If you had some more money would you still keep your 3rd gen?

[Rancho5]

My wife is getting a pretty hefty raise soon and told me I should buy a truck...used, of course. I love my 02 Sport, and so does she so I was a bit surprised. It’s got 160k on the clock. Anyway, it got me thinking. Maybe a 4th gen but every one I see has more miles than mine and costs a crap load more. 5th gen? Again, same problem.

Mine is worth maybe 7k here in NM (?) so if I sold it and added 5 grand, what would you buy? And I’d prefer not to “just mod it”. I love off roading but I’m not a big fan of lift kits and things that just cause more problems down the road. Toyota engineers did it right and I’d like to keep it that way. Just my opinion, so please don’t flame me.

Ideas?

 

[Capnemo]

I would keep it and invest the $5k...boring I know. But when you are old, you will not be wishing you had sold the 4runner and got....whatever.

Or spend the money traveling. Memories....

 

[AZBub]

Hell if I had a bucket of money I’d sell my home and we would live out of an earth roamer writing a blog worth a million bucks. Some may prefer sniffing coke off a hookers ass. Honestly the decision is yours and yours alone. (I don’t plan on selling mine, even if and when i buy a 2021 Bronco if it lives up to the hype)


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[Yoter]

Some may prefer sniffing coke off a hookers ass.

 

[thezentree]

Nah. What would I replace it with?

 

[pokeyman]

I will keep mine till I die

 

[LittleCaesar]

Maybe in NM $12k buys you a lot of truck but here on the East Coast you would need at least $22k to avoid having to look at ones the rich hillbillies have modded to the extreme. And sadly probably $32k is really what is needed to get a low mile decent one.

Keep driving it.....

 

[97Cruiser40th]

Stick with the devil you know and keep her, you know ultimately youll have sellers remorse.

 

[Cree]

Just because you have money doesn't mean you need to spend it. I could go buy a new Raptor today, but for how I use my vehicles it wouldn't do anyting my 3rd gen doesn't do already for literally a fraction of the price. These are super practical trucks and properly maintained extremely reliable. I haven't found any vehicles that do enough things with enough Improvement to justify the expenditures. I bet if you sat down and thought about it you'd end up in the same boat.

 

[feta]

Just drove a friend's brand new 19 4Runner TRD.

Since Buttons and gadgets don't really turn me on, I preferred my 99 5sp.

$40k (plus interest over 7 years) adds up to a lot of money. Are you guys debt free?

 

[96RedRunner]

I say keep it, you've found out in your area, LittleCaesar East Coast, I'll cover SE, $12k gets you very little in a 4th 5th gen will need a few dollars on top of purchase price. You both love the Sport, do a refresh of what you want on it, done.
Or say baby I'm happy with what I've got go to the spa, happy ending.

 

[Coward]

So a $12,000 budget would be a nice used Honda Accord. I don't think a used 4Runner for $12,000 is any better than what you have. Unless you wanted one with all goodies already on it. And you said you don't want all that anyway. For me, I won't ever sell my 96'. I bought it in 1998 and my son will take it over in 2023. sometime between now and then I have to buy a replacement. 6th Gen? LC200?

 

[mtbtim]

Sounds like your rig is meeting your off-road needs so do nothing and save your money for something else.

 

[rightyouareken]

My household has 4 cars (the cars in my sig + my wife's 2014 Acura RDX), and the 4Runner was by far the cheapest. My budget when shopping was fairly undefined. I had a green light from my wife to spend up to $20k on an offroady toy, but for the money, I couldn't really find anything I liked better than a nice 3rd gen.

I bought the 4Runner because it's fun, reliable, offroad capable, and takes me back to driving simpler cars without all of the computers and stuff. It fills that gap in a similar way my e36 M3 does, just that one is an offroader/utility vehicle and one is a sports sedan.

Would I like a new 5th gen? Sure. But I wouldn't like it 5-7 times more than mine ($40-50k vs ~$7k)

 

[Joelzy]

wife and I actually had this discussion last night, she was shocked to learn i'd buy another 3rd gen and have one SAS'd on 37s with some sort of swap and one more tame for regular use.

