Remember when minivans were not exactly status symbols? Lexus apparently thinks people can be persuaded to reconsider. The LM500h is the brand’s most expensive model in export markets, with a starting price of $107,000 for the Royal (yes, really) trim and $142,000 for the Executive – which makes it more expensive than a top-of-the-line Mercedes S-Class or BMW 7-Series sedan.
And it’s a minivan.
This minivan may replace the current top-of-the-line Lexus in this market, which is and has been, for decades, the LS series sedan. It is being retired after the end of the 2026 model year. Could a minivan take its place? It already has – in export markets.
To be fair, it is an extremely posh minivan. It has a real wood steering wheel, reclining (and massaging) passenger seats, a beverage chiller and a 48 inch LCD display for the passengers to gawp at as the van rolls down the road. But still – it’s a minivan. One that hasn’t even got a six cylinder engine, by the way – forget a V8 (which the retiring Lexus flagship sedan, the LS, used to come standard with). Instead, what you get for $142,000 is a 2.4 liter turbo-hybrid-augmented four cylinder engine – because naturlich people who can afford to spend $142,000 on a vehicle are “concerned” about gas mileage.
All that’s missing from this clown show are the actual clowns – who ought to be hired to spill out of the side doors in the commercial for this thing.
Will people buy it? Well, about 85 percent of the populace apparently bought the “COVID” drugs.
Marketing (and social pressure) can work meerakuhls! Still, it calls to mind that scene in the movie, Rob Roy, in which the Marquess of Montrose – played with brilliance by John Hurt – checks Archie, his henchman, played with equal brilliance by Tim Roth: Do you take me entirely for a whig? – that is, an idiot – the Marquess asks Archie, who expects the Marquess to believe his sudden wealth came from winning at cards rather than skullduggery.
Some will remember the brilliance of the marketing campaign that sold the Chrysler Cordoba – say it like Ricardo Montalban said it – back in the mid-1970s. Especially the line about “soft, Corinthian leather.” Some consider this the apotheosis of cheesy marketing, in part because of the hilarious disco suit worn by Montalban and in part because there was no such thing as “Corinthian” leather. It was in fact New Jersey leather. “Corinthian” was marketing. It sounded good, though – which is why the marketers invented the term. But – looking back – the Cordoba was far less cheesy than this six figure minivan.
For one, the Cordoba was a large, handsome car made of steel rather than plastic – with substantive and actually chromed chrome bumpers. Today, “chrome” is cheesy because it is plastic and not even six figure cars get the real thing (actual chrome-plated metal) anymore. The same is true under the hood. The ’75 Cordoba came standard with a V8 engine and there were two (larger) optional V8s available. In 1975 – the Cordoba’s first year – four cylinder engines were what you got in economy cars, such as a Pinto or Datsun B210.
Fast-forward fifty years and look how much less you get for so much more. Even if you’re one of the few who can afford a six figure new vehicle.
Top-of-the-line luxury sedans from Mercedes, BMW, Audi and Lexus come standard with little sixes and they are also smaller than the Cordoba, which is a real measure of the enshitification of things. You may recall that Chrysler marketed the Cordoba as the “new small Chrysler,” which it was – relative to the massive Imperials and Newports of prior years. But – measured by today’s enshitified standards, the Cordoba was a huge car. It was 215.3 inches long. To get a sense of this, a 2026 Mercedes S-class sedan (which is the largest sedan Mercedes makes) is all of of 209.5 inches long. By the standards of 1975, a 2026 S-Class Mercedes sedan – which has a base price of $119,500 by the way – would have been considered a mid-sized car at best, something in the same general class as a mid-1970s Chevy Nova. A mid-1970s Nova did not cost six figures, either – though you did get a standard six cylinder engine in the Nova, just like you do in a new S-Class.
By the way, the base price of a ’75 Cordoba was $5,580 – which according to the government’s inflation calculator, is the equivalent of $35,366 in 2026 dollars.
