Thinking about buying a 2008 4wd Access Cab

Hello Tacomaworld, First post!
I said goodbye today to my little car that could...a 1999 honda civic that I have had since feb of 1999....it suffered an early death by stopping a 2000 mazda with it's front left wheen (Totaled...I think the 2 oldest cars in town hit each other!) And since I am a homeowner and sick of borrowing my neighbors 2000 silverado whenever I have to do anything manly I am thinking of a Tacoma for a replacement. I have a very short commute for work each day and I would probably put less than 10K a year on the truck.
I found a 2008 Tacoma manual 4x4 4cyl access cab with 77k on it. It looks great and I took it for a minor test drive with the caveat that I would be back for a REAL test drive if I was close to purchasing... and have talked them down to a flexible low $16K on it pending little issues.
It's a one owner truck with what looks to be a well maintained truck. No smell, clean..It had a great ride. I was wondering what things to look for on my return trip. I know there can be leaf spring issue? (look for 4 instead of 3?) I will be under the thing with a flashlight looking for rust etc. I know to drive it on highways (with hills, but i have never been power hungry...i had a honda civic for goodness sake!) I will test the 4wd, 4low, hard braking, tight steering, all the usual stuff....But an tips on things I might forget to check with a 2008 tacoma?

Thanks all, hope to join the owners club some day...enjoy some pics (My kid wants it because it's blue..so i HAVE to get it right?)

 

nice to see u got a rim upgrade (those are trd sport 17" rims)

 

IDK it's a truck I am buying...description said "Steel Wheels"...I believe that they are the ones offered by Toyota..Ah, you say they are TRD 17"s that must be the "sport package" the truck has that gives it a better ride...it was nice and stiff on bumps without that pick-up truck bounce you get on a lot of trucks..But they look 100x better than the stock wheels on the 2010 next to it...

 

its not a trd sport (the truck), sorry.........those are only available in V6, and have scooped hoods, color matched mirrors, power outlet in rear, different seats, so on and so forth.

those rims are aluminum tho, and from the sport package....unless they were offered as an upgrade...def NOT steel in that picture tho

 

i bought mine with a hood bug deflector like what you have and then i had it taken off cause i didnt like it and the clips from it actually chipped the paint on my hood, also when i bought mine someone warned me about the manual transmissions, they said they had some issues with there's but mine is a V6 and i havent had a single issue with it, take a look and see is there is any types of recalls on it to.

 

its missing the engine cover....

but i love my 08,

 

its a 4 cylinder....

 

Are you down on the 4cyl due to the lack of power? The V6 is quite a bit more expensive and gets worse mileage..
I don't need a massive towing machine and the truck will only be on the highway when I need to use it...I wouldn't have a power issue. I would guess my daily avg speed is about 35mph (8 mile commute to work...)
I go through 4 to 5 cords of firewood a year and if I had a truck there are tons of places (friends with trees) that I could get some wood here and there...that would prob save me $500 a winter...I don't mean that I am going to have the bed overflowing with wood...just a reasonable 800lbs or something..

 

me?

no, i dont care what people drive....ur money, ur rig, ur needs....I think u missed the quote I included.

the other guy said "its missing the engine cover"

so I stated "its a four cylinder".........meaning, the 4 cylinder doesnt have a huge plastic shield/engine cover that I assume the other poster was looking for.....I get 2 pics, gimme a minute.

 

V6 large plastic rectangular cover




4cylinder....no massive plastic "engine cover" and looks like the 1 u pictured.....so it looks fine to me




I hope that cleared things up if u thought I was trash talking 4 cylinders......its a toyota and will run forever V6 or I4.....if u dont need the V6, then by all means save the money and the gas...I have NO issues about the truck ur planning on buying at all

 

The ONLY bad thing is that Toyota started putting the OEM rear view camera on the 09 models, but the truck looks great, and Tacomas are awesome so have fun with it

 

this one sold before I got a chance to get in and check it out...but I will keep up the hunt!