Practically speaking, you cannot. There are so many hurdles to buying from Yahoo if you don't live in Japan that the hours and hours of time it would take you to find and complete just one transaction makes it impractical. Perhaps you've heard of someone who was able to make an account, find a buyer to ship overseas, and work out all of the payment detail. But what you probably found was someone who was interested in the personal challenge in seeing if it could be done. There's nothing wrong with that if you want a hobby, but most people just want something they can only get on Yahoo or they want to save a few bucks getting it.
Note: Some of you might know about Yahoo's English website, but that's discussed in another
article. Whether you're at the English or Japanese site the hurdles are mostly the same, in fact they're more difficult on the English site. Please read the article about the English site to get more information.
Registration
Registration is the first hurdle to use Yahoo Auctions Japan. You need to have an address in Japan and you also need to have a Japan based credit card. You can always register on the English site but the fact remains you must have an address and credit card in Japan on both registration sites. Without the address you won't be able to join, and without the credit card you won't be able to make any substantial bids.
Japanese Language
Obviously, the site is done entirely in Japanese. You'll have to find another website that can translate each and every step you'll need to know in the process including finding items, product descriptions, making bids, etc. Proxy services help a lot with that. My site has some search links to help as well. But in the end you'll have to translate the descriptions of the auctions and the translation results can often be cryptic and difficult to understand.
Payment
PayPal isn't used in Japan. Buyers and sellers use what's called a "furikomi" which is a bank transfer. Or they have a payment system through Yahoo that's used in connection with your Japanese credit card. Since you won't have a Japanese credit card or a Japanese bank to make a transfer from, making a payment for an auction will be nearly impossible, unless you're willing to put cash in an envelope and mail it overseas.
Shipping
About 99% of the Sellers on Yahoo don't ship overseas. They don't want to and they don't know how to. Even the Post Offices in Japan have staff that are often unfamiliar with shipping overseas. The default option when making a listing is "NO OVERSEAS SHIPPING." If a Seller wants to ship overseas he has to make that choice when he lists, and most/all Japanese people just aren't interested in that. Japan has enough money and customers that they don't need overseas Buyers. To them it's not worth the headaches and they don't trust non-Japanese with money anyway.
Communication
Japanese people don't speak English. Period. The chances of getting a Seller who is able to communicate in Japanese on Yahoo will be one in a thousand, if you're lucky. Trying to use translation services like Babelfish or Google Translate is brain damage and won't work effectively
I have an account. A Seller will ship overseas. Now what?
Then go for it. Maybe the Seller will use PayPal, but it's rare. Maybe he'll be able to use English, but not that well. In reality sellers who ship overseas and trying to get foreign Buyers and their prices reflect that. I've even seen some listing written in English where the Seller invited overseas Buyers, but the prices are twice as high. In the end you'll get your item from Yahoo but at the same price as eBay. What's the point?