Marvel at the enshtification.
Fifty years ago, you could have bought a brand-new V8-powered Chrysler – with Corinthian leather – that was larger and arguably statelier and more actually elegant than a plastic-draped, fake-chromed six-figure new Mercedes – for about a third as much in real buying-power dollars.
Or a fourth as much as something like this new enshitified Lexus minivan.
It’s the perfect vehicle for an evening out at Taco Bell.
. . .
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Live down by the river in style. Show off your ‘Corinthian’ leather to your neighbors. If you buy one of these, can’t afford a house—or I couldn’t. Think I would rather live in my house.
The price is ridiculous and it is ugly. You would think Toyota could do better.
A lot of the SUV’s/Crossovers look like vans to me, inside and out.
Probably never have any real cars ever again unless something changes. Just like the cheap toy plastic cars/trucks made in China that people buy instead of the metal Tonka Toys.
Child size front seats and a knee knocker center console for $142k? Wow.
Hope they include a car cover standard so you don’t have to look at the hideous beast when parked.
Here is an interior from 1978, back when adults designed cars for adults to ride in comfort, click the right arrow twice to see the interior – oh Buick your pillow seats!
https://smclassiccars.com/buick/124722-1978-buick-park-ave-2-dr-coupe.html
Honda Super Cub, rated 188 mpg
6 100MPG Vehicles Under $5K!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WhYePdd35ZY
oil shock inbound
back in the 1970s I can remember the oil shock, I drove a Chevy station wagon that got 12mpg, which ate nearly half my paycheck at the factory I worked, and I looked desperately for a used Honda Civic in the Cleveland Plain dealer
where I live, people drive huge trucks and huge SUVs – they are completely screwed when gas hits $10
Amerikans were lured into buying huge, and I mean HUGE, vehicles, part of empire strategy to get the public to support the wars. Anyone who travels overseas knows what I am talking about. A mid 1990’s honda civic in japan is a big car
Then Trump came along and completely screwed the nation. Trump has caused a fuel apocalypse. $10 gas means nearly everything we drive is now useless
Hi Jack,
I think $6 will do it – for many. That will amount to a doubling of what gas cost just four months ago. How many people can afford that? I doubt many…
What a load of crap, no doubt you’re a dazzling urbanite in one of the mega urban coastal shitholes. Many of those so beloved Asian or European countries could fit inside my home state of Nevada. When some sophisticated elite tells me “Well they drive these Fiats tin boxes in Italy” I remind them driving from Reno to Las Vegas is the same as Milan to Naples in distance but there you cross through Florence (400,000) and Rome (3,000,000). On my drive we have Hawthorne, population 3,000 if you include the stray dogs. There’s a lot of open and empty space around here that book smart elites never see from their skyscraper think tank offices.
The Lexus LM500h is a Lexus-ified version of the JDM Toyota Alphard. I love that name. To the Japanese it must sound cool, but emphasize the “FARD” part and it is endlessly entertaining.
Peak Fugly. The end of Empire, the death of common sense.
The Honda Odyssey is the perfect example of the progression of the minivan. It started out as a right sized people carrier that was nimble and affordable and slowly morphed into a zillion dollar barge. Other good ones were the Mazda 5 and the Toyota Previa of the ’80s and ’90s. We had no idea how good we had it!
“Enshitification” — such a perfect word to describe what’s taken place over the last 30 years (at least).
First came the enshitification of our currency.
Then came the enshitification of our politics and the end of statesmanship.
Then followed the enshitification of food, health care, pro sports, business, everything else.
I have a Dodge Grand Caravan, and I really love it. It’s not a sports or performance car, which are what I’ve cared about my whole life (I have a Miata), but it’s the GOAT when it comes to road trips, hauling a group around, or house projects; better than any SUV, in my opinion. In my dreams, if I had been the product manager at Dodge, this sucker would have been on the LX platform (same as the Charger and Challenger) and would have been available with a Hemi and a six speed. Then you have one vehicle that can haul everything, including ass.
