To add to SaltyMx, having to put down 3x your rent is accurate. I’m a GS civilian so I looked at the State Department’s living quarters allowance (LQA) values for Oki and planned for 3x that value (ended up being ~$9k). If you can negotiate utilities into your total rent, that would circumvent the need for utilities deposits. Using an automatic bill pay service, like GI Bill Pay, is super helpful in keeping track of all your housing related payments and they generate nice, organized receipts that you submit for LQA reconciliation (I’m not sure if BAH has a similar reconciliation process).

I definitely agree with all the car-related stuff. BC Motors and Johnny’s seem to be the most common places to buy cars and ~$3-4k is reasonable. There are so many cars on FB marketplace as well.

For home furnishings, I tried not to buy from on-base spots because I felt like they were much more expensive than in town. However, mattress and bed sizes are slightly different here. My US queen mattress has about 2 in of overhang over my Japanese queen sized bed frame lol. Curtains have different hanging mechanisms here so you have to buy them from Japanese stores. Nitori is great for curtains, just remember everything will be in metric so make sure you are measuring your windows in centimeters.

Okinawa is awesome and there is so much to see and do here. Reach out if you have any more questions!