Time To Trade In 2002 Rx200 (Possibly)

[vilmosz]

First, let me introduce myself. My name is Vil, I live in Santa Monica, which is a great place to live, although it's hard to make it the quarter mile to the beach during the summer when the ocean attracts our many thousands of seasonal visitors. It's always great to find a community like the Lexus Owner's Club on the web; having perused the comments and posts, I appreciate the work that goes into this by admins and members.

Couple years ago, in 2007, I purchased a pre-cert 2002 for my wife. The main draw was the low miles (60,000 at the time) and the price was 21k, with a full five year warranty. (I knew we'd need it because of the transmission issue common to these models/years.)

Now that our pre-schoolers are grade-schoolers, it's time to consider a minivan, and I'm inclined toward a pre-cert Sienna. We still owe $8k on the RX200 (@6.6%) and I'm wondering in broad strokes how to approach a possible trade in type situation and if there is any upside to dealing with Toyota completely in this process.

BTW -- the RX-200 has served us well; the local service folks have been great and extended themselves on several occasions to address the inevitable oversights of the pre-cert folks. They've given us some service for free or at cost.