Expected longevity.

I have an 07 Tacoma that I have had for years. I am the second owner and have taken care of it very well, and the previous owner had the dealership take care of it to a T for the first 180k. She is now sitting at 250k and I’m starting to wonder how long she has left. What can I expect for the future of a second gen Tacoma with 250k? Will she stay reliable, or start nickel and diming me to death. Is there any major failures like transmission or engine to worry about? She needs some love like new suspension soon and I’m wondering if I should keep investing in this truck or start thinking about the next one.

 

Good for 500k easy. Look at like this. Even if you put 2000k year in repairs and maintenance for the next 10 years. It’s still 25-30k cheaper than a new one.

 

I prefer to drive my vehicles to the junkyard.
If a vehicle is well maintained, it can last a long time. Driven by a sensible driver, it will last even longer.
Do a compression test, compare to factory specs can tell you a good deal about the condition of your internal engine environment. If it's OK, the most major engine repair would be head gaskets, valve job or timing chain. Fix stuff yourself and get a good feel for the condition of the truck.
Check out the price of new trucks.

 

It will go until you get Crank/Cam correlation codes.
And then it will still run. But it will be in limp mode.

It seems the closer you get to 400k the more likely you are to start experiencing “money” problems.
Money= Big ticket/repair items.

Head gaskets are a concern too.
But any engine with 300k “could” have that issue.
That’s an issue you don’t even worry about. You can’t. It just “happens”.

 

How's your frame and suspension with respect to rust? If everything isn't rusted to pieces, you can replace a lot of stuff and keep the ole girl going for several years. Keep your oil changed and do your routine maintenance and she'll go a long time.
My goal is to someday report here that I made it to 500,000 miles. I'm at 156,000 now and have been pretty adamant about PMs and frame spraying.
But, I like to work on stuff.

As a side note, my dad is 92 and is still replacing broken exhaust manifold studs and fuel pumps for other members of my family. I plan on doing the same.

 

I think you meant $2K. 2000K is 2 million. But $2K per year for 10 years is throwing good money after bad. There comes a time to let it go. You can buy a new Tacoma for around $40K. The truck you have is worth around $8-10K. That means you only have to come up with $30-$32K to buy a new one. Your truck sold new for about $30K. Put another $20K in it over the next 10 years and you have $50K in a nearly 30-year-old truck.

If he trades now, in 10 years he will have a 10 year old truck that he has $30 invested in. If he keeps his old truck for 10 more years and spends $20K to keep it running he will have a 27 year old truck that he has $50K in.

But I don't think you'll need anywhere near $20K to keep it running another 10 years. My 07 has 243,000 miles on it and so far I haven't spent $2K on repairs. I expect at least 400,000 before the engine or transmission goes. Will make a decision if that ever happens, but it may be time to go to the scrap yard.

I still think the most economical way is to let them go while they still have some value. At 10 years and 150,000 miles any pickup will sell for 50%-60% of what they sold for new, and you'd be very unlucky to spend any real money on repairs. You can get 50-60% of your initial investment back and apply it to the down payment on the next one. You will end up having about the same amount of money invested in the new truck as the guy who buys your 10-year-old truck. And the 2nd owner gets to pay for the repairs.

If you have good credit there are still some very low interest rates. With a significant down payment (50% or more of the vehicles price) low interest, short term loans will cost you very little in interest. I only borrowed $10K to buy my 07 new and paid it off in 2 years at 2% interest.

 

expecting mine to last 1m miles or more doing repairs as needed.

you can do a compression test to assess the cylinders.

The drivetrain is reliable.