What Are You Willing To Overlook? 1983 Toyota Cressida vs 1990 Toyota Camry

In the used car market, at nearly every price range, one name often stands above the rest: Toyota. Its cars are well-built, reliable, and low enough maintenance to survive some neglect. Get a used Toyota, and you can still go wrong, but your odds are a lot better. But even used Toyotas sometimes have some marks in the negative column. Is the brand’s reputation good enough to ignore those negatives?

Yesterday we looked at a mildly-busted Honda, and an Infiniti for which the state of California demanded its pound of flesh. I thought this one would be a little more evenly matched, honestly, but the Infiniti absolutely trounced the litle CRX. Enough of you from outside California voted for it, stating correctly that the back fees don’t apply to you. There was some debate about whether or not the car could legally leave the state under its own power, but that’s not my concern. That’s between you and the California Highway Patrol.

As for me, I’m taking the CRX. I already have a big, comfy, V8-powered sedan; I don’t need another. A CRX in need of some love, even the fuel-miser HF version, is much more interesting to me. In fact, if I ever were to get another project car – which, let’s be honest, I probably will eventually – a rust-free CRX in need of mechanical repair would be just about perfect for me.

“Get a Toyota” is the typical response when someone asks what would be a good used car. And it’s good advice, but because of their reputation, used Toyotas often command a price premium – commonly referred to as the “Toyota Tax.” The two cars we’re looking at today wouldn’t be nearly as expensive if they were, say, Fords. But they both have features that a lot of you might find undesirable: automatic transmissions, and automatic seat belts. And both suffer from aftermarket wheels that don’t fit particularly well, as well as some other minor modifications and maladies. Can you overlook these flaws for the sake of the Toyota badge? Let’s find out.

1983 Toyota Cressida Wagon – $3,000

Engine/drivetrain: 2.8-liter DOHC inline 6, four-speed automatic, RWD

Location: Portsmouth, VA

Odometer reading: 298,000 miles

Operational status: Runs and drives well

Named after a character in a Shakespeare play that nobody reads anymore, the Toyota Cressida was basically Lexus before Lexus. It was Toyota’s flagship model, a comfortable sedan or wagon with an inline six, rear-wheel-drive, and all the latest bells and whistles. Among those technological advancements is a safety feature that is now thankfully extinct: motorized safety belts. The Cressida was the first car to have them; it is, you might say, “patient zero” for that particular disease that ruined so many otherwise nice cars up until the mid-1990s.

You could get a Cressida with a five-speed manual behind its 5M-GE inline six, but good luck finding one; I think I’ve seen maybe one or two over the years, and never a wagon. Most of them have a four-speed automatic like this one does. It’s rapidly closing in on 300,000 miles, but the seller says it still runs just fine. These cars, much like the Lexus sedans that replaced them, have a reputation for racking up some serious miles, so don’t let the odometer reading scare you. It’s a lot more faithful than its namesake. (I’ve read the Cliff’s Notes at least.)

The US-market Cressida had a cushier and more luxurious interior than the Mark II on which it was based. Toyota wanted to compete with the likes of Buick, and soft seats and power doodads were one way to do that. This one is in great shape inside, except that the steering column trim is missing. It’s worth asking why. More curious, these days, is the ashtray full of change; no toll booths exist anymore, and I haven’t seen a coin-operated parking meter in years either, so why does the seller need an ashtray full of quarters at the ready?

There has to be a catch, and here it is: the seller says this car has “a few” rust spots, like this one behind the rear wheel. How many is a few, and how bad are they? It’s hard to tell from the pictures. Most of the paint looks fine, though. The car has been lowered and sits on too-wide aftermarket wheels, but finding a cheap RWD Japanese car that isn’t so afflicted these days is difficult. I still want to know what’s wrong with stock ride height and tires with some actual sidewalls on them, but maybe that’s just me.

1990 Toyota Camry DX – $5,000

Engine/drivetrain: 2.0-liter DOHC inline 4, four-speed automatic, FWD

Location: Lexington Park, MD

Odometer reading: 86,000 miles

Operational status: Runs and drives well

Here it is, the car everyone hopes to find when looking for a used vehicle: a clean, straight, low-mileage Toyota Camry. This is the second generation, when the Camry really came into its own and became the “nice” car that it would be for decades to come. This is the first Japanese car that my dad seriously considered buying, after renting one for a family trip, and I can’t express how high praise that is.

Camry engines, by and large, have never really been anything special – just very, very good. This one is powered by a 2.0-liter twin-cam engine that makes a hundred-and-something horsepower and drives the front wheels through a four-speed automatic. The exact stats aren’t important; all anyone needs to know is that it’s enough power, and it just keeps on going. This one is probably due for a timing belt replacement, if it hasn’t been done already, but otherwise, at only 86,000 miles, it’s just getting broken-in.

This generation of Camry also features those hateful automatic seat belts, but otherwise its interior is a nice place to be. It’s in beautiful condition, but you’d expect that, with the low mileage. The seller has replaced the stereo with something more modern and more powerful, including a pair of 12 inch subwoofers that eat into the available trunk space by quite a lot. (Kids; what are you gonna do?)

It’s clean and rust-free outside, but it has a set of aftermarket wheels that just don’t belong on it. Or on anything, in my opinion. That skinny-tires-on-wide-wheels thing looks stupid, and it can’t be safe. Those wheels and tires, along with the stereo, make me think that this car was owned by an elderly family member who passed it on to a younger member. At least they didn’t do anything permanent to it.

These are both probably really reliable cars, with quite a bit of life left in them, but either one is going to need some tinkering to put them back how they should be, at least in my opinion. But maybe you can look past the silly modifications and the rust. If so, which one do you think is the better deal?