Quote: (03-10-2014 11:01 AM)jamaicabound Wrote:
Quote: (03-10-2014 10:27 AM)Hotwheels Wrote:
Quote: (03-10-2014 08:59 AM)jamaicabound Wrote:
My main thing with cars is dont stunt if you dont got money. I have tons of buddies working low paying jobs driving bmw's and mercedes and stuff, got car loans for like 10k to 15k at like 18% interest costing them a fortune and they are always putting money into the cars. I know we got a lot of beamer drivers on here but my old one was nothing but headaches nothing huge but constantly taking it in for rattling noises, electric problems, lights out, etc. Couple of my buddies have similar issues
bingo
I picked up my E46 convertible as a fun summertime car. It is NOT my daily driver and if I was looking for a daily driver it would not have even made my list.
Even at that Mech warned me about buying it. It hasn't been bad but it is not for the faint of heart. Entire cooling system replaced, EGR system and suspension work. All before 75K. And currently there is something wrong with the electrics as it drains the battery and the Vanos seals need to be done.
If the tranny goes, not uncommon, that will be 3 or 4 grand.
No problems with the top. Yet.
Anyone that has 7 grand to spend on a daily driver is nuts to buy an older luxury car. Your fronting will cost a lot of money in keeping it on the road.
Buy something non descript that is reliable and you will be much happier.
Edit-I like how guys are considering CTS'. Finally making inroads on the German only mentality. I wanted a ragtop, hence the Beemer. Only Caddy option was the XLR and I'm not really a fan of those.
It's always perplexed me why the luxury vehicles which are supposed to be true drivers cars are the worst in terms of reliability and maintenance costs.
Does anyone know why this is? All I can figure is they build a car for performance but in a sense its like a finely tuned machine where as your economy cars are not built for performance just built not to break. Any truth to that? Maybe someone who's good with cars can comment I'm not very mechanical.
Agree thogh, if you wanna get a fun car for the weekends or for dates or for summer by all means get what you want but dont buy a 10 year old luxury car as your sole car and daily driver.
My bmw drove great, felt solid, you definately feel the quality and performance but always had stuff going wrong from tie rods to cooling system to electrical stuff.
In my opinion they build them to make it through the warranty period. 4 years/50,000 miles. And even then they are in the shop a fair bit for warranty work. Warranty work isn't such a big deal for the buyers as they generally have more than one car and get a loaner anyway. They get the "prestige" implied by the badge.
Things like suspension bushings are designed primarily for performance and NVH qualities, not longevity, so they end up being shot before 70k.
German cars are notorious for this but seemingly get by on the "German Engineering" meme. That just reminds me of the Tiger tanks of WWII. Great machines when they worked. Too complicated to be reliable. Germans do the same with their cars.
They are great cars when new and under warranty. Not so much with some miles on them and you have to foot the maintenance bills. This effect can be seen when it comes to resale as they drop like stones past warranty.