UDel

I agree though normally for the first 30-50K miles/years under warranty people generally do the schedules at the dealership. I do DIY but I try to keep every receipt and write down every thing I have done at what mileage. I am more gentle, careful, and normally use better products then what would be done/used at the dealership when I can so DIY is often a good thing as long as there is some documentation. I don't have a issue it was not done at the dealership, my concern is there is simply no evidence/documentation of any service being done on it for most of its life.

SW17LS

PwrdbyM

They can, but if they're like me I've had plenty of bad experiences with other people doing work on my cars. I'm an accomplished mechanic myself so why spend extra money for substandard service? No one cares for my cars like I do. Quite the assumption I hear regularly that because people have money then they're also careless with spending it.

Many finance companies, including Lexus (Toyota) financial, will send cars direct to auctions when they come off lease. When a customer turns in a leased car the finance company owns it, not the dealership. Therefore they can do with it what they want and the quickest way to ditch it is an auction where dealers will buy them and make them CPO cars.

I agree with most others on here. Those histories don't make for a bad vehicle, but unless you can adequately inspect the car yourself a PPI is in order. Just note the PPI isn't going to be able to tell you if the internal components are in good shape or not.

satiger

iTrader: (1)

"No one cares for my cars like I do" - this is exactly what I meant too. But I am not handy (do spark plugs etc but not beyond that), so need to find someone who is meticulous in his/her work and pays attention to preventive maintenance. I am not saying all technicians at all Lexus dealerships are great. Its like any other, hit or miss.

Past 20+ years of owning Lexus, I lucked out at one Toyota dealership in TX and one here in NJ. I don't sign work orders and later pay at the counter and leave. Almost all the services, I speak with the technician to get his input.

Indys that I tried more like volume business, most don't even have time to explain what they did or should be done, could be my bad luck. Since I buy OEM parts, I need someone who can take care of my cars much like me.

OP, sorry about this side track conversation!.

SW17LS

To give you an example, I had the 5k service on mine done (one of the free ones) which is just a rotation basically. I like to change the factory fill oil at 5k miles, so I took it after to my mechanic so he could change the oil, brought my own Toyota 0W20 and filter. First time he had seen the new one.

While his tech changed the oil, we hung out in his shop, he showed me the 07 460L he had in there that has 220k on it and talked about the issued it had had, was showing me underneath mine how they had changed certain things (control arms, etc) and how mine shouldn't have those issues. We checked out his 2000 LS400 with over 300k and talked about that. His tech dripped some oil into the shield under the engine while he was taking the filter out. With no prompting he removes the shield, sprays it down with cleaner and wipes it all up and reinstalls it.

The cost? $35 (brought my own oil and filter remember. Oil was $66 and the filter was $12. So cost of the oil change was $113.

So yeah, I get taken care of better than at the dealer lol.