Checking out Lexus SUVs

My wife and I had lunch a block away from the Lexus dealership today so I convinced her to check out a couple of cars. We had the baby with us and we didn't want to disturb his sleep so we just sat in them. We did not drive them.

But first, I saw my first LC500 in person. It was really nondescript and bland, especially from this angle. Here is Junior next to it. This is Matt Farah test driving one. Apparently, Lexus is only selling 400 of these a month. This dealer sold five within the last week. This is the only one left in its inventory. Maybe white is not a desirable color.

The car stickers for $102,000. In order to make more money out of this rare car, the dealer added Cliajet (paint protection), Dentpro (dent repair?), and Forever Start (battery insurance?) for almost $10,000 extra. Ripoff!

First up is the GX. My wife saw one recently and liked the looks of it. It's nice.

But the LX was really nice. But at $98,000, it was way too much. Sitting in it did feel like sitting in a comfy living room. The salesman said that 80% of these are leased. My wife doesn't like the grill and all the unnecessary gadgets, like the back seat TV screens. She was surprised that it wasn't as big as she thought it was going to be.

We concluded that the best compromise would be a slightly used Land Cruiser. Depreciation has taken a hit already. We're going to keep it forever. And it has a lot less bling. But then I saw this tweet:

@TamerlaneBlog Hear tell they're a steal at 3 years old. Also that they're the most unreliable current Toyota, whatever that actually ends up meaning

— Will Pierce (@greatistheworld) May 25, 2017