My friend has a Lexus IS 250.

He was told they use special tires and he has been paying $500 each.

Is that true ?

Sounds ridiculous.

My car has larger tires that go for $119 each.

What do you think ?

Where is your friend buying the tires? Depends on wheel size 17" vs 18" for this model, load range,speed rating and whether or not the car is AWD etc. I would guess the tires that came with car new were Michelin (z rated). Some tire stores will only replace with the exact same ratings. Also looks like the IS 250 uses different size tires for the front and back.

Looking at Discount Tires on line worst case with 18" wheels would be $338.00ea (US dollars for non USA people...). $500 a piece does seem a bit high...

My friend clarified what he told me.

He got 2 tires for $500.

Big difference, though I think that is still a little high.

Ask your friend if they are the rear tires and if they are Michelin. High, but cost seems on par.

I know they are Michelin.

While I am on the subject of his tires.

He keeps them at 36 p.s.i.

I noticed some wear on the outer edges of the front tires.

Don't know if that is normal on a RWD car or that maybe they are a bit over inflated.

He was also told that the tires did not need rotating.

I know that is a big lie.

Not possible to rotate because the front and rear tires are different sizes.

If the outer wear is only on one side of the tire then the car probably needs an alignment and check the wheel balance too. If the wear is on both outer edges of the tire then that is typically due to under inflation. Excessive wear in the middle is due to over inflation. How old are the tires and how many miles since they were installed?

He can purchase any tire in same size and load range. It could be that he has run flat tires or very high quality tires.

$250 a tire isn't out of the normal.

Try high performance car tires and really get a shock.

It's a Lexus. Everything is going to be expensive. But he doesn't have to use Michelin tires, any tires with the same specs will be fine. Underinflation is very common, IME, even tire stores like Discount Tires underinflate tires. Car manufacturers recommend lower inflation pressures because it gives a somewhat smoother ride, but I tend to inflate my tires close to the tire manufacturer's maximum recommended pressure, which gives better gas mileage and handling, although it does give a slightly rougher ride, which I can live with.

Had a stealership tell me I needed $300 tires (each) for my old Cadillac. They weren't high performance, run flats, or anything special. Think they were Vogue tires.

I suggest that you simply: "ask someone who really knows." A professional tire shop. (Look online at the tire-manufacturer's website for more gory details.)

And, hey, don't automatically call a car-dealership a "stealership." It really does vary from company to company. For instance, with regards to my car:

• The 'local' dealer, when asked to do 'routine X-thousand mile maintenance,' wanted $750 to do things like 'change the spark plugs.' Of course, I balked.
• Another dealer, in an adjacent (and much larger) city, not only charged me much less, but informed me that this particular maintenance protocol did not (yet) call for spark-plug replacement. Furthermore, when I asked that dealer to "look at the tires for me," and openly expressed my assumption that the tires probably needed by-now to be replaced, that dealer declined(!) to do so, instead providing me with detailed information as to why I did not, in fact, safely need to do so yet.
• Yeah, you're damned-right which dealer is gonna get the future business.
• (Uh huh. Of course "that dealer" knows it. Smart(er) businessman.)
• When I "chatted-up" my experience at the car-manufacturer's web site, the manufactuer was quite interested in details, confirmed that my local dealer was in the wrong, and promised to 'educate follow-up with them.'

Yes, tire-technology is more expensive than it used to be. And, therefore, tires are more expensive. (But they are also much safer and more reliable.) Nevertheless, "be a sensible and bright-eyed consumer, don't be afraid to ask questions, and don't be afraid to use the Internet."

Generally speaking, I find that "the Internet" has both flushed-out the few remaining "shysters," and greatly improved the overall quality-of-service that all of us can expect to receive. Simply stated, "you can't 'get away with it' any more." If you do "keep the customer's interests front and center," the customer-in-question has plenty of ability to spread the good news. (As I did, or could have, done right here.) And if you don't, "the same." And we all know which kind of "news" spreads faster!

