Renting car with Japanese driver’s license

I previously lived in Japan for two years. During that time, I acquired a Japanese driver's license. I have since moved out of Japan and back to the US. However, my Japanese driver's license is still valid. I will soon be returning to Japan for a brief visit and would like to rent a car. Since I still have a valid Japanese driver's license, I was thinking of using that to rent the car. However, I'm worried that the car rental company may ask me for my residence card (在留カード), which I no longer have, and therefore will not allow me to rent a car using my Japanese driver's license. Does anyone know if the rental company will ask for a residence card? Or, if they ask for an ID, would a passport suffice?

Rental companies only need to see your passport or what ever else if you use a foreign license with IDL.
if your Japanese license is valid...then it is valid. Nothing to do with visa or AR card.

@Alishan, but doesn’t your license say your place of residence? Which at this point in the OPs story will no longer be Japan, but rather an other foreign country. But that’s last crane will still have his/ her former address in Japan...?

How about Japanese citizens working and living overseas?
They can rent a car on their Japanese DL within Japan despite having a different "home address"

The only people that are allowed to see/ask for your residence card are the police. No one else has the right or authority to request that (it's the law). So if asked, refuse.

I think you have to write your address in the application form. what address do you write ?
if I were you, I will show the Japanese license card and the passport.
they are requested to confirm that you have a driving license.
also they want to know who you are.

All they ask for are local are driving license, nothing else, for tourist its passport, international driving permit and telephone, but you do have to put a address on the form, just put any, my case is the hotel address.

My understanding is that if you change your home address you must register your new one on your license. If you fail to do this, you may be asked to pay a fine of 20000 yen or lower. So, technically speaking, I'm not sure if your license is "valid" if it still has your non-valid address in Japan on it.
https://www.npa.go.jp/policies/application/license_renewal/japan.html#...

Let me add to my own post. And if the police has the right to check your license just like another poster wrote, you may have to show your license to a policeman while driving your rented car, and that may get you in trouble during your precious time re-visiting Japan. But I guess the worst that can happen is to be fined and to be taken time while at it, which is still quite terrible according to my experience in another country. Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

if you change your home address you must register your new one on your license. If you fail to do this, you may be asked to pay a fine of 20000 yen or lower.
An international driving licence would cost you a pittance, why taking risk of a fine.

Thanks for the responses. Yeah I think I'll just get an international drivers permit, just to be on the safe side.

driving license is valid. but, for the purpose of ID, it is invalid.
I am very suspicious that 公安委員会 will accept a foreign address to Japanese driving license. thus, a license holder, who is currently living in a foreign country, but keeping a (previous) Japanese address in the license card is pretty common even among Japanese people.
it is true that, once a person fixes his/her address in Japan, he/she must change the address to the correct one (that is the law policy.). In the OP's case, he/she comes as a temporary visitor (and don't have an intention to live in Japan right now). 100% no problem.

the driving license card is NOT the certificate to PROVE the address. it is the certificate that the holder has enough DRIVING skill. Of course, the adjustment of the address on the card is necessary, if you LIVE in Japan.

I guess that what Ken just wrote is related to the part where the National Police Agency says:
一時滞在先が免許証上の住所地と同一であるときは、特別の手続は不要ですが、一時滞在先と免許証上の住所地が異なっているときは、一時滞在先への住所変更手続を行う必要があるhttps://www.npa.go.jp/policies/application/license_renewal/living_abro...

It means that if the address of the place you are temporarily staying in Japan, while revisiting, is the same as the address written on your license, you don't have to do anything and the license is valid as is. This typically happens if the address is that of the parents' home of a Japanese national now living outside Japan. However, if your new address back in Japan is different, you need to register the new one. By the way, it doesn't imply that you will be fined in this case, but you do need to present a document at the police office to prove that you are staying at the new address. All in all, this means that the address on your passport doesn't have to be the same as that on your license.