign income within the Japanese charge is limited, so a foreign pension may sit outside it at first and come inside it later as the years of presence accumulate. Retirement is usually open-ended, so most people who retire to Japan will end up on the wider basis. Plan on that footing from the start: it is easier to set up the foreign tax credit claims and the pension paperwork once than to unpick a few years of returns built on the narrower basis.
Can I get back the tax withheld at source on my pension?
Often part of it, by one of two routes. The first is prospective: the payer applies the correct treaty rate to future payments once your residence and the supporting certification are on their file, which stops the problem recurring. The second is retrospective: a refund claim for what was over-withheld in earlier years, made to the country that withheld it, within whatever time limit applies there. The second route is slower and needs the payment records, so do the first one as soon as you arrive. Waiting until your annual return is prepared usually means at least one more year at the wrong rate.
Does my registered retirement account keep growing tax-deferred in Japan?
Do not assume it does. A retirement account that grows without annual tax at home does so because domestic law says so, and that shelter does not automatically travel. Some treaties preserve the deferral for a resident of the other country; where they do not, the income inside the account can become reportable annually even though you have drawn nothing. This is worth settling before you retire, because the answer changes how you should hold your retirement savings and the cost of getting it wrong compounds quietly across a retirement.
My pension is being taxed twice — what do I do now?
Separate the two things that get confused here. Tax deducted at source is not the same as tax finally due, so the first step is to work out what each country is actually entitled to under the treaty for the year in question, rather than reacting to the deduction on the payment advice. Then correct forward, by getting the right rate on the payer's file, and backwards, by claiming the credit or the refund on the correct side. Bring the payment advices, the annual payer statements and both years of returns, since the claim has to reconcile to them.
How do I claim a tax treaty benefit?
Three things usually have to line up: proof you are resident of the treaty country, a declaration to whoever is paying you so they withhold at the treaty rate rather than the statutory one, and the claim itself on the return of the country giving relief. Do it before the payment where a reduced rate is available — claimed afterwards it becomes a refund exercise instead, which takes far longer. See certificates of residency.
What is OECD Pillar Two?
A global minimum effective tax for large multinational groups, delivered through top-up taxes rather than a single global rate. Where a group's effective rate in a jurisdiction falls below the agreed minimum, the shortfall is collected — by the parent jurisdiction under the income inclusion rule, by the source jurisdiction under a domestic top-up, or as a backstop by other jurisdictions. Canada has enacted implementing legislation. The compliance burden is data, long before it is tax. See BEPS and Pillar Two.
