Lexus IS250 325,000km Ownership Review _ The QUEEN of Reliability

What is up guys ?

So for Canadian Rider here and today I'm going to be giving my three year ownership review of my 2009 , Lexus is 250 .

Now , you guys know I am not a newbie when it comes to the Lexus second generation or the two is I had my 2006 Lexus is 350 for six years before I sold that and I still have this 2009 , Lexus is 250 I've had it for three years and I want to talk about my experience with this car and really why I think it is actually one of the best value cars that you can buy for those looking for a budget that are looking for a used luxury sedan .

I have a lot of great , you know , history with these Lexus vehicles .

I have become a Lexus fan boy because of the amazing things that these cars deliver .

You know , number one , when I look at it for any car , you look at it from the exterior .

This car looks really gorgeous and we've kept this car in amazing shape .

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Make sure you subscribe to the channel over 25,000 subscribers , which is amazing .

And you guys know all these things that we've done with this car from , you know , the full paint correction , the polishing , the ceramic coating , fixing all the scratches and really made this car look like a million dollars or almost looks like it's brand new and it's got over 325,000 kilometers on this car right now , which is an insane amount of kilometers .

That's a lot of mileage on this car .

And I know before COVID hit , we were putting 25 30 40,000 kilometers on this car a year .

So obviously , lots of experience driving this car over the course of , you know , three years and then a lot of experience with the second generation Lexus cars for myself for the last six years .

And I can tell you in terms of exterior styling , this thing looks beautiful .

I think it looks very handsome , hasn't aged too much at all , especially if you keep it in great shape .

I think it's got a great design where it doesn't look overly aggressive , but it still has that nice , aggressive look , especially with the body .

It's got that thick rear end which I really like and very beautiful headlights in the front swooping hood , I think overall , this is a very beautiful car .

I don't know if anyone can say these are not good looking cars I know a lot of people don't like necessarily the new Lexus designs of the very aggressive front grills .

But I think this is a very , very beautiful car and specifically this Lexus is 250 along with the other two is generation models , extremely reliable cars .

I am talking to you right now and driving this car 325,000 kilometers on this car and you know , maintenance in terms of like what has gone wrong in this car , um , in the ownership period that I've had it really nothing .

Um , we , we did brakes which are consumables and that's fine .

You know , oil changes .

Uh you have to do , I use full synthetic oil .

Uh you know , I change it every 10,000 kilometers with the oil filter and I do this at home .

So if you haven't seen that video as well , I'll make sure I link it in the cart above you .

Go ahead and do that .

What's great about this car in terms of its reliability and the maintenance .

Yes , I'm just doing basic maintenance on this car and that's really all it needs because it's got a solid engine , right , solid transmission and I'm doing all these things at home and it's really cheap to do that .

So you're basically doing the majority of the maintenance at home in a diy situation , saving yourself lots of money and you know , that the maintenance is being done properly because you're the person that's doing it , which is great .

Um There is the caveat .

So along with my Lexus I S3 150 I love that car .

It was amazing .

The caveat for the I S 250 .

And that's why , you know , if I think the I S3 150 is the king of used car luxury and reliability .

I think the I S 250 is the queen of that .

And the reason is , is because of the Achilles heel with the engine .

This car is a direct injected engine and specifically it doesn't have port injection as well .

You guys know the Lexus is 350 has the dual injectors , the direct injected injector and the port direct injector , which will also give it the ability to cover those intake valves with fuel .

Unfortunately , that's not the case for this car .

So this car suffers from potential sludge build up , it suffers from potential carbon build up on the valves .

Now there's lots of issues that can come around this if you leave it and don't do the maintenance properly on it .

So you have to make sure that you do oil changes , you use full synthetic oil that you're changing the filter and you're doing all this maintenance along with some other things like maybe a sea foam treatment and then running the car hard once in a while to make sure that those problems are not going to happen .

I've seen the problems happen .

I've read the forums and I , obviously it does happen .

But does it happen all the time ?

No , I think as long as you keep your maintenance regimen , you know , very strict around the oil , especially around the engine , you're going to be fine because otherwise this engine is rock solid , reliable , transmissions , rock solid reliable .

It doesn't have the power of the , is 350 that's the other thing is 350 has around 300 horsepower .

305 this car has about 200 horsepower .

So , you know , you are losing a lot of that right now , I'm in this car and I'm trying to buy a gun in here .

You know , it doesn't have power .

Let's be honest here , it is pretty weak on that but not buying this car for the immense power .

Yes , it'll get you from point A to B .

No problem .

You're buying this car for the reliability , the looks , you know , the capability of daily driving it and it has all the great functionality of the I S3 50 .

Um in terms of the interior .

So you're talking about heated cooled seats , you got everything's memory seats on this thing .

The interior is beautiful .

If you check out this car , I obviously I'm gonna be showing you videos of this .

The interior is great , you know .

Yes , it doesn't have the navigation of new cars .

