Being such a masterpiece, I always wonder why the LFA didn’t do well when it first came out. Yet now you see them selling for damn near $1M. It’s like Van Gogh. No one appreciated the work of art until it was gone. But why?
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Too expensive and also Lexus
Too sterile; high revving V10 w low production
Spent an extra 5 years redeveloping the car (from aluminium to a carbon fibre structure) which ballooned the price to a whopping 375,000 USD. This was meant to cover for the extra time needed to develop, as well as paying off the carbon fibre loom that Toyota/Lexus developed in their legendary Motomachi factory. Even then, they still did not break even.
The LFA was meant to be a monster around the time when it was supposed released in the mid-2000’s. But in 2010 when it was actually released, it was a great performer on track (heck it basically shattered the Nürburgring Nordschleife lap record), but the single-clutch and high-revving V10 (with its lack of torque) made it slower than contemporary supercars in a straight line.
Despite the legendary levels of engineering behind it (that rich people at the time were not privy to), they didn’t think a Lexus supercar could be any good (boy were they wrong).
The reason why the LFA is held to a godlike status now is because people have come to the realization the LFA is an expression of pure and genuine automotive excellence, from a manufacturer that advertises on being on the “relentless pursuit of perfection”.
And yeah… it sounds fucking insane too.
It wasn’t appreciated for what it is.
When it came it was incredibly expensive and the performance was average at best for what you were paying. It was also a Lexus, spending that kind of money for a Lexus just didn’t make sense.
Yes, the exhaust note and engine are glorious but this is in an era where you could still buy cars NA supercars for less money.
Now were in a world of more stringent emissions regulations, high revving NA engines are a dying breed, manuals are being dropped and a lot of vehicles all come out with the same configuration. Turbo engine+automatic.
People start looking to the past for cars that offer an experience or even just a drivetrain configuration thats essentially unavailable brand new and things like the LFA get rediscovered and sought after.
The development time was also incredibly long, it had to be redone at some point and by the time it came out all its metrics were basically “last gen” and outdated.
Carrera GTs also sat a bit new, and one we looked at was being sold for $385k with just under 1k miles, imagine a Carrera GT for $385k, then look at prices today.