help me guess a value for an E34 535i
Discussion
car is a 1990 535i SE though it's had M sport suspension fitted not long ago. it's got original, cloth interior with a few small rips of the drivers seat. mileage is 224k. i've driven it 160 miles and it's taut as a nut. engine pulls extremely cleanly, starts well whether it's hot or -3 deg out like this morning. not sure on service history, but it's owned by a classic BMW specialist and it's their courtesy car, and it's for sale.
no wheel wobbles, no funny noises, all electrics work (seats, mirrors, air con, OBC, sun roof etc). paint work is a little untidy, no nasty scratches but could do with a good clean up and polish. minor patches of rust around the fuel filler cap and that's about it i think. interior is a little tatty but not bad by any means.
now, with the miles it has, it can't be worth much more than £500 surely? i'm tempted to ask them for a price after they throw 12months MOT on it, and give it a full inspection II service, with 3 months warranty. what you guys reckon?
i'm seriously tempted to make an offer....
Ross.
no wheel wobbles, no funny noises, all electrics work (seats, mirrors, air con, OBC, sun roof etc). paint work is a little untidy, no nasty scratches but could do with a good clean up and polish. minor patches of rust around the fuel filler cap and that's about it i think. interior is a little tatty but not bad by any means.
now, with the miles it has, it can't be worth much more than £500 surely? i'm tempted to ask them for a price after they throw 12months MOT on it, and give it a full inspection II service, with 3 months warranty. what you guys reckon?
i'm seriously tempted to make an offer....
Ross.
If the filler cap area is going then I'd have a very close look around the corners of the rear where the bumper folds around. Also check the bungs in the rear up under the bumper. These rust out for a pass time.
Sills need a prod too - inside the rear wheel arches as the ends go.
I wouldn't want pay more than £500-£600.
Sills need a prod too - inside the rear wheel arches as the ends go.
I wouldn't want pay more than £500-£600.
Don't forget to mention to your insurer that it's a modified vehicle, as the M-Sport suspension will have lowered it and made you into a 'boy racer' all of a sudden.
The rust around the filler cap is a common problem on e34s but should be simple to fix. Check the sills by the jacking points and the bottoms of the doors for corrosion as this is where lots of rust usually sits, hidden until your jack goes through the sill.
If it was a proper 'sport' then I'd have said up to £1000 would be reasonable, but it's not, so £750 would be my max.
The rust around the filler cap is a common problem on e34s but should be simple to fix. Check the sills by the jacking points and the bottoms of the doors for corrosion as this is where lots of rust usually sits, hidden until your jack goes through the sill.
If it was a proper 'sport' then I'd have said up to £1000 would be reasonable, but it's not, so £750 would be my max.
that's what i'm thinking, but i'm doubting they'd let go of a reliable car for £5-600 unfortunately. i think i'll just stick it out until i finish uni and then can get a decent example of an E34 or possibly an E39. manual ones are getting hard to find, and i'd much rather a manual than an auto tbh.
I sold an absloutely mint, no rust anywhere 535 SE last year. It had full sport bodykit, immaculate black leather sport interior, all working electrics and about 157000 miles. It also had Koni suspension and 17" alloys. It sold for £450. There are bargains around because nobody seems to want the bigger engine.
kwk said:
I sold an absloutely mint, no rust anywhere 535 SE last year. It had full sport bodykit, immaculate black leather sport interior, all working electrics and about 157000 miles. It also had Koni suspension and 17" alloys. It sold for £450. There are bargains around because nobody seems to want the bigger engine.
at the end of the day, the 525i is the better all round car isn't it. i know it revs a little higher on the motorway (70 in this 535i comes in at about 2400-2500rpm, yet on a 525i it's about 2900rpm), so at outside lane motorway speeds, it is doing more work, but it's not much slower, and far more economical.i've just been really taken by this example. i think i might keep my E21 until the summer and when i then won't need a car, i can sell it. see what i get and see if a nice 525i comes up. what with E21 and E34 prices being as they are at the moment, my E21 seems like it'll sell for the same (if not more!) money than a decent 525i.
i love the E21 to bits, but i do love the idea of something a little more, err, relaxing.
what you think? to be honest, as good as this 535i is mechanically, it isn't tidy by any means, so it's probably not worth them selling it. and i wouldn't fancy something with nearly quarter of a million miles on it either.
damn though, you should have flogged it to me
To be honest, I bought mine because I already had a 535 sport which was beyond economical repair and I swapped the good bits over. I already had a 525SE E34 with nearly 200000 miles and it was still going strong. I loved the 535 though and only sold it because I have two 3 series and I wasn't using it.
Where was you when I sold the 535? It was for sale for nearly two months.
