Does anyone have a guess as to overall engine life of the base 07 MC (not sport)? I’m thinking of buying one but tend to look for very long-life cars. My previous car was an 8-valve Civic 3-door which I sold at about 260k mi. (never had any major repairs and still ran fine, just got too ugly for my wife to stand)

Unfortunately I promised myself the next car would have to get better mileage, be more fun, and last longer than the old one. That doesn’t leave many options.

In general I think simplicity of design, quality of alloys, and general good engineering affect this, but I’m no expert.

Thanks!

So, say I’m paying $30,000 for a new MCSc, and have an older 3 series with a trade-in value of $17,000, but has a private-party resale value of $18,500.

Let’s say the total tax rate is 9.25%, tax on the MCSc would be $2,775. Tax with the trade-in factored in is $1,202.50 – that’s a difference of $1,572.50. That more than offsets the premium one would get from a private sell.

I currently own and drive on occasion, a 1987 Dodge 600 convertible – turbo – with 125,000 miles.

I have now been waiting for it to die for 6 years – it won’t. It has lost some steam in the past couple of years and the car itself is now a beater…

but like everything else in life (especially women, and cars) if you keep them tuned and lubed they keep going and going and going…

I also have a ’94 VW Corrado – supercharged – and that runs well also. Ah well, Get the turbo – I also think it will hold more value than the supercharged versions from years past.

It is a game, you’re right, but then in this day of easy internet access to real world prices it’s a shame how delerships still feel they can pull the same tricks that were the norm 20 years ago.

Electronics could be an area of trouble more than anything else.

I personally prefer to keep my vehicles 4-6 years tops while much of that time I am covered by the warranty. Keeping a MINI for another year or two after the factory warranty expires should not be a cause for alarm either (But that depends on the overall service/repair history of the car).

Right now we are driving a ’02 MC CVT with 40,500 miles (Warranty expired because of time, not mileage) and it is out of warranty. We bought the car brand new over 4 years ago. I am keeping on top of its maintenance and still no problems to speak of. A hard working daily driver. Hopefully, we won’t have any issues until our new ’08 Clubman arrives here next year. We plan to sell the ’02 MC once the Clubman becomes available.