All that jazz , but you don't need that .

You just need your phone , put here on a magnetic phone holder and you can do everything on your phone .

Otherwise it is a beautiful car .

I think the interior still looks really great and you can tell , look at the materials and the quality of the materials .

325,000 kilometers , the materials have aged really well .

There's not much wear on the leather seats , you know , the plastics , everything .

I commend Lexus for the job they've done building these cars .

They're honestly rock solid .

Yes , there are minute things that will happen as honestly with any car as it ages , maybe some that are more unique .

Like , you know , the window trim , there's like the plastic trim on the windows , those start dry rotting after , you know , this many years and this many kilometers and that's kind of normal and common and they cost money , but they don't cost a lot of money .

They cost like , you know , 50 bucks , 40 bucks , 100 bucks to replace a bunch of , you know , trim pieces .

Ok .

That's fine .

You know , the dash has cracked on this car .

So my Lexus I S3 150 suffered from none of that .

It was actually older , but this dash has two cracks down on the , on the main plastic and you know , that is kind of disappointing , but at the same time , come on , it's not disappointing .

This car is super old .

325,000 kilometers .

You can't expect that all the materials are going to be perfectly , you know , kept up over the age or over the lifetime of the car .

So , you know , as long as you're reasonable with a car like this , you should understand that .

Listen , it is actually in phenomenal shape and it's pulling out phenomenally well , for the age and the climb the car .

So interior , amazing exterior , you know , it's keeping up .

This car has no rust .

My Lexus I S3 150 developed a little bit of rust on the trunk lid and that wasn't that big of a deal , but this car virtually not , virtually .

Absolutely no rust on this car .

So exterior , I'm thinking great .

It's in great shape , holding up really well , interior , great shape , holding up really well , we have a really strong engine with an Achilles heel that you're making sure that you're addressing with really strict oil changes and other maintenance to make sure that it doesn't have a problem and then transmission , the transmission is solid .

I don't have any problems with this transmission .

I've never had a problem with any transmission issue at all .

On my Lexus is 350 or my Lexus is 250 you know , in the three years that we've had it , you know , knock on wood , it's just been super reliable .

I haven't even needed to think about it .

And that's what you really want in your daily driver .

Right .

You don't want to think about these things .

You just want to do the maintenance that , you know , you have to do and you want to just drive the car wherever you have to drive and it's going to get you there .

It's not going to plane , it's not going to leave you stranded .

It's not going to cost you thousands of dollars randomly at times in additional maintenance or repairs because you know , that's what Audi did or what BMW did and no flake on Audi my 2008 Audi R eight , which is thank God been super reliable up until this point and I don't want to jinx it .

So I've had that car for three years , but this car I could 100% .

If someone said from , you know , the greater Toronto area drive to Vancouver , this is the car I would be taking , I'd be 100% confident this car would get me there .

No problem .

Like there's not even an issue in that regard .

So really ?

And I think about now you think we talked about exterior , we talked about interior , we talked about reliability , the engine and the transmission .

The other great thing about this car is that they've come down in price significantly , right ?

They've bottomed out in the depreciation curve .

So you can snatch these things for , you know , I've seen this car go for like 3 to $4000 with high kilometers and in decent shape .

I've seen some really good condition ones with lower kilometers sell for like 56 $7000 Canadian .

So really amazing kind of car that you can get for a really great price made by a manufacturer that obviously really used quality premium materials .

Like , like look at this thing .

It's , it's beautiful .

It's , it's sporty .

I do feel it's like it's very sporty in here .

It doesn't feel like , you know , Grandpa Mobile , I'm not there yet .

I have a lot of white hairs right now , but I'm not grandpa mowed yet .

And it even has the paddle shifters , you know , for the novelty of having paddle shifters on a car like this .

Um And truly , and everything works like on the inside too , like the air conditioning works , all the mirrors work , everything works on this car .

So really , it is truly .

And I think about what other cars there may be that you're comparing it to , you know , an older BMW , older Audi , we know older Audis have had problems with their engines .

We know , especially on those twin turbo V M W .

Lots of problems with those cars with the water pumps , everything in this range , this model year for this car for this price .

I actually don't know what else you could buy that would give you all of the things that this car gives you beautiful , looks great .

Daily driver performance , a handsome interior , a fully fleshed out very luxurious interior , by the way for its age , you know , minus the navigation , which is honestly a non non deal breaker to me because everyone has a mobile device now where all this stuff exists anyway .

So you don't need any of that and truly the experience of owning this car and the fact that they made it very easy for you to do all that maintenance yourself .

This is just a no brainer of a car to have .

I think in your stable , if you're looking for , you know , a car that's very reliable , something that you can get into on the cheaper end of the market that's going to serve you well .

And that , you know , there's also a host of mods .

If you want to go ahead and mod the car , put an exhaust , all the stuff , it's really all out there and it's fairly cheap .

