Acura vs. Lexus

actually a pre-2006 model (this is noted because of the lacking integrated fog lights), & 3) Chris Pirillo no longer drives a TSX, but instead drives an Acura RL. I don’t know what automotoprotal.com was doing, but it sure wasn’t research. Here is the entry from Chris Pirillo when he was thinking of “upgrading” his Acura TSX. Being a TSX owner myself, I actually left a comment on that entry in September of last year. At that time, I had no idea Mr. Pirillo was “famous.”

How about making your next car a google?

http://www.electriccarnetwork.com/hybrid_cars/will_your_next_car_be_a_google/

Chris, you have a great car in the Acura TSX, but there haven’t really
been to many changes from 2004 to the 2006 model your driving now.
The lexus is an all new while Acura won’t have an all new TSX untill next year.
But the biggest difference between the two is that the IS250 is rear wheel
drive, you just can’t beat it for balance and handling.

This is why BMW, Mercedes and the rest stick to rear wheel drive, there’s
just not a better combination.

You can’t go wrong with the Acura, but it’s an older design, the Lexus is
brand new off the drawing board.

Get the Lexus. To me it’s better quality, and looks nicer. It’s got Bluetooth, nav, and all that stuff too.
IS Interior
At least take one for a drive.

Chris,

Good to hear the that you really appreciate the Acura TSX. I am the IT director at an Acura dealership in Boulder Colo. I also manage the sales people. Let me know if need any help.

Brian

There’s only one real geek car – the Toyota Prius. It’s got everything you mentioned above, plus that warm fuzzy feeling of doing the planet something good

Japanese cars are the only cars I would consider leasing, good choice. They hold their value well so the residual value is high. Your lease is cheaper because it is worth quite a bit when you turn it in.

You can walk into dealership to look but I never buy or lease like that. You can save thousands using the Internet and you can dicker via email. Much more pleasent than face to face with a car salesman.

You do this by getting quotes from edmunds.com and kellybluebook.com from nearby dealerships. The local dealers have internet sales guys that respond via email.

If you are leasing again, (it helps at tax time if self-employed and drive business miles) understand the formula explained at leaseguide.com.
All leases use this formula and you need to ask the dealer while negotiating the price, what the values are for “money factor” and residual value. The dealer knows what they are, but they may not want to tell you if they are screwing you on the real price of the car.
When a factory lease special is advertised on TV, these values are in the fine print. Usually they are great deals, because the money factor (interest rate) is low (VW is offerring 0% for instance) and the residual is high.

Why on earth would you lease a car? Cars depreciate faster than any purchase on the planet and when you lease you pay more longer and depreciate faster.

For the money, there is no better car/value. I love my ‘05 TSX.

My vote goes with Hubert Kay. Although it should clearly be pointed out that there was yet another recent recall in regards to those vehicles. This is on top of the one in relation to the onboard computer highway glitch – better known as the stall problem. The most recent issue involved a problem with steering / faulty parts. Granted Toyota is far from the only company that has seen major recalls this year.

celery – that’s exactly why you lease. You buy things that appreciate, and lease or rent things that don’t. Obviously I’m over simplifying here, but in Canada when you lease a vehicle you don’t have to finance taxes, and at lease end, like Chris P has, you have choices – Buy it, sell it, give it back. If you like keeping cars a long time I suppose that leasing might not be the best way, but I wouldn’t finance a car any other way.
Chris.

First, forget haggling – unless you stack the deck. My best haggling experience was in ‘87 when I bought a new Accord, and did some reasearch beforehand (not online in those days) from Consumer Reports about dealer cost factors. I looked at the cars with my wife and then she went to work and I *then* sat down with the sales guy. He did the usual thing of putting numbers on paper which represented *payments* and I knew that was NOT the way to go, I wanted to talk price of the car, leave the financing out of it. They gave me their “best price” and then I called my wife at work, and told her what it was – she thought it was a good deal but they of course couldn’t hear that – I said, “too high, yeah, I agree” – they couldn’t hear her laughter – and we succeeded in getting about another $400 off the car that way. Now, I recommend Remar Sutton’s “Don’t Get Taken Every Time” – http://www.amazon.com/Dont-Get-Taken-Every-Time/dp/0141001496/sr=1-1/qid=1159086946/ref=pd_bbs_1/104-8403592-7547105?ie=UTF8&s=books
he was an ex-super-salesman who tells everything about the car biz – and how to evaluate leases, very important. I read it (or at least the important parts) every time I buy a car. And, – look, I work for them – but I *do* recommend going online with http://carsdirect.com – you get the option of buying through them or getting a good price and a referral. No haggling. Any questions, email me…

Uh, the way that should have read is, “you get a good price (up front, online, no information needed), and the option of buying through them OR a referral to a dealer who will honor that price.”

