Hi there. I’m new to the Lexus community so please bear with me if I’m asking newb/rookie questions.

TLDR is at the bottom.

I currently drive a 2021 Honda Acoord 1.5L Sport Edition and I am having a buyer’s remorse. It does it’s job of getting me to point A to point B but it feels like I’m driving plastic. Granted, it’s built quality inside is solid, no creaks or anything. Back room is roomy.

I’ve been doing extensive research on BMW because that is what I loved as my first luxury sports car. I used to drive a 2009 BMW 335i xDrive Coupe. Did not like the turbo lag though.

I drove a 2019 CPO ES 350 last week and I fell in love. It’s smooth and luxuries (the ventilated seats also got me for my sweaty bottom…) and it seemed solid and upon researching it seems as if Lexus is the best luxury brand in terms of reliability.

I’m at a point where I’m just not into sports cars as much. I want a BMW but I do not have the finance to lease every three years nor I am willing to own one to pay a leg for maintenance and repairs every year.

This is the reason why I’m here.

I want to custom order a Lexus ES 350 UL however when I went to the Lexus dealership at Indianapolis they told me that for the past year and a half Lexus is rejecting all custom or special orders from clients for some reason so I will be unable to order. It sounds to me that me and the dealership are at the mercy of buying whatever is on the way or the lot.

The salesperson wasn’t being a **** either and was professional.

My last car was a 2020 Ford F-150 and I absolutely hated the dealership experience I went through. I just want to custom order my ES 350 to the way I want it.

Has anybody else experience this in the recent pandemic? If not, then how do I force the dealer for a custom order?

Im at that point where I want to buy a high quality reliable car and have it last long. I believe Lexus can do that.

I am also considering test driving a 300h however I haven’t had the chance. Mostly not because I test drive a Honda Accord Hybrid and I hated how it drove but I’ve heard good things about the 300h experience.

Your response is greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

TLDR: I want to special order a Lexus ES 350 UL but dealership said no one is able to custom order one from the last year and a half for some reason. Is this true? If not how do I convince the dealership to custom order? Salesperson was professional and he didn’t force me to buy anything else.

 

Within the last year members of the forum have posted that they've been able to place special orders for Lexus. However, if you've been reading current posts on this forum you would have seen that obtaining ANY Ultra Lux ES 350 is difficult to impossible. Special order or off the lot. Due to current conditions all over America, car dealers have few UL 350's. Not saying that you couldn't find one somewhere for bucks over list, but very difficult. Do a search of the forum and you'll find the many posts regarding this issue. GOOD LUCK!

 

It is in line with what I heard from at least 15 dealers across the east coast that Lexus doesn't take custom orders at this point. They will probably resume custom orders in the future but who knows when! Just call many dealerships (and even outside your local region) and see if they have any allocation/incoming in UL with color combo you want. I ended up getting mine from a dealer 1200 miles away and it was just an allocation that they had. Took about 4 weeks for the dealership to get it and its being transported to me as we speak.

 

So in regarding to that, can you work with a dealership that has a dealer allocation for a UL to “special” order what you want out of a UL with their allocation? I guess the biggest thing for me is the blue exterior color, palomino interior, mark levingston audio and the 18/19 inch wheel noise reduction.

 

No, allocation is not changeable. From what I learned they should just take what Lexus allocates to them and it cannot be customized. Blue exterior is a tough one to find. In my search, I saw white black red with palomino or acorn or the white one in different combos

 

Dealers won't change anything in an allocation car and would just sell the car to someone else who would accept it as is... In my opinion the whole concept of buying a new car is upside down. Spend $50-60k and not get what you want? Really unfortunate for those of you willing to spend that amount and not get what you actually want. And it doesn't look like the end of this BS is anywhere in sight. One of the few times I got timing right when I bought my 2019 UL 350. I wish you good luck in finding what you want and believe that patience is a necessity...

 

I am a Sales Manger (not at Lexus) and the current chip shortages are making it near impossible to get the vehicles in a timely basis.

I tell folks if they want a vehicle and they want something specific it will be a year or more. I know it’s not what they want to hear.

 

Holy cow. Well I guess it is a waiting game then. I appreciate for your response.

 

First, be flexible where you can do so and still get the most essential parts of what you want. The noise reduction wheels, for example, can be added after the fact to any ES. I think TXWJ steered you straight.

 

Lexus will REOPEN special orders for the Ultra Luxury (UL) model soon. Just because they aren't taking special orders on the UL right now doesn't mean that they will not take special orders in the near future. I just placed a special order for a 2022 UL with my local Lexus dealer early last week. I gave a $1,000 deposit and I told them what color and options that I wanted. The dealership will put through my special order as soon as Lexus reopens its production run for the Ultra Luxury model. There is no way that Lexus will stop making the UL model so early in 2022. It's still February and it's still only the beginning of the year and because of this there will be continuing production of the UL soon. Lexus will build more UL models within the next 1 to 2 months. The UL will become available again once production for it will restart again. Do NOT believe the dealers when they tell you that you cannot special order a UL. That's BS. They say that because they want you to buy something else that's NOT the UL that they either have in stock or to buy an ES350 that's a non UL model.

