I just bought a 2003 GTS with automatic; has 155,000 miles on it; bought on eBay, flew to Pennsylvania, drove it back to Texas, running like a champ. Occasionally shifts hard at low speeds, but that seems to have diminished. It does have a leaky timing chain gasket; dealer wants $600 or something like that to replace that, but I'll just add a quart of oil now and then, until I see how involved it really is to R&R the timing chain cover.
PS: I have owned two 1975 Celica GT with 5 speeds at different times; put 50k on one of them, put 250k on the other.