I had a first gen Lexus IS for 10 years and loved it. I also purchased a CPO and only had one issue the whole time: O2 sensors needed replacing which cost $350. Otherwise, nothing but $60 synthetic oil changes every 5K and $1000 for the 60,000 maintenance.
It was not expensive to insure. I think the last year was about $500 for $150K of coverage.
There are certain places I miss it since I now have a weaker car. One spot is the ramp onto the 15 by the Aero Drive Frye’s that you go from a stop to a steep hill to the highway. I used to floor it up the hill from a stop which was a lot of fun.
The great handling also let me go on curved ramps faster than I can do now. It took a couple sad months to adjust.
You can’t compare it to a Miata or non-lux sport sedan as it comes with a lots of lux features standard.
The driver and passenger seats both adjusted 30 ways electronically, there was a compass in the mirror, and the leather seats used good leather. The stock stereo system was also really good.
Random fact: the first gen IS (up to 05) and mid 2000’s Lexus SC were the last production cars to come with tape decks. I had an iPod in 2004, so tape decks were several generations out of date at that point. However, I find that the tape deck to audio adapter works better than FM adapters my friends were using to play their ipods. Now of course cars have Aux.
