Toyota Vellfire in the Lime Light

I was reading the headline in the Sun two days ago and saw that a Toyota Alphard is in the limelight for the wrong reason. The article was on Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) probing the allegation that the wife of the Health Ministry had received a Toyota Alphard as a birthday gift from a contractor who won a ministry tender. I am not much into politic so I am not really that interested in the motives and timing of this allegation. What interest me are the details that goes behind the allegation.

The allegation was that the wife of the Health Ministry had received a Toyota Alphard which cost RM574,884.10 in January 2009 as a birthday present from a Health Ministry construction contractor. The Sun article then reported that a check by them revealed that a Toyota Vellfire (not an Alphard) manufactured in Japan in February 2008 was imported as a used car and registered in January 2009. The reported purchase price was RM384,884.10 and the loan approved by a bank was for RM250,000.00. The report even quoted the actual engine specification and the chassis number of this car! The same article also reported in this news but the difference is in the actual selling price of the car. A check with the chassis number provided in the article confirmed that this car is manufactured in February 2008. However without the full model code I can't confirm if it is really an Alphard or a Vellfire as mentioned in my previous post.

The reason I was interested in this article was that during that same time period I was actively looking for my giant. At that time the 2nd generation Toyota Alphard and Toyota Vellfire were brought in for the first time by a few dealers to sell as a new car. As I was going in and out of the Cheras Autocity dealers' premises I saw a couple of unit of Toyota Vellfire then. Just to satisfy my interest I did asked for the price of the Toyota Vellfire 3.5 model and was quoted a price around RM570K. This is consistent with what was reported in that article. Well I guess what the reporter did not do is to find out how did the buyer managed to secure the car at 35% discount from the dealer price!

Due to the high price of these high end models there were only a handful of units were available but even then they get snapped up pretty fast by those who can afford it because of the exclusivity of owning one. Then about 3 months down the road, I heard from some of the dealers that they have stop selling these models as these model cannot be sold as new car under the Approved Permit system. Since the 2nd generation Toyota Alphard and Toyota Vellfire was only launched in May 2008 in Japan, it has not reached a minimum of one year period at that time to qualify as an imported used car. Therefore for a period of I think 3 months from April 2009 there were no dealers bringing in these models. Then in late July 2009 only some dealers started to bring in these models into the country again. By then the price of these model has started to drop as the demands pick up.

Back in late July 2009 I think the top of the line Toyota Vellfire was still going for about RM490K and recently in my last visit to Cheras Autocity, it has drop to about RM440K. Even the lowest spec model, the 2nd generation Toyota Alphard 2.4L model, has finally dropped below the RM300K mark beginning of this month.

In fact in the last visit to Cheras Autocity, the number of 2nd generation Toyota Alphard/Vellfire on display has actually out-numbered the 1st generation Toyota Alphard. Look like the dealers are now focusing on selling higher priced model to try to catch the demands while it is still hot.