Have I drunk the Kool Aid?

[ingenieur]

politeperson said:

I would have no problem buying it at this price if it wasn't rusty.



Vehicle structure is corroded but structural rigidity is not significantly reduced (6.1.1 (c) (i))

You even get newish cars with that helpful line added to the MOT inspection history. You get a kind of orange rash over everything on the underside of a car relatively early on in the life of it but it doesn't change in most cases. I have seen a VW with special extra rust on it where the rear control arms had rotted through completely but on the whole it's quite common and nothing to worry about.

I would be checking the arches carefully if I were to be spending £7k on an older E46.

It's great that it has the 6-cylinder with a manual gearbox. Just a shame there's no leather.

[smn159]

Wow are they that much?

I've got one with leather - need to get it advertised for £10k!!!

Manual too

[ingenieur]

smn159 said:

Wow are they that much?

I've got one with leather - need to get it advertised for £10k!!!

Manual too

I like to apply a 'discount scheme' when shopping for a used car. I think in this case if you accept 0.05p off the asking price for each mile covered we could probably have a deal!

[hedges88]

P. ONeill said:

There’s a 540i Touring on eBay for about half that. For some reason I keep looking at old 5 Series estates.

You're just going to end up with extra costs for the rear air suspensions spheres and also the v8s with their steel subframe and recirculating ball steering are not really very engaging to drive

But God I do love an E39 and miss my late model touring with the baby six very much

[Gixer968CS]

Got the wrong wheels on it too (M V spoke were only on the M Sport models) and for some reason that's a thing that really turns me off. Don't know why.

[Richard-390a0]

Have we talked the seller down to accepting £4k yet lol!?!

[smn159]

ingenieur said:

smn159 said:

Wow are they that much?

I've got one with leather - need to get it advertised for £10k!!!

Manual too

I like to apply a 'discount scheme' when shopping for a used car. I think in this case if you accept 0.05p off the asking price for each mile covered we could probably have a deal!

Still puts it at £4k, which is decent considering I paid £1800 for it!

I like it a lot to be honest, although it's getting a bit scabby around the rear arches. Rising prices mean I'll probably get them sorted properly

[Triumph Man]

paintman said:

Of course, they might have been told by their other half that it's got to go & what we're seeing is a cunning plan in action.
'I'm sorry dear, I advertised it like you said to get rid of it but just didn't get any interest so we'll have to keep it'.

I've done that before I put my E34 520i up for sale for £1500 6 years ago. At the time that was quite steep but I didn't really want to sell it. 6 years later it's still here

[d_a_n1979]

P. ONeill said:

There’s a 540i Touring on eBay for about half that. For some reason I keep looking at old 5 Series estates.

Yup; and it'll cost you that again to fix it to a decent standard

[d_a_n1979]

hedges88 said:

P. ONeill said:

There’s a 540i Touring on eBay for about half that. For some reason I keep looking at old 5 Series estates.

You're just going to end up with extra costs for the rear air suspensions spheres and also the v8s with their steel subframe and recirculating ball steering are not really very engaging to drive

But God I do love an E39 and miss my late model touring with the baby six very much

IMO the E39 530i Sport Touring was the pinnacle of the E39 tourings... The V8s were great for sound and straight line speed, but the M54 engined tourings were the ones to have..

I am biased though

[J4CKO]

It’s a moderately tidy old BMW, it has a value but think folk get carried away, it’s nice but just not special enough to command that kind of money, for me anyway.

[CoolHands]

I hate the stupid expression in the title of this thread

[3GGy]

Do the buyers of these 10k old sheds know they will spend every 3rd month fettling with it regardless of miles? Or is it pure nostalgia? Surely no one is garaging these things.

I just don't get it.

I'm just pissed off al the old cheap cars are disappearing

[donkmeister]

CoolHands said:

I hate the stupid expression in the title of this thread

It's a phrase I've used, it's never struck me before your post that it's actually in very bad taste when you think about it. But then we also say things like "I didn't expect some sort of Spanish Inquisition" or call people "grammar Nazi" without flinching.

