1990 MR2 TURBO

I’m crying. I’m crying over this nice, clean, beautiful MR2 GT Turbo with T-bar roof (SW20 type chassis) that we recently shipped from Japan to a customer in the USA. Now, I’m not crying sad tears because I don’t get to have this mid-ship sports car myself. O.K., maybe I’m moaning a bit about that, too. But I’m mostly crying happy tears because I’m happy that I had an MR2 myself for many years. I’m happy that I had that car, that well-built affordable super car that is perhaps Toyota’s greatest contribution to the world of pure sports cars.

When the MR2 SW20 came out in late 1989, it marked a new quality standard for reasonably priced sporting machinery; and when I picked up my 1990 MR2 in 2003, it was definitely a cheap second hand car. In fact, when I compared it with what a used SW20 cost back in the UK, I thought that my secondhand MR2 was a positive steal, especially considering the good condition and low miles on the car. (89,000 kilometers on the clock when I bought it.)

What was true back then about the quality of secondhand MR2s from Japan is still true about these cars here today: They are well cared for and in good shape. (Mostly. There are some units out there that have had a hard life, and so, as with all used high-performance and sporting machinery, here at Japan Car Direct we strongly recommend an engineer’s pre-purchase inspection. We’ll arrange this inspection for you.) But these days I would not say that MR2s are cheap, cheap, dirt cheap. No. Prices are beginning to go up as sports car buyers and mid-ship enthusiasts around the world (especially in some of the countries we ship Japanese performance cars to, like the USA, the UK, Australia, Canada, and France) have figured out that the best place to buy a good used MR2, “Japan’s Ferrari,” is directly in Japan itself, whether from the Japanese used car auctions or from private dealers. (And we source from both for the cars that we export from Japan.)

But for what you are getting, prices for a used MR2 SW20 are still very reasonable. Being so well built, these are long lasting cars. They have a high long term survival rate. I’ve never seen a crappy looking MR2 on the roads here in Japan. Although there is a red one in my neighbourhood that I often see driving in the opposite direction to me as I go to work, and the paint on that one is fading. This is a known problem with red paint due to the different molecular chemistry required to make the red colour. You do not find this problem so much with the yellow ones, like this beauty here that we shipped recently, or with that gorgeous white one Japan Car Direct also sent to the USA a few months back. I have not written about that SW20 turbo yet, but I’ll put it up here on our site so all you guys wanting to buy an MR2 Turbo direct from Japan can just look at our photos of that lovely machine and weep tears of joy.

Because under the rules for secondhand cars imported to the USA or to Australia, it’s no problem to buy an MR2 SW20 yourself and ship it directly from Japan. And, of course, it’s straightforward to ship one of these dream machines to the UK.

And since we at Japan Car Direct are a Japan based used car exporter, we will guide you every step of the way, sourcing and exporting your Toyota MR2. I had one for five years. I drove all over Japan in it, from Honshu to Hokkaido, and from Hokkaido to Kyushu and Shikoku. I loved every minute with that car. You’ll love every minute with yours.

Turn that frown upside down!