I was just curious if others gave consideration to any other cars beside their ES. For myself, I wanted a car this model year, and dropping my Mercedes E350 I wanted to come back to Lexus and the ES (had two previously). Only the UL would do so I tried hard to get that, and if things go as planned, my UL should be at my dealer tomorrow. If I couldn’t get the UL I probably would have gone to Lincoln for a Navigator. I just don’t love the current RX as it really needs a refresh, and there no other sedans that would have worked.

So would you have taken an alternate car, wait, or…?

 

I was looking at the Dodge Charger RT and Scat Pack Widebody before I made up my mind to get the Lexus ES350 Ultra Luxury. I had a Dodge Challenger Scat Pack Widebody that I was leasing until February that I purchased and sold in March. I needed another vehicle to replace the Challenger and I decided to buy the Ultra Luxury this time. I also lease a Mercedes Benz E300 that I’m trying to give back to Mercedes under the Lemon Law because of electronic and computer problems that I’ve been having with it for the last 1 year. I’m thinking of purchasing a 2nd ES350 Ultra Luxury model if I like the first Ultra Luxury that I will be getting. I really want to stay with Lexus because of reliability and excellent residual value. We’ll see what happens.

 

Yes! Audi A6 55 Prestige. Too expensive @ over $70k+ and no inventory. The 22 ES 350 UL was a better value.

 

Of course the 22 ES350 UL is a much better value than the Audi A6 because the ES350 UL is more reliable than the Audi and also because it retains a very high residual value than the Audi A6.

 

I am a conquest buyer and owned various brands over the years. Lexus is latest stop and will probably the last. It seems after owning a bunch of vehicles and dealing with my share of headaches I came to value long term reliability and low maintenance. Those are very high on my list as time marches on. For this particular purchase I cross shopped multiple vehicles in this segment and ES300h won out. I almost got Avalon but that hideous infotainment screen just rubbed me the wrong way and I knew I can't live with it.

 

I think everybody cross-shops, right? At different levels of seriousness, anyway.

In my case, I read about a bunch of cars, sat in several, visited the showroom for a few and drove a couple. I knew I wanted a midsize sedan. I knew I wanted style, ride comfort and quietness, good if not great performance, and reliability.

The first car I drove was actually a Mazda6 Signature. Beautiful and well-made car inside and out, but after all the hype I was really let down by the drive. I felt it was decent at everything but great at nothing. The ride, handling and engine note were all mildly disappointing.

I buy, not lease, and keep my cars a long time, so any German car was a stretch for me. But I researched the Audi A4 very intensively. It was already hard last summer to find cars to test-sit let alone test-drive, but I sat in an A5 (same front seats and dash design) and felt everything was just subtly off about the dimensions, controls and seating comfort. Figure in its notorious disposable water pumps and a junior sales rep whom I'm convinced was coached to be just barely short of outright rude, and I'd had enough. An A6 would have been a money stretch for me, but I did look at it and sit in it. I was surprised I didn't like its interior better. It wasn't all that roomy for its size, and all the controls were nothing but screens. Not my thing. I wrote off the E Class and 5 Series because of a similar combination of purchase price, maintenance costs, repair bills, and reliability worries.

I was coming out of an Acura RL that I really admired, so I looked long and hard at its successor the RLX. On paper the value and performance were stellar, but in the metal I just couldn't get past the wonky controls and above all the hideous cheapness of the fake wood all over the interior, old GM-grade with printing so coarse you could see the dots. The RLX was engineered during the 2007 Great Recession, and Honda reportedly slashed cost out of it in the belief that buyers and carmakers could never again afford quality. It showed with painful obviousness.

That drove me to the ES. The only question that remained was whether I felt good about the test drive. I did, and here I am.

 

I have owned Mercedes-Benz, Audi, sedans. I have had three Toyota’s and loved each one.

I knew I wanted to hybrid, and I knew that quiet was important to me. But lead me to ES300 So much quieter than my Camry XSE.

 

I was all over the place when I had initially began my search for a new car back in Nov 2021. I started look at Audi S4, S5 sportback, Acura TLX type S, and M340i. Financial responsibility got the best of me and I ended my search for a performance sedan, it just made no sense.

