Any reason to avoid higher mileage Tacoma?

Right, I'd forgotten about this crucial distinction. Out here on the west coast, CA / OR / NV / AZ etc., with no salt on the roads cars can last literally forever.

In the rust belt its an entirely different matter unless you take excessive care to do complete underbody & inside-door-and-rocker-panel cavity petroleum-lanolin treatments annually.

 

In my experience, at 15 years my vehicles start becoming a hassle. That includes our family Toyotas and Hondas. The mileage doesn’t seem to have much of an impact. It’s just the age that eventually eats bushings and seals and makes plastic brittle. You can also disguise a terrible maintenance history with a pressure washer and an oil change, but the internal damage is done.

Near the end of my beloved 2005 4-Runners life, I started getting an endless series of minor issues and even though the body was fine, it was clear I was losing the frame rust battle. The lack of a monthly payment just wasn’t worth it anymore.

With the high resale of used cars, I spent less monthly driving a new vehicle (2019 Civic Sport 6MT) than repairing my old one. I plan to bail on my ‘23 as soon as it’s paid for and get something else.

Life is too short to be replacing a frozen brake caliper in the middle of winter, laying on wet cardboard in my barely heated garage.

 

maintaining the vehicle on schedule with a cheap seal kit would have prevented this.

 

Just curious, what did the frame-rust battle involve in your case? Did you power-wash the underbody annually (in summer,) let it dry completely, and then apply a complete new coat of lanolin-petroleum type protective coating such as woolwax, fluidfilm, etc?

Curious because I live in CA now but might move to a rust-belt state at some point in the near- to mid- future.

 

Have you test driven both? I was split between a used 2015 tacoma vs. a new 2018 tacoma back in 2018. My personal opinion, but the 4.0L V6 just felt too good vs 3.5L V6. Now I have almost 100k miles on it, and there has been no issues at all in the last 70k miles and more to come. I don't think you should worry about 150k miles as long as you make sure everything checks out with the truck.

 

I did drive both. The 10 felt a bit stronger off idle but both pulled fine through the gears. My mom has a 17 DCLB with the auto and I do not like driving it due to the gear hunting (to be fair, my BMW has an 8spd Getrag automatic and it's similar with the constant shifting) which drives me nuts. Maybe I'm a luddite but I definitely prefer a manual transmission.

 

My approach was cleaning and using some Por-15 or equivalent. Then one day my jack sunk into the frame while I was doing a tire rotation. The section looked fine externally. It was rusting from the inside. That’s another reason I’m selling early and enjoying the 3-5 years of the 10+ trouble free years we’ve always gotten from Toyota. With the great resale, that seems to be the sweet spot unless you drive them into the ground. (My previous approach, which is fine too.)

 

Meh… Taking my brakes apart periodically isn’t really practical, and using my shade-tree skills to mess around with things that aren’t broken only increases the likelihood of catastrophic failure. My brother is always extolling the virtues of his ‘95 Subaru, but it’s usually with grease under his fingernails from his last attempt to keep it on the road.

 

I'm not afraid of high miles if I'm the one who put most of them on the vehicle. But I don't look at 150,000 miles as a lot for a Tacoma. I bought my 2007 new and it's at 245,000 now. I've replaced the alternator. Other than that, just normal stuff like brakes, tires, and batteries.

This is still a tough call though especially without knowing the asking prices for each. In the long term the 23 might be cheaper. If like me, you're thinking about driving it till you get to at least 300,000 miles the 2010 will be there in another 150,000 miles. You can drive the 23 for almost 290,000 miles before you get to 300,000. I'd have to play with some numbers and see which way works out the cheapest to get there.

 

This is true, my frame went at 117K. Last year I had the intermediate steering shaft and then the oil pan go, both due to rust/rot as well.

 

They're asking 17,995 for the 2010 and are offering me $8k for my BMW which leaves me upside down pretty badly, somewhere along the lines of 25k for the 10.

The 23 is listed for 41k but agreed on 38,5 with a trade value 1k off what I owe on it.

Having a trade in that I owe more on than dealer valued trade kicked me in the nuts with this.

 

They have to make a living off the differences but I’d decline unless they can significantly sweeten the deal.

 

up to you. Did mine well past 100k while I was in there made it a bit easier. Was already working on it area taken apart probably to do ECGS bushing or something.

Quick and dirty clean, pop out pistons, shove back in with kit then maintenance bleed. Or I guess 4runner BBK would accomplish that.

trades can be lowball vs selling

 

3rd gens get better MPG. That said, get the 2nd gen, if you're fine with those prices.

 

Have to say I was impressed with the MPG on the 22 Offroad DCSB I rented recently. Was almost 24 in a mix of city/highway for the week. Pretty close to my 2.7 in my 2010

 

turbo ford ranger gets better MPG.
So do V8’s.

I wonder if saving $20k on a vehicle leaves some money left for gas and how many hundreds of years it takes to spend that on gas

or how long until something large breaks on 16-23 and what that costs

 

My '09 oil pan needs replacing due to rust. Out of curiosity, what did it cost you to replace it?

 

Financing $25k for a 14 year old vehicle (lets call it half of life remaining, for fun), or financing $38k for a 1 year old vehicle? Is that what I'm hearing here? That is not a difficult decision, but I don't really think either is a good choice.

Why are you getting such different trade-in values for your car? What is it worth private party (or Carvana, KBB, etc.). I've had good luck with KBB instant offers, fyi, about 9k over the trade-in offers on two cars.

If you buy either one you're immediately upsidedown again, which is a poor financial decision for anyone, let alone a growing family. Do you need a truck or want a truck? You can easily find a lightly used Sienna, Odyssey, Highlander, Rav4, etc. for less money and fewer miles. Your future self will thank you (Tacoma back seats are stupid for kid crap, not a vehicle I'd choose if I was having a kid).

 

I am not saying either is the right answer but the fact the old one has that price tells you something.

Lower pan you can probably do for like $50.

 

I had it done, was $1100 for the new pan and getting a transmission fluid change as well. Guessing more like a G for the oil piece.