[...] Okay, I think I want to lease a 2006 Acura TSX (with a few bells and whistles, like the navigation system and MP3/WMA add-in). My lease with Honda is up in another month, so I have to “scramble” to get my next car lined up before then. There have been fantastic suggestions in my Acura vs. Lexus post, including links to no-dicker resources and/or the idea of getting a car sponsored by any given dealership. I’m wondering if I should reverse engineer this entire car leasing process? Who wants to give me an offer I simply can’t refuse? I’m throwing my business out there – who wants it? acura, acura tsx, auto, automobile, car, car dealership, car lease, honda, lexus, tsx [...]

I too love my 2005 Acura TSX. The Lexus is nice, but also more expensive. For all the people who think rear wheel drive cars handle so much better than front wheel drive cars should google RealTime racing. They’re a team that uses only Acura cars, they compete and WIN against the likes of BMW, Audi, Mazda, and etc.

The TSX is a great car but keep in mind the new one is due for 2008; can you extend the lease one year?

I like a lot of things that have been added since its debut: memory seats, heated mirrors etc etc but I am not a fan of the new rims or the new lights on the gauge clusters.

Personally, I would try to wait till the new model comes just to see what it has: hybrid, SH-AWD, ventilated seats …. ?

Chris,

You need to get it for free by slapping something like “Lockergnome… powered by Acura” on the side. Heck you are the out of the box advertiser (first and only chest advertiser that I know of).

I have heard nothing but positive things about the Acura TSX, I am sure you will be happy with it.

Alan

chris, dont be cheap and get the LX470. the acura is a piece of shit

get a bentley or something, get a job

Hi Chris,

Can I rent you Acura for a week?

I can offer one thousand dollars and give you a Ford Explorer for the time that we have your car.

Our company is at 2111 30th street on Boulder Suite L and we do data collections for speech recognition systems in cars and we are currently using a 2006 Acura but that is going back to the client Saturday the 25th but the collection still needs to continue.
In the meantime I am trying to contact dealers or private onwers so that we can complete the collection. We’ll even have it steam cleaned for you.

thanks,

David Cole
President, Sound of Sound, Inc.

BBB Denver Member
Yes this is all very strange so call me at 720-494-1920 if you are interested.

[...] Acura vs. Lexus  [...]

[...] black Acura TSX merged in front of me. I subscribe to Chris’ blog’s feed so I know that he’s a TSX owner. The really weird thing was that there were 3 Acura vehicles in a row in front of me, but [...]

I got a 2008 TSX which promptly died on me and has been waiting for parts for 2 weeks. I got seriously ticked off today and test-drive the IS250 to see if I should just cut my losses and change cars. (1) The IS250 has got to be the smallest, most uncomfortable car in this class. I’m not sure why they bother putting in the back-seat. The front seat is too narrow and the telescopic feature on the steering wheel is hardly worth it. I think it moves about 1 inch at best. It’s not nearly as torque-y as the TSX. Honestly, between the IS and the ES (which I also drove) the ES felt more like the TSX to me. The big difference is the Navigation system. My mother and my father-in-law both have Lexus navigation and neither system is terribly intuitive. Acura’s Navi system is the benchmark for which all nav systems should be judged. Now if they could just make my TSX actually RUN, all would be good.

Actually Front-Wheel Drive is more stable on the road than real wheel drive. Think about it, when driving in snow (or in any circumstance) when the drive wheels slip on a rear wheel drive vehicle there is very little weight on them and cenctrifugal forces will cause them to swing out to the side like a pendulum, and because the wheels are moving on their own power they have very little friction with the road surface causing the car to “fish tail”. The faster the vehicle is moving the worse the “fish tale is”, im pretty sure you already knew this but the person who said that real wheel drive is “more balanced” is a fool. In a front wheel drive car the weight of the engine is directly over the drive wheels, providing much better tractioon with the road in all conditions. A front wheel drive vehicle rarely “fish tails” because the drive wheels dictate direction.