Just imagine, for a minute, the kind of cars that would be possible today, and at very reasonable prices, if not for the combination of safetycrats and government. They spend all day everyday ruining everything, and they are nowhere near done. Where does it end?
Too bad Lee Iacocca wasn’t allowed to build his V8 powered minivan at Ford in the 1970’s. He had to wait until the 1980’s at Chrysler to build a minivan, and there wasn’t no V8.
Minivans are the Rodney Dangerfield of vehicles in the USA. They get no respect. I think the problem was they were very popular when they came out. You couldn’t get your hands on one. So like when something is very popular, and gets that way too fast, you get the opposite reaction to it. They had the stigma by the early 1990’s already.
It’s too bad, minivans can be very practical when they are inexpensive. Too bad they aren’t inexpensive anymore.
I would be surprised if they bother bring this Lexus one to the USA. It won’t sell well. It will only sell OK in the Asian market that it’s clearly designed for.
I doubt it’ll sell here very well but globally MPVs are all over the place. People in Asia and Europe are more practical and less appearance driven about their vehicles so you see minvans and minibuses all over the place. They are starting to go upscale with versions, like the Mercedes V-class, BMW Active Tourer, Buick Encasa and Acura VDX, etc.
You can get 3 GMC Savannas for that money. And that has a 3/4 ton truck frame and a 400 ci V8.
But you don’t get the touchscreen.
As I was sitting in traffic this morning, waiting for a train to cross, a guy in a slightly rusty older Ford police interceptor vehicle (post-Crown Vic) pulled up beside me and I had a realization.
I bet cop cars don’t have that stuff. Especially not the “impaired driver detection” technology. They can’t have their stuff going into limp mode in tv r middle of a chase, or whatever.
Just another way in which they treat themselves better than us. But it also means, if you’re looking for a workaround that’s a pretty good starting point.
A good example of the double standard that used to exist in Michigan on two fronts involving firearms was thankfully abolished.
Most people are unaware that in Michigan, police officers, unlike ordinary citizens could always purchase and possess NFA items (machine guns, silencers, etc.) Gun stores that catered to police officers had a special section where NFA items were kept. Only police officers could enter such premises. Prior to the changes in federal NFA laws, a “chief law enforcement official” signature was required on applications to purchase such weapons. Good luck for any ordinary citizen attempting to obtain such a signature.
To add insult to injury, Frank Kelly, the former state prosecutor declared that since there was no state form or procedure in place to process such applications, ordinary citizens were effectively prohibited from possessing such items.
That all changed when the state prosecutor (Frank Kelly) retired and the federal requirement for a “chief law enforcement official” signature requirement was abolished, his successor declaring that as long as federal law was followed, Michigan residents could legally obtain and possess such items under federal law. Michigan then became an NFA state.
This ”double standard” was effectively nullified.
The second “double standard” involved the issuance of concealed weapons permits which once were only available to the “connected”, (judges, politicians and celebrities). Ordinary citizens who were lucky enough to obtain permits were issued extremely restricted “HBB” (home, bank and and business) permits.
That all changed when Macomb County prosecutor Carl Marlinga declared that Macomb County would become a “shall issue” county whose residents could apply for and receive unrestricted concealed weapons permits.
That rapidly snowballed and become the “law of the land” statewide.
What do you get when a doughnut-eating cop is in the middle of a car chase and the automatic emergency braking system engages?
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Sweet & Sour Pork!
Hi Ernie,
Is Lexus trying to duplicate the ugliness of the Tesla Cybertruck in their minivan? I don’t know, but what is it with new vehicles that look like beasts or something out of a dystopian movie?
