Buying advice

Royal Enfield · June 14, 2021

Good evening,

firstly apologies for treading what is no doubt a well beaten path. I am a happy and committed Toyota owner (can I say that here?) looking to upgrade my current vehicle to an NX300h. The excellent Toyota dealer is co-located with Lexus immediately adjacent. Extensive happy experience and reputation together with the new 10 year warranty arrangement suggests an upgrade is opportune. I am thinking of a vehicle in the £20-25k range, 2016/7, Luxury spec and mileage ideally no more than 40k. I could be tempted by an older/ milier Premier. I would plan to buy from a Lexus dealer rather than an independent.

I am reasonably knowledgeable about cars and my brother ran his own car business for many years and is a further source of advice. Therefore I am reasonably clued up on all the usual wear items, body etc and what to check for. I am particularly interested in any specific Lexus/NX issues - particular wear items and points to check, spec items ideally I should have, things to avoid and any experience that would impact my decision?

I did have a Prius at one time and did over 100k miles in it before the terrible, shoulder wrenching, neck breaking driving position and screaming, elastic band style engine performance finally got to me. Reviews I have read tell me that comfort is not an issue but the elastic band effect is noticeable. I am not a fast driver and expect to check this on a test drive. My local dealer has offered a vehicle for a day. Also the corners seem remarkably well hidden, but parking sensors and reverse cam will help. Boot space looks OK, and it does have a spare. I don’t necessarily value a pano roof. I dislike all black interiors and would look for suitable trim. Any comments on these points would be welcome too.

If you are not asleep by now (!) Many thanks, Royal Enfield (a Classic 500 currently occupies my garage)

Spacewagon52 · June 14, 2021

Welcome to the Club Roger. From what you have said you have covered most of the points you need to be concerned about. Others on here who own an NX will be able to give you further information.

Pan roofs mean it is not advisable to fit roof bars is the consensus - not impossible but with many caveats.

Car registered after 1st April 2017, which have a list price over £40,000, mean you have to pay extra road tax for the first five years after registration. Others on here may correct me.

Interior trims seam to be mainly black so you may have to hunt a different colour down.

Colin Barber has some old price lists that I am sure he would share with you if that helps. I have attached 2016/17 price lists originally from Colin.

Regarding the CVT box - they do not run on rubber bands! They are different from an ordinary auto box but as you describe yourself as a steady driver, I think you will find the seamless gear changes a delight - the test drive for a whole day will confirm if you like it.

I am sure others will be along to add more than I can. The NX would appear to be very reliable with no major issues throughout the range.

Good luck with your search.

ColinBarber · June 14, 2021

Nothing really to look out for on the NX other than the general things to look for on any vehicle.

Try and test drive a model that is the same age as what you are looking to purchase. Certainly don't test a face lift model if you are going to purchase a pre-facelift one. The newer ones are quieter and definitely do not rev the engine as much when mildly accelerating, which given your dislike of the Prius may annoy you.

george72 · June 15, 2021

Hi everyone, just joined this forum and i am in a very similar situation to 'Royal Enfield'. I have just sold my BMW 530d luxury and looking to swap to an NX300h. I have a similar budget and want to know if i would be better to hold out for a face lift model or are the pre facelift models fine? Important things to me are comfort and reduced noise-Does the facelift model make a difference to comfort/refinement level.

apologies in advance if i should have started a new thread.

many thanks

Royal Enfield · June 15, 2021

Thank you all for your comments, and welcome George to the discussion. I am old enough to remember the original Daf cars that had CVT and I think did indeed have rubber/ steel bands. On the Prius forum there was discussion at one time about the potential CVT issue of the lack of relationship of engine speed and noise to road speed and acceleration, known by some as the rubber band effect. I understand that the current set up is a planetary design and both simple and extremely reliable. My current Avensis has a CVT box with seven fixed ratios and drives beautifully, none of the roaring engine and sluggishness of the under powered Prius, just smooth, quiet and acceptably rapid.

I think I need to consider carefully the age of the vehicle with respect to facelift or otherwise, tax and associated gadgets. The pano roof is even more optional as I envisage a roof box may occasionally be useful. Very good to know that there are no obvious red flags. Any other thoughts and comments are very welcome. It will be an interesting balance between age/facelift, mileage, price and the implications for the, potentially, ten year warranty. I aim to optimise each of these as far as possible.

thank you all.

First_Lexus · June 16, 2021

19 hours ago, george72 said:

Hi everyone, just joined this forum and i am in a very similar situation to 'Royal Enfield'. I have just sold my BMW 530d luxury and looking to swap to an NX300h. I have a similar budget and want to know if i would be better to hold out for a face lift model or are the pre facelift models fine? Important things to me are comfort and reduced noise-Does the facelift model make a difference to comfort/refinement level.

apologies in advance if i should have started a new thread.

many thanks

I’ve owned both a pre-facelift NX and have owned my facelift for three years this week (MOT on Friday).

Differences are minor, although the facelift is slightly smoother, quieter and more economical in my experience - but the differences are small, and only noticeable if you jump from one to the other. The bigger difference is that the facelift has the larger navigation screen, which allows upgrade to add apple Car Play and Android Auto.

Personally, I’d buy on condition and mileage. If the deal for a pre-facelift is good, and the larger screen doesn’t bother you, there’s nothing in my experience to suggest that would be a bad decision.

Martin J · June 16, 2021

1 hour ago, First_Lexus said:

Differences are minor, although the facelift is slightly smoother, quieter and more economical in my experience - but the differences are small, and only noticeable if you jump from one to the other. The bigger difference is that the facelift has the larger navigation screen, which allows upgrade to add Apple Car Play and Android Auto.

I've driven facelift cars (as loan cars) and would agree with this. The slightly improved ride and reduced noise was noticeable when I first jumped out of my car into a facelift. But soon afterward I fitted new tyres (Michelin CrossClimates), which delivered an almost identical improvement in NVH, so there's not much in it.