High Mileage BMW (Would you buy)?

jase1

colino wrote: »

Council MOTs are a joke. The guys doing the job ordinarily are there to legalise the local authorities fleet, not be over scrupulous of a nice marques foibles. Lets face it, if you have a mate who is a council plumber (i.e., bloody useless and couldn't hack it in the commercial world), you wouldn't trust to fix a leak. Why would you trust a council wage taker, with virtually no real life experience, to do a proper MOT?

What a complete load of bo11ocks.

reeac

colino wrote: »

Council MOTs are a joke. Why would you trust a council wage taker, with virtually no real life experience, to do a proper MOT?

Do you apply the same logic to the NHS? Are they all just wage-takers etc. etc?

colino

There's a twisted argument posed for no value. If a council mechanic was good enough, he'd be on bonus out in the real world. The council MOT centres are there to keep their fleet legal and on the edges, carry out other MOTs. Council MOT centres are the easiest places to get a pass, they do no favours to unknowledgeable private motorist giving easy passes just because they lack experience in a wider range of vehicles.
Well done in comparing dedicated, trained, life-savers to a council MOT tester, they'll be delighted with your comparison.

desperate101

On a 6.5k car you'd be mad not to get a full AA inspection.
Have seen quite a few modern diesels being written off because of repair bill looming. End up being sold privately or auctioned.
Get the AA check - the full bells and whistles one - cheapest insurance you'll ever buy.

desperate101

And by the way, the whole MOT tester argument is pointless. An MOT is valid for 24 hours, but only needs to be undertaken every 12 months. Don't ever judge a car's virtues by whether it has an MOT or not. Everyone has mates...

TradePro

GAZ237 wrote: »

135k with FSH is nothing.

It's not really, is it..?

CrazyRed

Albeit much older models (E34's, both) but I've had a couple of high mileage BMW's.

The first was a 525i, ex Fire-Service. 155,000 when bought, 182,000 when sold a couple of years later. Absolutely faultless and cost me virtually nothing over and above regular servicing and wear-and-tear items.

The second was a 520i, es private owner. I bought this with 226,000 on the clock (the dealer was going to great lengths to point out the mileage on the test drive and to give me every opportunity to walk away from it if I wished) and sold it 3 years later (only because I 'upgraded' to a diesel Merc C Class) with 252,000 on the clock to a local garage. That car's still going today!

With regular servicing (if anything, I'd change oil filter every 5,000 and oil every 10,000 - ignore what the computer tells you), most of the BMW's out there are superb cars - mile munchers, comfortable, fairly sporty and not too uneconomical (dependent on the position of the right foot, of course).

The vehicle you're looking at has covered around 45,000 miles per year which suggests that it would have spent most of it's life on the motorway, fully warmed up (in fact, with that mileage on the clock, it's probably hardly had time to cool down on a daily basis!) - IMHO THE best treatment to give a car.

If it's genuine FBMWSH you might well be able to buy a BMW Warranty for it - perhaps it might be worth asking the dealer for a contribution towards it rather than have his likely-to-be-worthless-when-you-need-it warranty - the BMW Warranty is truly bumper-to-bumper, virtually regardless of mileage and is well regarded by the BMW Owner's Forum members.

The 318 is not one of the engines that self-destructs from ingesting it's own swirl flaps (watch the 320d's - a huge number of them had this problem and it generally destroys the engine when it happens) - and is regarded as a n engine that can happily soak up the miles without major problems rearing their ugly head.

For 6.5k that's not a bad deal - see if the dealer will pay, say a quarter towards the BMW year warranty (he'd probably have given you a three-month warranty anyway, from the people he uses) and then you, and your dog, go and enjoy your new ride!

HTH

GAZ237

TradePro wrote: »

It's not really, is it..?

Not on a BMW no.

If it was on a Corsa, Fiesta ect. Then yes I would say run away.

Stageshoot

Thanks for the input, everyone much appreciated,

Contacted the original suppling dealer (Who was also all the stamps in the servicebook), and they confirmed the mileage and service history was all above board.

So anyway long and short of it is, its now on my drive.

Nice Cheap to insure as well, added to my exisiting policy with Aviva on Multicar, it came in a £195 a year, 15k Miles a Year with Business use & Breakdown/Recovery/HomeStart


So now the Dog is happy days out coming up soon,

Just look at that contented smile





Cheers.

GAZ237

Lot of car, for that price. Well done.

Nice dog aswell LOL