New car time, BMW (I know, I know), appreciate some help please

Steedie

Steedie

Steedie

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Joined
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Hi all

I'm treating myself to a new car in a couple of months, just started looking at ones now.
Now I know I want a BMW, I've always loved them, from the shark nose style way back when to the shape now, I've just always wanted to own one. They are just so cool to me. Unfortunately, I'm clueless about cars, and even though I claim to love BMWs I know very little about them

So basically, I've decided I want a 3 series, now because of my budget, which I'll get onto in a bit, I've decided on an E46 3 Series. This is where my knowledge is very very hazy. I want a coupe, I think, I'm guessing the coupe is like the shape Fox has? I wasn't sure if it was a saloon or coupe (see this is how bad I am). Also it has to be a manual. Apart from that, I'm not really overly fussed, the more toys the better but that's a given I guess

Obviously a 330d would be ideal, but I'm not expecting one, or a good one in my price range, so I'm not sure what the best model is for price/performance after that is. I'd like good running costs, but then I'm also being a realist and expecting the odd large cost and lower MPG compared to my Fiesta :p

So the budget, I'm looking to spend £8k, I will be willing to go to £9k, but insurance is going to be about £1-1500 because I'm 23 and only had my license 1.5 years, so that limits me a bit. But I've saved to pay for the insurance outright, and I've been saving for the car for ages now.

I appreciate this thread might come across as me being extremely lazy and asking you to find me cars, but I'd like to assure you it isn't. I'm not very clued up on cars and being this will only be my second car, I'm not too sure exactly what I should look for, and what's good and bad when looking at used cars. For example, I'm looking at mileage a lot, but then I guess being a BMW, 80k miles is still fairly low.

Here are a few I'm looking at but unsure how good they are considering the price

Car 1 - I love this one, why's it so cheap?
Car 2
Car 3 - EDIT - Forget this one, it's an auto
Car 4

Those are a few examples of ones I thought were good, but obviously I'm sure there are better examples for the money which is where I struggle

Any help would be much appreciated

Cheers
 
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Focus on condition and number of owners more than the mileage. The car is likely to have been looked after better if it's had one owner who treats it as well as you would if you paid 25 grand for a car, rather than someone who's just paid £less for a second hand "bargain".

Higher motorway mileage > lower, town mileage, too.

And Fox has a 530i which is a 4 door Saloon :)
 
Steedie said:
Car 1 - I love this one, why's it so cheap?
Click to expand...

£8k isn't that cheap
but it doesn't state the mileage, so you can assume it will be high seeing
they only write "drives like 50,000" which is useless information

what do you actually want though? you've listed a 330ci, 330d, 325i auto and manual..

do you want manual or auto, 2 doors or 4, petrol or diesel?
narrow down what you want and go from there
 
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Sorry, I guess I should be more specific. In terms of the model number, that's the thing, I don't know enough about the differences between them in terms of performance to know which is worth getting

I remember people on here usually say avoid the 318? As it's underpowered?

I'd ideally like a 4 door, petrol and manual. But if it was diesel I wouldn't be too fussed, and again, 2 door, not a big issue

I didn't notice one of the cars I listed was auto, I'll remove that one, thanks for pointing it out :)
 
Ah ok, I knew it was too good to be true, I did email about the mileage but I won't bother following it up

Cheers for the advice Spud, if the right car came a long for that extra money then I guess I can stretch, but I don't really want to go over 9 unless I have too
 
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