Where was you when I sold the 535? It was for sale for nearly two months.
kwk said:
To be honest, I bought mine because I already had a 535 sport which was beyond economical repair and I swapped the good bits over. I already had a 525SE E34 with nearly 200000 miles and it was still going strong. I loved the 535 though and only sold it because I have two 3 series and I wasn't using it.
Where was you when I sold the 535? It was for sale for nearly two months.
fWhere was you when I sold the 535? It was for sale for nearly two months.
k!!! you're in south wales too!!!! bks!kwk said:
It went to London.
i'm at uni at glamorgan. i know, neither an E21 or an E34 are typical student cars but hey ho 
i don't spend my money of booze, i spend it on cars that's such a shame, if i'd have known a decent example from a pher was going for that price that was local, i'd have snapped it up.
where abouts are you then?
as i said, think the logical thing is get my 3rd year exams out the way (4 yr course) and when i have a little more time, sell my E21 and wait for a decent 525i to crop up and snap it up then. have you ever driven a 525i? what's it like compared to the 525i?
I'm in Swansea. As I said, I owned a 525 at the same time. The 535 just seemed more brutal and you needed to rev the 525 more.
The previous owner said that the 535 was super chipped. I don't know if it was but it did seem quicker than the sport that I also had at the time. It did have a k+n induction kit, stainless exhaust etc.
The previous owner said that the 535 was super chipped. I don't know if it was but it did seem quicker than the sport that I also had at the time. It did have a k+n induction kit, stainless exhaust etc.
kwk said:
I'm in Swansea. As I said, I owned a 525 at the same time. The 535 just seemed more brutal and you needed to rev the 525 more.
The previous owner said that the 535 was super chipped. I don't know if it was but it did seem quicker than the sport that I also had at the time. It did have a k+n induction kit, stainless exhaust etc.
so presumably a 525i which has been chipped wouldn't be THAT much slower than a 535i?The previous owner said that the 535 was super chipped. I don't know if it was but it did seem quicker than the sport that I also had at the time. It did have a k+n induction kit, stainless exhaust etc.
a lot of my trips now are motorway trips. at uni, i don't use the car that much, but when i do, i want it to be quite a relaxed motorway trip. is the 525i still quite relaxed at say 85-90mph? the 535i was almost silent at 100 but if the 525i could be as relaxed at 90 as the 535i is at 100, i'd be more than happy.
Ross.
I took my 525 all over the place including South of France twice, Switzerland and Austria. I also did numerous trips to Germany including Munich and a few laps of the Nurburgring. It never burned a drop of oil and in all the time I owned it I only ever replaced the viscous fan.
It was a superb motorway cruiser and was very economical.(except on the ring).
It was a superb motorway cruiser and was very economical.(except on the ring).
kwk said:
I took my 525 all over the place including South of France twice, Switzerland and Austria. I also did numerous trips to Germany including Munich and a few laps of the Nurburgring. It never burned a drop of oil and in all the time I owned it I only ever replaced the viscous fan.
It was a superb motorway cruiser and was very economical.(except on the ring).
good to know. think i'll start saving now. though with current prices, my basically mint E21 will sell for approx same as a decent 525i. it's just playing the waiting game.....waiting for a good, low-ish mileage example with good service history with a manual gear box. also want a late one with vanos.It was a superb motorway cruiser and was very economical.(except on the ring).
i'm not picky
though to be fair, if i want one, i want a good one. MUST be an M50 one, not an M20.from what i gather, the late 525i's get better economy than my little M10 4 pot which is pulling a far lighter car. means more petrol for hoonage
E21_Ross said:
kwk said:
It went to London.
i'm at uni at glamorgan. i know, neither an E21 or an E34 are typical student cars but hey ho i don't spend my money of booze, i spend it on cars that's such a shame, if i'd have known a decent example from a pher was going for that price that was local, i'd have snapped it up.
where abouts are you then?
as i said, think the logical thing is get my 3rd year exams out the way (4 yr course) and when i have a little more time, sell my E21 and wait for a decent 525i to crop up and snap it up then. have you ever driven a 525i? what's it like compared to the 525i?
yinujim said:
E21_Ross said:
kwk said:
It went to London.
i'm at uni at glamorgan. i know, neither an E21 or an E34 are typical student cars but hey ho i don't spend my money of booze, i spend it on cars that's such a shame, if i'd have known a decent example from a pher was going for that price that was local, i'd have snapped it up.
where abouts are you then?
as i said, think the logical thing is get my 3rd year exams out the way (4 yr course) and when i have a little more time, sell my E21 and wait for a decent 525i to crop up and snap it up then. have you ever driven a 525i? what's it like compared to the 525i?
kwk said:
My 525 was the M50 non vanos. That and both the 535's were the all important manuals.
thanks for making me feel even better about not getting the 535i maybe the vanos 525i feels much better....you said you had the rev the 525i more, the vanos did flatten the torque curve from 3000-6200rpm so maybe it's much better mid-high range than the non-vanos model?
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