Flip over to the new year and well a lot of bad things have happened in the world, including increasing gas prices, especially here in California. I had decided to consider hybrids (taboo for me until this year). Welp, I knew what I wanted; a luxurious ride that was similar if not better than my daily driver which is a 2015 Acura TLX Advance trim, better mpg, and of course looks good. Lexus is the only luxury brand that fit the bill perfectly for me. Other luxury brands offer hybrids, but they rely more on PHEV and I'm not ready to commit to that. So, I started looking at Hondas; Insight and Accord hybrid. Then I moved onto Toyota; Camry hybrid, Avalon hybrid, RAV4 Prime. All the cars I tested from both Honda and Toyota felt like a tier below my current ride. Both brands offer a ton of great value and luxuries for the pricepoint, but with this group of vehicles, the only gain I would get would be increased mpg. So I looked at Lexus and was happy to see that the ES hybrid had still existed for this 7th generation. Every generation of ES prior has looked very bland to me, but the 7th gen, especially the F sport trim I'm getting look amazing. I'm really happy Lexus changed the design of the ES to have it look sharper, but in the F Sport trim it looks amazing.

So I went test driving, test drove a Ultra Luxury model. The cabin was library quiet, seats were very comfortable, drive was extremely smooth and planted, and the overall feel was of high quality. After that test drive I knew I wanted it. It feels like an upgrade in every way possible except for HP, but I don't drive spiritedly anyway. This car will have plenty of power for what I need and it'll return almost 20mpg more than what I currently get. I'm excited to take ownership sometime next month once the vehicle arrives.

 

When the ES was first shown in 2019, I knew it was my next car. So when it came time to actually get it, there was zero cross-shopping cause I was already aware of what I wanted:

High quality, roomy, premium, hybrid (fuel economy)

No other large luxury/premium car that takes gasoline can achieve the economy the ES300h does. It's probably the only "have your cake and eat it too" car on the market that ALSO has platinum reliability. To me, it sits alone in that very specific category that can check all those boxes AND get 40+ mpg without breaking a sweat. Oh, also VERY cheap insurance and maintenance. The ESh again strikes a lot of VERY good boxes. Too good to be true category.

My last car was a CT200h F Sport. While I loved it, it was TINY. This ES is WAY way bigger, quieter, faster, roomier, and EASILY gets better fuel economy. It's mind-blowing to me still. This is why i considered no other car.

I think the closest car I'd consider is a 530e. That car though would require a bit of pre-planning and pre-thinking to maximize economy as I'd have to babysit it by charging and watching my E-only driving.

I like that the ES requires zero thinking.

 

Wow, some interesting answers. Thanks folks!

 

I agree completely. I have only driven Toyotas, first used when I was younger and then new. My '21 ESh is heavier and larger than my '10 Prius but gets better MPG. When I was ready to make the jump to something a bit more luxurious, Lexus was the only choice. I'm on the younger side for an ESh driver, but I couldn't be happier with my car.

 

This goes back to 2012. We usually get my wife a new car every 5-8 years. Her last three had been Volvos (93 850, 00 and 06 S80s), which she really liked. In May 2021 we went with some friends to their son's college graduation about 100 miles away, in their 2011 ES 350. We rode in the back seat (plenty of room) and both really liked the car. Did some research, and new generation coming out in September. Decided to try the hybrid, particularly with gas around 3.75. Went to the dealer in October to look, and they were very proud of the new cars. We were in no hurry and I told the salesman to let me know when they wanted to sell one below invoice. He chuckled, but called on December 27 saying they needed to hit next incentive and manager would sell us one at invoice, so we bought her a 13 ES300h.
When new generation came out, we upgraded her in April 2019 to a 19 ES300h. While the 2013 was fine, we upgraded due principally to the safety feature upgrades from the 2013 and the increase in mpg. She really likes the 300h, and with the pandemic mileage is low and we plan on keeping it a while.
I will say that the 2013 did not seem as luxurious as my friend's 2011. However, the 2019 has a more luxurious feel to it than the 2013 (both had the Luxury package).

 

Great question! I wanted the Mercedes E450 sedan. In all honesty, I will probably sell my wife's 2019 ES and givie her my 2022 ES UL so that I purchase the E450.

 

Which strengths of the E450 are the ones making you want to upgrade from the UL?

 

The Mercedes Benz are money pits. I’ve been driving the E300 now for over 2 1/2 years and it’s nothing but problems. These cars have computer hardware and software problems that Mercedes doesn’t know how to fix. My car doesn’t start, the doors don’t lock and unlock and it’s been in Mercedes Service multiple times for these same problems. They haven’t fixed the problem. I have a lemon law lawyer handling everything now and I’m waiting to hear back from Mercedes Benz. We’re trying to get Mercedes Benz to take back the car. If they take it back, I’m going to buy a second Lexus ES350 Ultra Luxury. The Lexus ES350 is a more reliable vehicle.