So , you know , you may be looking for a car as your first car , maybe this is your first daily driver or you need a reliable daily driver .

This car has all of those pieces .

This is a rear wheel drive model .

There are some models that come with all wheel drive .

This is the rear wheel , which adds a little bit of fun in the winter .

You're not necessarily going to be losing traction on the rear tires on this car with 200 plus horsepower , but it's there and it's fun to have .

And really , you know , I've become a Lexus fan boy , since I've had this car and I've owned many cars and just to be very clear , God , I've owned a lot of cars so far in my lifetime .

And , you know , I've been blessed to have that experience .

BMW M three BMW .

389 .

You know , Mazda , Miata , a Honda S 2000 thousands .

Mustang , 5.0 with Coyote engine .

My Audi R eight .

My Lexus is 250 that I had or my is 350 that I had my motorcycles .

Anyways , I've had the pleasure to own a lot of cars .

And I'm telling you honestly , from the bottom of my heart , I have fallen in love with these Lexus vehicles because I see the amount of dedication and work and the quality of the materials and a really great engineering and design around how the engine is placed , how you can reach to the oil filter and change the oil yourself and all this stuff is made so easy and designed so somebody can go and just work on this car to keep this car in great shape and it's designed to live over a long period of time .

You know what I mean ?

Where a lot of cars , maybe they're designed in ways so you can't work on it or they're designed in ways where honestly the materials are cheap and they're going to break apart in 10 years .

I really , honestly , Kudos to the Lexus engineers and the Lexus team for building a car that obviously was built with , you know , long term longevity in mind , in keeping the car in great shape , built with great quality materials inside and out .

And , you know , I feel like this is almost like a Lexus advertisement in a way , but it's true .

And listen , there are problems with this car , right ?

And I talked to you about that the engine problem , you know , by the way , lots of other manufacturers did have this problem .

Audi a lot of people in direct injection started coming into , you know , the mass market .

A lot of people did face these problems in the first place .

So , you know , I wouldn't say it's a Lexus problem by itself .

Uh , you know , other things maybe just the , you know , the dry rotting of the plastics , you know , I don't know if that's , I don't know if you can expect that to be , you know , still in great shape this many years , this many kilometers in the future , right ?

Like everything works in here .

Like I , I'm really trying to think like , what is the problem in this car and what you should be wary about ?

Uh , it's just the consumables , I think at this point .

Now , you know , the car is not in an accident , you know , the car has been taken .

Well , of , I think what you need to do when you're looking for this car at this point is see when the maintenance of some of the consumable items were done .

So , brakes , rotors check that , you know , suspension that's consumable check if the suspension has been refreshed , especially on a higher mileage car .

To be honest with you , we bought this car , there was no suspension paperwork done .

It's 325,000 kilometers .

The shots are still in great shape .

Obviously , I don't know .

Obviously , I think it might have been replaced one time in its life before I bought the car .

But I don't know , but otherwise it's been perfect .

It's been great , you know , maybe in a couple of years I'm going to have to refresh the suspension maybe , but I see this car lasting me , you know , for the next foreseeable future , at least until I probably get a full electric car as my daily driver one day .

So this is really going to be the horse that I'm going to be staying with until electrification kicks in .

And you guys know , I also think cars are going to go electric one day , that's fine .

But if you're looking for a car that's gas powered , that's reliable , that's going to get you from point A to B it looks really great , super reliable .

Great daily driver .

It's got a lot of luxury features on the inside .

I don't think you can go wrong with this car .

Honestly , it's truly one of a kind I think especially in the years that it was introduced versus what the competition had , where the competition had so many problems with different parts of their cars in terms of engine and transmission .

So I really think it was a unicorn of his time .

And you know , I think if you can get this car for a really great deal , you found a great example .

I think it's going to honestly serve you well .

It's going to make you really happy .

It's made me really happy on both of my examples .

With this is 2 50 I couldn't have asked for more .

If you have any questions , guys , leave them down in the comment box down below .

You guys see how beautiful this thing is .

I'm very passionate about it , but I know if you're looking for something like this or you have any questions again about the car .

Let me know I've had a lot of experience and a lot of work on these cars myself .

I know the ins and outs of these cars on a on a very deep level .

I'd be happy to help if you found this video helpful .

Give it a like and make sure you subscribe 25,000 subscribers plus on the channel , which is amazing .

And really this channel is all about all the cars , motorcycles , car detailing everything .

And I love sharing these stories with you guys .

I love driving this car .

I hope I have helped you for those that are looking to actually purchase this car or if you're another owner out there and a big Alexis lover and all of this stuff makes sense and it resonates with you , you know , leave it down in the comment box down below .

Share your thoughts , share your experiences with this car um to those people that are looking to get it .

Um I see this as an opportunity to kind of share the joy that I experienced with this car to others as well , which is super exciting .

So thank you guys so much again , make sure you like the video and I will see you guys in the next one .