Lexus is a specialty car. Look up the actual recommended tires for it. Likely they're rated for higher speed than normal (from the manufacturer) and likely they may possibly be what I call "low profile" which are these very skinny banana skin type of sporty tires which grip the road great, and etc, and the other issue is that you can't get away from using them due to the size of the hubs and the available clearance in the wheel well. My sister had a VW Jetta which comes with sport wheels and with the stock hubs from VW, for that particular model, her tires were limited in choices, they were a certain size rim, but what also matters is the amount of space between the outside of those rims and the wheel wells. Basically she had to choose these low profile tires, such as the Pirelli which they shipped the car with and those were like $400+. Her other problem is in the area we live, the roads get horrific in the spring after Winter thaws and she'd hit a pothole, the tires are made for grip and performance on like a racing track or near perfect road, so hitting a nasty bump destroyed the tires, or really came close and cumulatively over time the life of the tires would be reduced. Further, in the snow and ice, these low profile + performance tires were horrible because they're for speed and handling, not traction.

As a result, she, and many other persons in our area who have this problem do any of:

1. Tolerate it and swear alot
2. Buy a secondary car for the winter
3. Buy an entirely secondary set of rims which allow them to put on larger profile tires and all-season style of tires and then they swap Summer and Winter tires twice a year

She, as many, found that the purchase of 4 rims, all season tires, and the labor cost her about $800, or ... the cost of replacing two of those stock Pirelli tires. She liked the performance in the Summer, so she kept changing them out twice a year. She finally bought a new model and asked them to sell her one which doesn't have these low profile rims so she can buy normal tires. Her husband drives her old model and he NEVER swaps out the winter tires, he just keeps them on the car all year.

I don't know if that's the issue here, that being the rims and wheel size configuration which limits their tire choices, or if they happen to always, always stick with exactly the recommended tire. But in a capitalistic world, it is possible to buy thousand dollar tires if you want to be all picky and stuff.

Another side story to that is I accompanied a friend to lunch and on the way back he wanted to drop of his Vette for new tires. So we go there and funnily enough, they know him like he's a best friend, because he's always there, hey that's his thing. Either case, one of the shop guys had to bring us back and my friend comments "nice wheels!". I'm like "It's a pickup truck!". He meant, "nice wheels and tires", those two gabbled about it all the way back to work and I ask "What's the big deal?" He said those wheels and tires were like $4,000! It was because the local NFL team won the Superbowl about a year before, all the team players bought Escalades and went to have them outfitted with every specialty thing. About half of them forgot to ever pick up their wheel sets. So this guy was driving a normal pickup truck with one of the player's hubs and tires, all worth about 4K.

I think it's up to anyone how stupid or frugal they wish to be.

That's a great idea... buying some different rims that can use regular tires.

The tires they are using are high performance...meant for racing.

They both drive conservatively, so they can buy the "not for racing tires" and save some money.

It isn't expensive just because it is a lexus/toyota. $250 isn't expensive anyway for a tire. A lexus is a toyota and a toyota is a common car. Nothing magical about it. I'm sure the dealer would charge that much.

Tires are made with oil and the tires out there were made with expensive oil. If oil gets down to $20 a barrel then tires will go down. There is no natural rubber in car tires. Or very little if any.

Almost every tire now fits into a standard bracket. That means he can run anything in that bracket.

Go to tirerack.com and find the standard types of tires that could be purchased. Almost every car has 20 or more available. Choices range based on the qualities of the tire, brand, warranty and such.

He is not using racing tires since they are not legal on the road.

Some very special tires are available only for law enforcement but I doubt they are that great.

Try buying a set of tires for a Corvette or Porsche or other high performance and really get a shock.

The size of the rim can make a good difference in price too. A tire for an 18 inch rim, can be more expensive than a tire for a 16 inch rim, even when the overall diameter and width are the same.

The stock tires for that Lexus are low profile tires, the front and rear are different tires. As a result the tire option choices are limited. Yes they are not using actual racing tires, my point was that the tires are more geared for performance, a.k.a. sporty, but they are street legal and they are also low profile.

I do agree that one can go to online resources and find some bargains. And maybe this would be their solution. I just know that in New England, having sport tires year round is not good, we have too many road changes due to frost and the continual churn of road repair.

That's up to the car owner, they did buy the car. Although I'm sure there are many cases like my sister where they just bought "a car" and didn't realize that the tires would be a bit more special than just garden variety cheap ones and that it would also really matter if they did go bargain basement. I had a similar situation with a truck. There were plenty of tires, but I did need traction and really only one model worked best, although I certainly tried cheaper tires.