Hi guys,

I dont oftern visit the RX forum so him to you all.

Im after a bit of help and advice please, my little sis is after buying a used RX300 which I know nothing about.

She has between 15-19k to spend and wants to know what she can get for her money.

Went to Lexus Woodfood and saw a couple of SE's with MM these were 03/04 reg and were 16-17k with average miles, is this around right? Can we get newer or better spec with that budget?

She wants an 300 SE with MM in black and black leather, looking on the net these seem hard to find ,

Also, other that the obvious, is there anything we should look out for?
Common faults, cambelts etc

Thanks
Paul

just checked lexus norwich and it seems to be what they are going for. only black one they had was an 05 at 21k tho.

of course owning a 99 IS i am ignorant to the "MM" bit tho!

Hi Paul,hows it going bud?My old man has the old shape RX300 on an 02 plate and an RX350 on an 56 plate.I dont know much about the newer shape RX300 but from what ive seen,there are lots of SE cars in her budget(even at the lower end of her budget).I know the black colour is not as common as the silver cars-so it may be harder to find one,but there are still a few.Is she looking for one with warranty?id imagine that would be quite an important thing on an RX.Just looking at autotrader and PH there are a few low 30k mileage cars with MM at around £17-18k in her colour-but they are from indies not Lexus.If i were her,id hold out for one from Lexus with a warranty-especially as her budget is healthy and flexible.

other tha wheel corrosion and the dreaded err3 theres not that much to look out for. i would make sure the test drive is over a few speedbumps to check for any lurching and have a play with remote boot and the bonnet struts (they should remain open when lifted). if all checks out she will have a great time with the car-good luck in your search keep us posted

Hi Raj,
Yeah im good thanks fella, hope your good too.
Thanks for your reply, yeah ive had a quick look around and cant seem to find that comb, will have to hold on a bit, shes not in a hurry. Would prefer to buy from a dealer.
Went to a dealer today to see a demo of the MM he will see what he can find for us.

Thanks

Thanks for your reply postie,

I have another couple of questions,
The car the dealer showed us earlier was a 2007 with all the toys, will a 04 have bluetooth too?
and
What are the service intervals and when does the cambelt need to be changed?

Thanks again
Paul

These cars have a regime of 10K or 12 months (whichever is sooner). The MM option is nice to have and we miss not having it in ours

You shouldn't be afraid to buy privately either - not only will you get a better quality of car, but possibly one that is much younger than off a dealer forecourt. If you buy one that has FLSH, has a Lexus Warranty (factory or extended) then you are pretty much safe. These are good cars in all honesty and with that budget she should really take the time and pick the best car.

whats MM?

i've just bought an 04 sel. and according to to books its 100k for a timing belt.

Thanks for that Mat,

MM means the multi media package, sat nav, dvd, camera, bluetooth etc...

i realised what it was after i posted but was to ashamed to admit it!! lol

ours hasn't got MM but it does have the reverse camera. it would have been nice but the kids just play on their psp's anyway!

cracking motor. love it to bits. not as powerfull as the LS but still plenty powerfull enough!

and ours is black with black low miles etc etc etc (we got it from lexus derby yesterday!!!). we wanted to get it from lexus for the piece of mind. we could have got one about £1kish cheaper from an independant but we didn't think it was worth it as we got a full service, new front tyres discs and pads and a 12 month warrenty which more than made up for the price difference. for the price range she's looking at i'd stick to a lexus dealer.

hi mate, we went to see a rx300 recently, it was an 05 reg with around 90k with fsh. it was a 3.0se but had navigation so the only difference between se and se-l was se-l has air suspension. it was up for £13890. it was in aleution grey with cream leather it was a trader that specialises in executive cars. dont know if this will help but its a rough guidlines.

Anuj

We looked at buying a used RX last year, just to let you know it isn't exactly MM as on the new ISs, it's not a multimedia pack, and rather just satnav. There's no DVD or anything, it's just satnav with a reverse camera.

You only get the ML sound system on the SE-L versions, and these are fitted as standard with everything including air suspension.

We were looking at getting an 04 SE-L, which was around £25k last year (also at Lexus Woodford) - I think the 04s did have bluetooth, but didn't have traffic info (I think that's how it was anyway).

Good luck with the search

Oh ok, the dealer was telling us it had a DVD player, maybe thats because he was showing us a 2007 model, we did say we were wanting a slightly older model so he should have told us,

Thanks for that, I will check this later

Thanks for your replys guys

we still havnt found one yet

Hi Mark,

I bought an '04 black/black SEL in December 06. IMHO it is the colour combination to go for. With regard to buying private or from a dealer, I was looking to my local dealer (Twickenham) but although a very nice bloke he just didn't appear to want to do business - coming up with blue/crema cars (I was after black/black) with high miles for what was pushing £25k. In the end I found the exact car I was looking for, with 10.5k, privately for £21k. It still had 6 months to run on the warranty so I was comfortable with shelling out that amount of cash for a private buy.

I would advise you to do the same. Pay for a HPI check, look at the service history and probably most importantly get to know the seller and his/her situation. If they are an honest family you will will know.

The final thing to bear in mind is that the depreciation is fairly high on these cars. This is another reasons for buying as low as you can.

Good luck.

Also check out Piston Heads

e.g.
http://www.pistonheads.com/sales/406016.htm

And this lot...

http://www.lotsofmotors.com/motorFrame.php?dealerID=37

Thanks dude

Paul

Is this too cheap???

http://search.autotrader.co.uk/es-uk/www/c...mp;max_mileage=

I don't think so, i looked at some 04 SEs last summer at lexus dealers at about 21k so 16k at a private dealer now doesn't seem too unreasonable. It's also not in london which should make it even cheaper.

Oh my bad, wrong link

this one
http://search.autotrader.co.uk/es-uk/www/c...mp;max_mileage=

If your sis wants a specific colour/spec combo just tell your dealer. That how I got my Alutian Grey SEL on an 04 plate. Only took a couple of weeks.

Yep that one looks really dodgy - just ignoring the age and price, anyone that's a private seller with an 0870 telephone number should be avoided!

The other thing is that car is too customised to be sold on so quickly - the painted calipers, optional alloys, chrome door handle covers, DVD system etc.......looks like a car you'd find on here and not the type of car that would get sold within a year and 2k miles.

Maybe give them a ring and see what the story is, but I'd be very wary before going to view it or anything (or take some muscle with you at least!)

Done that already, the salesman at woodford is being a bit lazy, she is gunna speak to some one else soon.

I thought the same, will not bother with that one