Indeed, John. That thing looks like a box with wheels. For that much money, it should float above the road (like a George Jetson vehicle), and drive itself to work and home effectively, so I can take a nap or something. Oh, and make my coffee, too, while it is driving me to work. And make it strong, please. I mean sheesh. Meanwhile, I found this via a Google search: A few, 8-cylinder engine vehicles. Hmm, for another hundred K, may as well get something really saucy…. https://www.roadandtrack.com/rankings/g61568654/v8-cars/
I’ve shat turds prettier than that thing.
It’s hard to get a sense of scale from that pic but it looks like this van isnt really a mini. It looks closer in size to the family truckster early 80s Chevy conversion vans, without the interior room and crisp unpretentious styling. And of course, without the ubiquitous small block Chevy.
Hi Ernie,
None of them – modern “mini” vans – are. They’re all huge. The original crop were indeed “mini.” But like almost everything else in this country they have grown monstrously huge.
Is that the same 2.4 liter that gets 25 mpg, for both gas and oil?
$147K is 2x what I paid for my house. Of course that’s 147k in debased FRNs. And thanks to orange man, it’ll take a C-note to fill up each time.
Marvel at the enshtification, indeed. It’s everywhere around us. Of course, You get what you put up with.
The answer to the enshtification is simply not to put up with it.
Motor Trend reviewed the 2024 version in Asia. Of course nothing but praise, that’s what they get paid for.
Clearly, this is not a driver’s vehicle. It is for the NetJets crowd, those who own everything but still rely on Uber and other “ground transport” from the GA terminal to their luxury suite. The fact that they’re bringing it to the North American market speaks volumes about how far we’ve gone down the globalization shit hole. The rich and powerful get big screens and champagne coolers. The rest of us get to work an extra shift to make the monthly quota.
Till regular is $8 in MS. Then no more.
The effete managers of our virtual reality will love it. It’s no different than their effrontery in January of 2000, right before the DotComBomb exploded. That moment was exemplified by a Super Bowl ad where several old men sat in front of an open garage door in webbed aluminum folding chairs doing nothing. The voice/text proclaimed “We just blew $1 million on this ad. What are you doing with your money?” or some such nonsensical drivel.
The crash came within weeks.
Now we have Toyota thinking this turd will sell. And maybe it will…during that moment of calm before the Judgement Day.
Is any one else having problems with the new home page? As it shows a blank page on my confuser.
I wonder who’s going to pay $142K for a fancier 4 cylinder minivan but time will tell. Either way I agree with Eric that this is the perfect car for a night out for a fine dinner at Taco Bell. 🙂
Hi Landru,
Yes – there’s a glitch – hoping to have it fixed shortly. God, how I hate computers!
I see a blank page as well. Also the utube videos want me to sign in to utube to view. I don’t do that.
It seems like the site has implemented Cloudflare analytics and Google tagging as well, which is going to cause problems if you’re trying to take care of your privacy.
Though I’m not against minivans, this one is a huge turnoff for several reasons:
1. Its ‘cowcatcher’ front end, inspired by 1870s steam locomotive designs.
2. Its bizarre proportions, with tall slab sides and a squashed-down greenhouse.
3. Its dowdy, boxy look, with wheels that appear tiny by contemporary standards.
As for paying $142,000 for 2.4-liter four — don’t even get me started!
Minivans may make a comeback. But not in this outmoded, low-effort configuration.
p.s. Had to click the ‘Politics’ heading to reach this article. Home page is blank.
That is truly a hideous beast of a van. I’ll bet the first white tail through that plastic “cow catcher” is a 20k fix.
‘Beast’ indeed.
Upon further reflection, I believe the shovel-nosed styling was inspired by a rhinoceros:
https://tinyurl.com/yeyf3xk8
But its horn had to be amputated because it violated FMVSS. 🙁
Or you could learn to drive and not hit random animals.
No deer and woods where you live, then?
…and no moose, either, apparently? Try hitting one of those even with knowing how to drive. If Bullwinkle does not kill or paralyze you, it will definitely….. rearrange your vehicle for you at no cost.