Owning A Lexus - Toe In The Water...

[stevew]

Hello All,

I'm looking at buying a 2nd hand Lexus in Australia and not wanting to pay a lot for it ( say 30K max ).

Given the price of Lexus cars from new ( of course half of it is tax..... ) a few questions:

(1) For 30K should I bother?

(2) If its worth doing, what models/milage should I avoid?

(3) What are common problems with Lexus cars that are serious and I should avoid?

(4) Can I put a baby seat in the back seat easily?

I'm a practical chap and know a fair bit about motors, engines etc and am hands on.

Thoughts and opinions welcome.

Steve.

[don_L]

For around 30 or so you can buy a pretty decent 98 LS if you look really hard. Anything with the Quad Cam V8 will be fairly economical in reference to future repairs as it's fairly bullet proof. I have even seen some really nice 95 to 97 models for 20's and by the time they have reached that age and if the previous owners have treated them good, most of their depreciation has been spent. So you will not tend to lose a lot on resale in the next couple of year or so compared to newer models. I wouldn't be afraid to entertain this car even with k's upward of 200000 at this age. This car can easily reach half a million with good maintenance. The LS would be a great family car as well. If you drive them for any length of time, you will be so spoiled you will tend to judge everything else by that standard. To me this is the ultimate driving car and I think you will find most every LS owners would have this opinion.

I also drive an SC and love it. I will keep it for years as they are solid, no rust, stainless exhaust, V8 quad cam vehicles with great performance and handling but as soon as you mention a baby seat, the practicality goes out the window as it's two door access to the rear seat just doesn't seem the go to me.

My next suggestion in that price range, as a really nice family/sport would be a 2000 or 2001 GS300. Really nice car. Find someone that has one and take it for a drive. Good economy, decent power, comfortable ride, great interior, sporty handling but still smooth.

I could write a book, but I'll pass in for someone else's thoughts now.

Cheers,