Dealer where SWMBO got her Ibiza was taking lots of beemers as trade ins against CRVs. They'd taken an 04 E46 330d manual which I quite liked the look of.

They dug it out and I went for a test.

It's an 04 but was squeak and rattle free. Nice to drive. Feltl like your sat very low in the car. Plenty of shove to motor which was very smooth* for a derv.

The hype of this being massively powerful doesn't really work when you've been driving a 200hp car for nearly 4yr. It was adequately fast. Not scary fast at all.

Salesman somewhat disappointed at my reaction he thought it was a rocketship. Octy feels considerably faster.

Pluses - 204hp, pretty much as fast as the VRS (on paper), better mpg, rwd, leather, xenons the works. FSH (BMW) Good tyres all round

Minuses - didn't start until 3rd attempt, * ran rough until it'd been revved a bit, inspection light on despite being serviced 6 months ago.

They wanted £8999 for the beemer which seemed high to me to start. Only offered £7499 for the Octy against it £1400 to change.

IMHO that's far too much for a car that's getting on for 7yr old, high spec beemer or not. If I had £1400 I wouldn't have paid it.

Salesman agreed, said he wouldn't buy it himself for that price but the manager had given £8100 for it as a trade in and needed to get the money back.

Edited 20 December, 201015 yr by Aspman

Wouldn't be much good in the snow either! :no:

Wouldn't be much good in the snow either! :no:

Was hoping for a good deal because of that.

Car is back on the their site

http://www.autotrader.co.uk/classified/advert/201050375347329/sort/priceasc/model/3_series/make/bmw/radius/40/quicksearch/true/page/1/postcode/ph74ln/advert-type/featured-listing/dealer/334253/usedcars?logcode=flp

Edited 20 December, 201015 yr by Aspman