So I think it gets a pass.

[hiccy18]

donkmeister said:

CoolHands said:

I hate the stupid expression in the title of this thread

It's a phrase I've used, it's never struck me before your post that it's actually in very bad taste when you think about it. But then we also say things like "I didn't expect some sort of Spanish Inquisition" or call people "grammar Nazi" without flinching.

So I think it gets a pass.

I took it as a Tom Wolfe reference, is there some youth reference I am unaware of?

[Riley Blue]

hiccy18 said:

donkmeister said:

CoolHands said:

I hate the stupid expression in the title of this thread

It's a phrase I've used, it's never struck me before your post that it's actually in very bad taste when you think about it. But then we also say things like "I didn't expect some sort of Spanish Inquisition" or call people "grammar Nazi" without flinching.

So I think it gets a pass.

I took it as a Tom Wolfe reference, is there some youth reference I am unaware of?

Having not read Wolfe I've only heard of Kool Aid in connection with the Jonestown massacre.

[ingenieur]

smn159 said:

ingenieur said:

smn159 said:

Wow are they that much?

I've got one with leather - need to get it advertised for £10k!!!

Manual too

I like to apply a 'discount scheme' when shopping for a used car. I think in this case if you accept 0.05p off the asking price for each mile covered we could probably have a deal!

Still puts it at £4k, which is decent considering I paid £1800 for it!

I like it a lot to be honest, although it's getting a bit scabby around the rear arches. Rising prices mean I'll probably get them sorted properly

Or to put it another way... at £10k it would be 60% overvalued.

[JakeT]

CornedBeef said:

Pov spec as well, beyond being an SE it's also got cloth seats, halogen lights etc. I wouldn't go as low as £1k, I think it's definitely worth more than that - I'd probably say £5k? If it was a nicely specified coupe with that mileage in Sport format, it would be getting to £6-7k these days?

To be fair, it does have xenon lights. But nothing else. Even 5 is a little toppy to me, unless it has an iron clad service history.

Gixer968CS said:

Got the wrong wheels on it too (M V spoke were only on the M Sport models) and for some reason that's a thing that really turns me off. Don't know why.

They aren’t. These wheels were available on SE models at additional cost. My dad had one new in September 2000, a 330i SE touring with these wheels from the factory, and I had a 325ti SE with them on the build sheet too.

I agree with the general consensus here. Seems a lot of money for the car, and I think the pre facelift E46 is the best looking one too. For £8,000 there’s a lot of other stuff I’d rather have.

[Gad-Westy]

d_a_n1979 said:

hedges88 said:

P. ONeill said:

There’s a 540i Touring on eBay for about half that. For some reason I keep looking at old 5 Series estates.

You're just going to end up with extra costs for the rear air suspensions spheres and also the v8s with their steel subframe and recirculating ball steering are not really very engaging to drive

But God I do love an E39 and miss my late model touring with the baby six very much

IMO the E39 530i Sport Touring was the pinnacle of the E39 tourings... The V8s were great for sound and straight line speed, but the M54 engined tourings were the ones to have..

I am biased though

Alpina 3.3 Touring would get my vote. I liked my B10 4.6 but would reluctantly admit that the straight sixes probably are a better overall package.

[smn159]

ingenieur said:

smn159 said:

ingenieur said:

smn159 said:

Wow are they that much?

I've got one with leather - need to get it advertised for £10k!!!

Manual too

I like to apply a 'discount scheme' when shopping for a used car. I think in this case if you accept 0.05p off the asking price for each mile covered we could probably have a deal!

Still puts it at £4k, which is decent considering I paid £1800 for it!

I like it a lot to be honest, although it's getting a bit scabby around the rear arches. Rising prices mean I'll probably get them sorted properly

Or to put it another way... at £10k it would be 60% overvalued.

Much as I like the thing, there's no way that these are £10k cars.