Her car is brand new and as nice as that is, its not for me. I love tinkering on my 96 and not having any payment is awesome for setting money aside to upgrade/fix this or that.
I might have $4k into by now which is a hell of a deal considering my e39 540 has about $10k for a car that is still 16 years old.

i plan on driving my current 4R as many miles as it'll take and considering the rebuild has less than 2000 miles on it, that'll be a while.

 

[Rancho5]

Just drove a friend's brand new 19 4Runner TRD.

Since Buttons and gadgets don't really turn me on, I preferred my 99 5sp.

$40k (plus interest over 7 years) adds up to a lot of money. Are you guys debt free?

Yep, and putting away a significant portion each month into retirement. Kids have left the nest.

 

[Rancho5]

Since all debts are paid and we love the 3rd gen, and we travel a bit (in Costa Rica currently) she’s staying put. As so many said, even with more money it makes no sense to sell and buy another.

I had a 99 Miata for a few years and it’s about the only non-Toyota car I’d drive again. Those cars are freakin blast to drive, and serve an entirely different purpose from the T4R... maybe I’ll pick up another and drive it on the weekends. Those NB Miatas are fun to turbo too.

I’ve got a few small dings in the Sport, so I’ll get those fixed too. And I’ve always wanted a really nice storage/sleeping platform like Ryan Napoleon’s.

PS: There’s a guy camped on the beach just down from our hotel, in a 96 Landcruiser with RTT. Sweet setup. He’s from Columbia and making his way up the coast to California. Maybe a Central American road trip with the 3rd Gen is in the future? But Honduras and deep Mexico scare the hell out of me.

 

[Jidaran]

you should buy another 3rd gen to keep in reserve for when the current one dies.

but for real, unless the current ride isn't meeting your needs, i'd keep what you have and save the $$$. i can't count the number of times i've seen people on this forum post about buying another 3rd gen when they realize how much they regret selling their last one.

 

[sleepydad]

My wife is getting a pretty hefty raise soon and told me I should buy a truck...used, of course. I love my 02 Sport, and so does she so I was a bit surprised. It’s got 160k on the clock. Anyway, it got me thinking. Maybe a 4th gen but every one I see has more miles than mine and costs a crap load more. 5th gen? Again, same problem.

Mine is worth maybe 7k here in NM (?) so if I sold it and added 5 grand, what would you buy? And I’d prefer not to “just mod it”. I love off roading but I’m not a big fan of lift kits and things that just cause more problems down the road. Toyota engineers did it right and I’d like to keep it that way. Just my opinion, so please don’t flame me.

Ideas?

I would ask what do you need and want, both things are important.

I'm older (just turned 50) and I have 3 trucks.

#1 family road tripper. we do an epic family road trip each year of 3000-5000 miles. I wanted a easy to drive comfy light offload capable truck.
#2 fun medium duty off road truck I could mess with and not have to worry about daily driving.
#3 I live in the salt belt so I wanted a cheap winter beater the salt can eat.

#1 used land rover full sized. very happy with this setup, it works great.
#2 used 3rd gen T4R in good condition with min rust so wrenching is easier.
#3 used 3rd gen T4R that was super cheap but still works well enough to get around in the salt time.

if you can't have multiple trucks/cars then you have to make compromises. For 20 years I was a single 3rd gen T4R driver because it allowed me to save a lot of money and it was cheap reliable transport. being frugal and not going nutters with a lot of expense is a great thing. I'm just having my mid-life crisis and I'm way out of control.

 

[JMat]

I'd keep it. I've had my '98 since 2003 and have no plans of ever getting rid of her.

As a matter of fact, I just bought a '97 for real cheap which I planned on putting a few dollars in to and then sell it but the plans have changed. After my girlfriend drove it and did some cleaning on it she decided to sell her massive Yukon Denali XL(with all the bells and whistles) and keep the new(old) one for herself. She likes the little 4Runner.