Someone Drove This Lexus LFA Home From the Dealership in 2012 and Totally Forgot About It

Lexus took their time with the LFA. Codenamed TXS and previewed by no fewer than three concept cars, the two-seat sports coupe spent nearly a decade in development. The process started in the year 2000, when the now-president of Toyota, Akio Toyoda, was promoted to a position on the board of directors. He loved sports cars and everything related to them. So the next logical step for him was to build one that would fight Ferrari, Porsche, and Lamborghini.

But he didn’t get much support from the top management. And this attitude towards the development of a supercar brought setbacks and delays. But Toyoda kept pushing, and the project survived.

The Lexus LFA in production form was unveiled at the 2009 Tokyo Motor Show, and series production started in December 2010. The car came with a 4.8-liter V10 engine co-developed with Yamaha and built in the same production center as Toyota Racing's F1 V10s.

The powerplant sported aluminum, magnesium, and solid titanium internals, which made it smaller than a V8 and lighter than a V6. As for the sound of it… many said that they have never heard anything like it, before or after it.

The engine was mated to an Asian six-speed automated sequential transmission. That translated to fun on winding roads. It had 552 horsepower and a red line that started at 9,000 rpm. And it has never been used in another production car. Ever! That is how Lexus did things back then.

Furthermore, the car featured a super light construction. It had the in-house developed carbon fiber-reinforced polymer frame and ran on titanium alloys. That is how Lexus achieved an impressively low weight of only 3,200 pounds (1,451 kilograms) – jaw-dropping for a V10-powered car – and a near-perfect weight distribution of 48:52.

Lexus built only 500 LFAs, with the A in the name standing for “apex,” a clear hint that it was a street-legal racer. Many of them sold long after production came to a halt in December 2012, which would label the model as a total flop. The final car built was one with the Nurburgring package.

With still one unit unsold, a dealership owner had to buy it themselves, at the beginning of this month, only to meet a deadline. The dealership would have been unable to register the car in the country later on if it remained unsold. Yes, that would be 11 years after production stopped.

436 of the 500 ever built were “standard,” while 64 of them were Nurburgring Edition cars. The package brought 10 extra horsepower for a total of 562 horsepower (571 PS), a lighter battery, different wheels, and performance tires. All these were available for $70,000 more. Today, the package would take the price of the car way above the $1 million mark.

Fewer than 190 of them were built for the US market. They were these fun-to-drive, spectacularly designed supercars that turned heads because they looked good, sounded even better, and were pretty rare.

One of the 500 is this one, in Whitest White. Only 27 cars in that bodywork paint arrived in America. This one right here has the dark premium alloy wheels and red carbon-ceramic brake calipers.

It also comes with an entirely bespoke interior in black leather for the upper section of the dashboard and contrasting red leather for the lower dashboard area, instrument panel, door cars, and center console. White leather, matching the exterior Whitest White, wraps the steering wheel and the seats.

It is a car that someone drove home from the Lexus of Westminster dealership in California, safely parked in a garage, and then completely forgot about it. It was 2012, and the LFA, serial number 188 out of 500 examples, was brand new.

Twenty-one years later, there is still the protective delivery wrapping on the steering wheel and seats. And the odometer only shows 47 miles. The car has been stored in a climate-controlled garage in Southern California, away from sunlight and heat. Everything about it is in showroom condition. And the car is now ready to find another home.

It is offered without reserve at the Monterey Car Week in August. The current owner is expected to get anywhere between $700,000 and $900,000 for it. Is it worth it? Just consider that, in February 2016, a Lexus executive confirmed that there would never be a replacement for the LFA, a statement which might just make prices of the LFAs currently in existence go through the roof. But that might not be all true, though. Lexus has already unveiled the Electrified Sport concept car. And if that's not an LFA successor, then we don't know what it is!