 

You can STILL special order an Ultra Luxury ES350. It's still the beginning of the year and Lexus will eventually RESTART production of the UL sometime in the next month or two. They've already built some UL's in December and in January that other people have special ordered back in October, November and December. They've just had to wait a few months for their cars to be built. That's all. Lexus will restart building the UL once they reopen the production run for the UL and they will start fulfilling the special orders again for this particular model. I just put down $1,000 early last week and I put in a special order for a 2022 Ultra Luxury ES350 in the particular exterior and interior color and options that I want. My dealer will place my order when Lexus reopens the allocation for the production run for the UL again. It will probably take 2 to 3 months before I get my UL, but the wait isn't that long and it's worth it because I will get exactly what I like in the exact color, exact interior and exact options that I like. Do NOT believe what your dealer says that the UL will not be built that no more UL vehicles will be built anytime soon. He's lying to you. Go ahead and put your special order in and your dealer will place your order in as soon as Lexus reopens the UL production again. Production for the UL will reopen within the next one to 2 months in March or April. Dealers say what they say to you because they want to try to get you to buy a different ES350 other than a UL ES350. I don't go for that. I would rather wait 1 to 2 months and get the exact model UL that I want.

 

Glam, I'm sure you sincerely believe what you're posting. But with all due respect to you, your post is an opinon and a prediction, not a report of the facts on the ground.

When multiple posters tell us that their dealers refuse to take a special order for them, it's unlikely they're all lying. And when I and others wait over 4 months for a special-order car and then the factory closes down entirely, you're likely to be left standing at the altar if you expect to stop by your dealer in six weeks and find your new car waiting to greet you. If the factory does resume UL production that soon, it will first fill the orders already placed, not the one an optimist places today. Confidently telling others here that they should all treat their dealers as liars and demand a delivery that's physically impossible to fulfill shapes up as an exercise in self-delusion by you (which is your right) and setting up frustration and failure for others (which is not).

 

When Lexus reopens, yes, they will resume production first to fill orders already placed. I know that. Lexus only shut down for the weekend. They have reopened again for production right now. Also, commerce and transportation has reopened again between Ottawa and the USA at the Ambassador Bridge today. The blockade of the tractor trailers has ended as of this morning at that particular commercial border crossing. So right now, Lexus and all the other automotive companies and automotive parts companies will be able to transport auto parts through the Ottawa border into the USA to all the different auto plants in the USA and also to the Lexus auto plant in Kentucky.

The UL will eventually be built soon as Lexus starts fulfilling the existing orders and the special orders. The current waiting period is between 2 to 3 months. Even if at the worse possible scenario, if the wait is going to be a 4 month waiting period for the UL model, that still means that the UL will eventually still be built sometime in April or in May 2022. Actually, 3 to 4 months from now isn’t a very long waiting period. Lexus still has the UL model listed on their website and in their year 2022 ES Lexus brochure, so that means that they will eventually build it sometime in the near future during the springtime in March, April and May of 2022. By placing a special order in February 2022 like I did for a 2022 ES350 UL, you will put yourself in line to be able to get the car built in the next 2 to 3 months and get delivery of your UL sometime in April or May of 2022. Lexus is not going to stop production of the UL anytime soon for the 2022 model year. And starting next year, for the 2023 model year, Lexus will be shipping and importing all the ES350 models, including the UL model directly from Japan. The ES350 UL model isn’t going anywhere anytime soon.

The dealers do not like to tell people to special order the UL or any other ES350 because they want to get people to take something that’s already on the lot. They discourage customers from placing a special order by telling them that the UL will not be built and by making customers think that the UL will never be built again in 2022. That’s not true though. The dealers are lying. Placing a special order will place you on the waiting list for your car to be built. It might take 3 or 4 months to get your car, but your car will still get built.

It’s still early in 2022 and Lexus has more ES350’s, U and UL cars that they will build. They’re not going to stop building these cars as long as there are orders placed for them.

 

Wait, you can order/get the noise reduction wheels at the dealership after you get the car? That would make sense. Obviously things like the Mark Levingston can’t be added (or at least not as easily) after the car is made.

 

Thank you for the words of encouragement. By no means the dealer tried to buy me a different car. They said to me, in quote, “no one has been able to custom order a car for the last year and a half”. That baffled me because, like I said, I want a BMW but I do not have the financial capabilities to do so. I’m not at the point in my life where I can just lease one and throw away and rinse repeat or to buy one and maintain it.

They were really professional and didn’t sway me in anyway. I just told them I’ll be back some other time and I thank them for their time. The salesman told me he will reach out to me once he found a car that is “close” to the configuration I wanted out of my custom UL I wanted to do. LOL.

So either he’s going to contact me later saying he found a car that is close to my config or he tells me “omg a custom order allocation has opened up! Place your $$$$$ deposit so we can make it happen!”

I’m willing to wait it out. I just want to buy one before the next generation comes out (that’s only me assuming they will go turbo i6/i4 which I’m not a fan) the ES 350 is super smooth and it’s something I haven’t experienced in awhile.