I placed special order for '10 limited, 4x4, nav, 3rd row. I have to place special order because here in dallas, we are part of Gulf states toyota, and they are not ordering any 3rd row options for their general dealership allocations. At dealership i was told 6-8 weeks for delivery, and after reading postings on this site it looks like that was a little short.

Called dealer today and guess what, few - several months. Order was placed with toyota on dec 25th. Their excuse was that toyota was not building 4runner with the 3rd row option right now!?

Apparently on Jan 10th, more information will be available on order?

questions, comments, snide remarks?

There is a white one here in AR with the 3rd row and nav that's a limited and we are apart of the Gulf States group also. It's at a dealer here in Searcy and it's the same dealer I got my Magnetic Gray one from. When I got mine there was a 12-16 week lead time on orders. (I wanted one without leather seats but with a sunroof, evidentally that's a crazy combination to Toyota but black leather seats during Arkansas summers just made me almost want to cry however after seeing one without the leather, the seats were amazingly ugly, they looked and felt more like airplane seats than anything!) Good Luck getting your's, they are worth the wait!

Mine is Shoreline blue with beige interior.

A special order can take closer to three months.

When I special ordered my '06, the dealer put in a preference for my configuration. It was in early November. It was mid December before my dealer got info that the build was accepted by Toyota. My 4Runner arrived at port in early February.

Toyota also builds vehicles in certain batches. So if their current production/build schedule doesn't include any third row seat 4Runners, it'll further delay your order.

Depending on what the configuration you're looking for, the dealer may or may not be putting in a special order to Toyota of Japan. If the configuration you're looking for is some thing another region orders regularly, the dealer is probably waiting for the next build allocation to see if your configuration is available and if they can have that vehicle diverted to their region. Toyotas are configured by the geographic regional distributors.

As advanced as Toyota cars are, they're special order process is archaic. When mine was special ordered, my dealer and I ran the risk of another dealer or region diverting my configuration from my dealer. My sales rep kept a close eye on when the VIN for mine was released and I signed the paperwork for it as it was arriving to port, so it was marked off as sold.

The problem I ran into with trying to get a special order is most dealers don't want to, don't know how or don't know they can. Every dealer but one said, what I wanted doesn't exist--because the Northern California distributor order them that way.

Sounds like another unethical salesman to me. I've seen several '10 4Runners with the 3rd row seating option. But then I'm not in the Gulf States Toyota region, either.

Confirmed what he said at a ethical dealership today!
If there is such a thing!

Your location is not in your signature.Why don't you tell him WHERE you saw several '10 4Runners with 3rd row if you want to help him and maybe he can call them and fly there.He's local to me,I can fly him there dirt cheap!

I wouldn't pull the trigger on "unethical" yet. I've only been looking at the '10's this past week, as our local dealerships are just now getting them (at least from what I've seen, and I drive by them almost daily). Just a few days of research over the net and I already have more information than most of the salesmen I've talked with. However, I'm in the semi-rural Pac NW and YMMV.

Talk to salesperson. Order was placed with GST, gulf states toyota, not Toyota of Japan. They cannot order direct, has to be through distributor.?

My dealer put in my configuration as the first 4Runner as their preference. My sales rep was in a system where they can pick out a preferred configuration, most of what's in the system are configurations that's available in your region (as chosen by the distributor). What my sales rep did was pick the model and trim I was looking for (8668 for 4th gen Limited V6 4WD) and changed it with the options I wanted. I believe that goes to the distributor which then forwards it over to Toyota of Japan. In that same system a few weeks later, it'll show if that "preference" was accepted. If the "preference" is accepted, then your "special order" is taken and accepted for building. The system doesn't show when that preference/special order will be built, so the sales rep and dealer need to monitor their allocations and look for that configuratin to arrive.

Most of the time we refer to it as a "special order" because it's not what the dealer and region typically gets.