2000 BMW 3 SERIES

Silver BMW E36 318i automatic convertible registered in 2000 and therefore one of the very last E36s.

In great condition with low miles for the age. Bought last year as a bit of summer fun, I’m now selling as a) I don’t need 4 cars and b) I’m finishing restoring a classic Fiat 500.

It has an advisory free MOT until July 26. There’s almost no corrosion, the underside is clean and the paint pretty good with a few chips scattered around commensurate with age. There are no suspension clunks or knocks, the engine runs perfectly and the gearbox is a proper old school slush box and changes smoothly. It’s very much a cruiser with this power train so don’t go expecting a missile.

Luckily its avoided being turned into a drift car (too slow) and seems to have been well cared for by previous owners. There’s a collection of invoices and MOTs, and stamps in the service book. It’s got BBS style alloy wheels, M Sport skirts and bumpers, and a factory hard top: all desirable and valuable on their own.

Also has a working six CD autochanger but one of the speakers is a bit fuzzy. The car has auto air con which still works reasonably well but likely needs a recharge. Also has projector headlights which are surprisingly good on full beam.

When I got the car the roof lining on the hard top was falling in (it looked like a bad previous repair) so I’ve had it professionally redone. The cost was £400 but I’ve stupidly mislaid the invoice, in any case the issue is solved as can be seen n the pictures.

The biggest issue is that sadly the automatic soft top isn’t working and there’s a dash light showing this. It was like this when I bought it, it seems that someone before had done a bad job of trying to fixing it and took off one of the connecting arms. It’s never bothered me as I view it as a coupe and just lift the hard top off for nice weather! I’ve only used it locally so never worried about getting rained on - plus the dry summer meant it got lots of use like this. It’s a relatively light removable hard roof with manual latches so it’s a quick job to lift off. The soft roof itself isn’t ripped and can be manually lifted but needs to run the powered to latch in the raised position; the motors all run and it actually closed under its own power while I was examining it so my guess would be it has a micro switch issue on the roof raising motion.

The other area needing attention is a split in the driver’s seat - see photo. Should be a simple fix for an upholsterer but it’s not falling apart or the cushioning coming out so I never had it looked at, that and you can’t see it when you’re sat on it, which always helps…!

This is a great first modern classic for someone, or just some summer fun for next year. Tax is in the pre-2001 zone which means it’s not too painful, and insurance is very cheap for how i use it.

Please message first if you are interested, happy to speak or arrange viewings thereafter. No group viewings please and I’ll undertake any test drives to keep things simple. I’m in no rush to sell, especially in winter, but i am open to sensible offers.

Happy for any inspections to be arranged by potential buyers.