I have been a Toyota fan since my first car - a 1998 Camry that ran for 170K miles. It was silky smooth and we had a good run for 16 years.
I then bought a 2012 Sienna which has been great as well. After selling my Camry, I was in the market for an SUV - I wanted an upscale lease return vehicle 2-3 years old at around $40K.
My credit union was able to set me up with a good price at a Lexus CPO dealership and I bought a 2014 Lexus RX350 with 10K miles on it.
At the dealer, I test drove a couple of RX350s - I expected that the car wwould be absolutely quiet and the driving experience would be like playing a video game (total isolation from the road which is a good thing in my book). However, this was not the case - I could feel the purr of the engine and there was mild road noise. My Camry was so quiet that on many occasions I had to glance at the RPM indicator to know that the car was running, but both my Sienna and Lexus are newer models but not that quiet (but still better than the competitor models). After driving the second vehicle, I realized that the RX 350 was not going to give me total isolation.
So what do I like about the Lexus? The seating position is comfortable, soft touch materials everywhere and nice optional extras like parking sensors and blind spot monitor.
The bad - the NAV package is horrible to use. It is too verbose when giving me audio directions and inputting information is cumbersome as the screen is not a touch screen. All commands are via using the small mouse-like controller in the center and it is not an quick and easy UX. I much prefer my Garmin GPS. However, the NAV package gives me a big screen which means my back up camera view is very good. Lexus really needs to move to a touch screen - if they can fix an iPad at the center, that would be awesome.
The central storage console holds contains two cupholders and faces the passenger side - awkward to use. A separate central storage opens near the passenger arm rest. It has a USB jack to charge phones. The storage space is fairly minimal and not well designed. The overall ergonomics are not well though out - the seat heater dial switch for example faces east-west instead of the more comfortable noth-south.
The SUV is nice to drive and my friends and colleagues have given good comments about it. The Lexus name does have a nice cachet.
I will update the review once I drive more; at the moment, I've done a 10 days worh of driving - many small trips and a couple of 2 hour drives. The ride has been good and not fatiguing. I have high expectations and the Lexus has met the major ones.
