I owned one for almost 5 years. Basically as reliable as a rock, but it does have some quirks (I'm talking about the 5-speed automatic version). The shifter cannot be manually downshifted to first. The upshift buttons, on the rear of the steering-wheel spokes, have to be accessed by feel alone....the downshift buttons are on the front of the spokes. The transmission restricts upshifts for a while, at very cold temperatures, until it warms up a little, so you have to keep your speed way down until it warms. The 2-3 shift sometimes flares or bumps a little due to an ECU quirk (most of the time it's fine)...a factory ECU did not solve it. Acceleration from a rolling start, at low speeds, can be extremely sluggish from another ECU quirk in the engine's Throttle-by-Wire system....though it does not affect starting from rest. And, in the climate control, the settings have a tendency to default to recircuated air, which can fog up the windshield in the defrost mode. You are often re-setting the intake-**** to fresh-air. Oh...and the RWD s**ks in on really slippery winter roads, even with all season tires, traction control, and snow-mode in the transmission. Get used to these quirks, though, and, especially if it is low-mileage and has evens serviced well, it should be reliable. But keep in mind that any vehicle that old is likely to have a number of rubber parts (hoses, weathertripping, seals, etc....) that may soon need replacement.

 

 

Wow, a car with a decent engine. That motor in there is epic even if it's not a rocket ship. Better than any 4 cyl garbage downsized crap, that Toyota I-6.

 

I've owned an 03 IS300 for around a year and a half now and it's a really cracking car. It's silky smooth to drive for it's age and the 2JZ Inline 6 sounds great when you rev it up! I'm sure you'll enjoy the car!

 

Congratulations. And, yes....you may have saved yourself some of the automatic's quirks. I test-drove a 5MT version (though didn't own one). A decent 5-speed, though the linkage itself was not as crisp as, say, on a Honda.

You much have had to search some for a used 5MT in good condition......there weren't very many of them sold in the American market to begin with.

 

that's definitely my favorite generation of IS, the engine in that is about as solid an engine as has ever been built... and an inline-6 by design is essentially perfectly balanced and smooth with a lovely power band

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm in the market for a IS300 manual transmission SportDesign, if anyone has one for sale, hit me up. Serious buyer.

 

 

I bought a Lexus IS300 lately.
I experienced a problem with the Iginition coils. This is a weak point of the car that can occur anytime and isn't talked much about on the english forums. It's well discussed on the french ones though. Car can also show problems with it's injectors. Both problems will be less costly in the USA than in the EU, due to the cheap US prices, even for OEM parts.

The advice of Mmarshall is great too :
"But keep in mind that any vehicle that old is likely to have a number of rubber parts (hoses, weathertripping, seals, etc....) that may soon need replacement."
That is a rigth sentence. When a car is this old, he could start having light problems with some rubber elements.