Living in Grand Cayman

Today we made an bid on a 2003 Honda CRV. I say bid since we are participating in an online auction via the IBC Japan.

Here is how it works. To be able to bid, we needed to make a 1000$US deposit. To do that, we did a wire transfer to the company which is in Nagayo, Japan. Once the deposit received, they gave us access to bid on the cars. These cars come from individuals. In Japan, environmental laws are very strict and its very expensive to maintain a car that is more than 4-5 years old, so people change cars very often. Hence, a huge surplus of cars exists in Japan, so they auction them and boat the off all over the world. Its important to note that IBC has a really good reputation and that I know quite a few people here that have purchased cars with them, so yes it a leap of faith, but I think we did our homework.

In the auction site, all I see is are two pictures of the car and there is an evaluation of its condition. That evaluation is in …. Japanese, so I cant even read it. The IBC (www.ibcjapan.co.jp) site has a “live chat support” where you can chat with a person who will translate the evaluation form and give you the cars details ; overall condition, dings, options, etc. Finally, everything is in Japanse yen. So I we always have to divide all the amounts by 121 to get the value in US$.

If we win the auction, it will take about 6 weeks for the car to get here. If we dont, we will bid again on another CRV friday or this weekend.

Say tuned.

Here is the actual car we bid on

Here is the evaluation sheet. Thats it! Of course, no test drive possible. With just this information in hand, would you have bid to spend thousands of dollars?

Hi everyone,

Many thanks for all the post & emails I received. Its great to get news from back in Canada & elsewhere. I posted quite a few pics below.

So I have my first full week of work & am already swamped with work. I was expecting this since Jan-Feb-Mar is always the busy season in accounting firms. I am already going to Miami in the week of the 5th (for one day) and plan to return soon.

Last wednesday, our container was finally inspected. It was delivered to our place but had to stay sealed until customs inspected it. There is no duty to import personal effects. So 3 customs agents (?) showed up and inspected a total of 3 boxes before being satisfied that we were not importing contraband.

In the house, there are a few repairs to do. Most of them are being done by the landlord Miss Marlene; she is nice and doing all as promised. She usually brings her grand children with her to the house. Aipa really loves them.

Here is Aipa with Louis, Jade & Jay Dan

One funny thing. The hot water heater was not working. However, tap water is warm enough to take a shower, so we did not really miss not having hot water.

Now we have stared looking for a car. We have pretty much settled for a 2003-04 Honda CRV. There is one problem though ; altough there are loads of them on the island, there are none for sale. And when one is for sale, its usually sold within the hour. So we will be buying it via the Internet from Japan. Its actually an online auction via a site called IBC (http://www.ibcjapan.co.jp) Many people here have bought a car via IBC and have been very happy. The reason it will come from Japan is that pollution laws in Japan are very strict and any car over 4-5 years is very expensive to keep, so there is a surplus of used (and relatively recent) cars over there. We should do this in the upcoming week and will keep you posted.

Also, we need to buy a TV. We will probably get a 32 inch flat screen TV. Julie has fallen in love with a Sony Bravia LCD. I have to admit, its really nice 🙂 I may get a better deal bringing it back from Miami instead of buying it here even with the 20% duty. I have to check if there are other fees like transportation on the plane.

Below are pics of recent events. Today we went to Rum Point to take pictures with the pets. Yeah .. we’re nuts! We wanted some “family pictures” to put here and to send to the Vets who helped us with all the vaccinations & paper work to get here. We also wanted to send a picture of Aipa to the SPCA where we got her exactly 12 months ago.

They put the container on the ground in front of our place.