Hey all! Hope everyone's doing alright this evening.
Anyways, as the title says, I'm a new "owner" of a 2009 RX350 w/ navi; actually it belongs to my mom, but it's in the family ! So anyways, first impressions: it's a great car, and in fact, this is our first Lexus; we've always stuck with honda/acura/toyota for the most part. Anyways, we purchased last Sunday, some what on a whim, for $500.00 over invoice; it's a VERY long story and it wasn't pretty. Some things that bother me though: doesn't have an auto start (turn the key once), it doesn't have the push buttom start-up like all the other lexus models, no available oem running board (wasn't there one available back when the 330 first came out?), no available mark levs (or maybe it's just in our region?-washington), mirror signals, and the seat warmers don't have the option of getting colder as well...I'm just a little curious as to what other people think. It's a 2009, in fact the only 2009 (year made) availabe on the market I believe (thanks to Lexus pulling back on their redesigned proto), and yet it seems to be lacking...almost feels like we got shafted...

thanks,
eric

 

we have an 09 with nav too. all the items you mention are symptoms of a car thats a little dated. but we were aware of them all before we bought and decided on the RX anyway. they're right there in the open, no secrets, so it's hard to say anybody got shafted IMO. hopefully you'll enjoy the car and what it does have. good luck with it.

 

I bought a 2008 in mid February knowing the 2009 models would be coming out in March. Why ? I knew that they would be identical vehicles other than the Pebble Beach addition and I could get a good deal on the 2008 model. I tend to keep vehicles for 10 plus years so the one model year difference was not really a factor. I can tell you the RX is so much better than a 1992 Ford Explorer it is not even funny ! Enjoy the new ride. There are a lot worse choices out there.

 

We also bought a '08 in Feb., knowing that the '09 was the same thing...and we also plan on it being a 10 year vehicle. We knew it lacked some of the newer stuff. Had a RX300 some years ago...the sweetest/smoothest ride we ever had, and that prompted us to trade in a Highlander for the 350. Now if the 350 would only get the mpg that I get on my corvette (29).!!!

 

In washington, you'll have to custom order the ML package, unless you buy the 400H.

 

absolutely! by all means, it is a beautiful car, and it drives VERY smoothly. By no means am I saying that it isn't a great car; I just wish that Lexus had just done a few adds ons, that's all...!

 

definitely agree it's in need of an update. which is coming next year. unfortunately for us, we were shopping now. we're also buy and hold customers so we wanted to get a specific color/configuration since we'll drive it a long time so went with an 09 because we could find exactly what we wanted.

 

not being able to get an ML car might be a regional thing or maybe they havent been producing it for a while. Something to remember for all prospective buyers, even if your dealership doesnt have it they can always trade another dealer for it. If you are relaly looking for something they can also make a trade region to region or they can make a trade for the car you want while it is still being shipped over to the US and on the boat. never settle for what the dealer has on the lot, its a lot of money to be spending to just "settle".

 

agree but our experience was the ML system for RX is very hard to find. Especially in an RX without the rear entertainment system. we tried via several dealers in case the first wasn't motivated.

 

they're just being lazy. if a dealer really wants to sell you a car, they should make the effort to find what you want. i hate when dealers get lazy and get customers to buy whatever they have, to save them some work.