Hi all, i have been a member for a while and own a 2001 es300, which unfortunetly i have to sell. I have been car shopping for a while and almost bought an acura legend, but the deal fell through. I have come upon a 2000 black awd rx300 for $2800 with 178k miles. It has all service records and has mainly highway miles, it was owned by my moms friend who lived 50 miles from work and she was the only owner. Does anyone have input on this and what i need to watch out for, worry about? I know about the transmissions, but if its made it to 178k miles, i don't really think i need to worry about premature failure. Thanks

 

That's extremely cheap so I'd run a carfax just to be sure that everything is in order. Besides the transmission there is not much to worry about if the owner did oil changes on time or used synthetic oil. This engine (1MZ-FE) is known to sludge if you weren't on time with oil changes that was with Dino/Conventional oil, now a days with the synthetic you can go up to 5,000 miles safely some do 7,500. But honestly I still change my oil at 3,500 miles even though I use a high quality synthetic like PU, PP, or Pentosynth.
If everything checks out good on the carfax, and there's no sludge then go ahead and buy it.

 

I have an '02 w/160k.
Couldn't part with it for less than $5k to $6K because I know I couldn't replace with like/kind below that figure.

She either:
A) got lowballed on a trade-in offer and just wants to get above that
B) knows of some underlying issue
C) does not have a clue as to the car's value
D) is independently wealthy and doesn't care
E) time is of the essence

 

2800 buy it

 

If the service history is complete and the carfax is (reasonably) clean, I'd rush to the bank and take the cash over there right now!

 

then have the tranny fluid drain and filled and the oil changed with a full synthetic. Do not do a Transmission flush....you are warned...... to many have lost the tranny after a flush on a high mileage car....

 

Go for it -- even if you have some repairs pop up, I think it's a steal!