Daily drivers

[emin_shak]

Hey guys i was interested about this topic for a while. So i have come to a conclusion with being a 19 year old that the gas prices with my 4.4l x5 is becoming very costly and was thinking about a daily driver. The daily driver i had in mind was the 318is e30. Does anyone have and opinions about to car, because i would really appreciate all i could gather up about it. I have also been curious what other people that own x5's drive on a daily bases. All are welcome to show pictures of the daily's or a simple description because well being a 19 year old, i dont have a pleasing job right now to compete with the problems and the costs a x5 gives to drive it everyday. Give me your thoughts

[TerminatorX5]

e30 for a daily driver is nice - a lot of E30s end up being race or track cars as the car's platform was ultimately the "BMW essence" that made the brand what it is now...

every age has its beauty and in your case you skipped a beat or two by moving into a "middle-aged refuse-to-be-soccer-mom/dad-van-driver" category... by the time we, the old folks, are ready to buy an X, we alreadfy have built up the infrastructure to support gas-thirsty car - have you seen middle-aged guys buying a Corvette? thank God for Viagra, the corvette sales went a bit down in the last 10 years!!!! hahaha... you are too young to consider those remedies yet... at least i hope so...

That is why the BMW has 3-series (and now 1-series), the MB has the C-class and the Audi - the A4...

I have a 4.8iS as my daily driver, and that thing is NOT easy on gas by any stretch of imagination... And even though I can support the gas bill, I still b!tch about it... nevertheless, I am not moving my a$$ into a Prius...

short of buying a Kia Spectra, if you care to stay in the BMW family, you should consider a 318is in E36 body, or your choice of E30... just remember, the E36 version will just keep you in a BMW, will not give you much factory performance unless you modify the engine bay and the suspension (or buy already modifyed car)

and, as you age, do what my greatgrandfather did when he was 60 - marry a 20-year old!!! lol... when he was asked, what he would do in 10 years when he would have turned 70 and she will be 30, he said that than he would divorce her and get himself another 20 year old!!!

I mean, apply that to the cars!!!!

[Ricky Bobby]

you think spending money on an additional car is saving you in gas, add to the fact that you will be insuring, maintaining, and gassing up 2 cars? An 11 year old X5 is hardly a garage queen that needs an additional "daily driver" car. Also, you suggest an E30 for a daily driver so you will have not 1, but 2 expensive and older vehicles to maintain and insure.

The X5 goes anywhere and does everything, I actually bought mine because I had a slammed VW that couldn't get into a lot of driveways and was terrible in snow, the X5 became my daily driver. Long story short, I'm almost 27, and realized why do I need a motorcycle, a slammed VW which I never drive, and my X5 which does everything?

Let's just say I only have the m'cycle and the X5 in the garage nowadays.



Want a more practical "daily driver" idea? Buy a beat to shit 20 year old Honda Civic beater for a grand with a stick, you'll get 40 mpg and insure it for bare minimum. From what I gather though, you have my old mentality is that you don't want to go "full beater" but still have a somewhat nice daily driver, aka you aren't going to want to drive a hoopty rust bucket and make your X a garage queen.


Save your money in my opinion for the X5 repairs. If you aren't prepared for them financially, buying another BMW isn't going to make it any better.

[TerminatorX5]

i thought he is giving up the X in favor of the other one - not keeping both... keeping both is double financial suicide (if such is even possible!!!!)

[epdarks]

Calculate the break-even point on a daily driver.

Let's say you drive 10,000 miles per year. Gas costs $4/gallon. The X5 we will say gets 18 MPG on average. Annual fuel expense: $2,222

Now let's try an E30. Same numbers, but 28 MPG. $1428/year.

Savings of ~$800.

Cost of E30 = $4k. Insurance, tabs, maintnence, misc = $1-2k per year.

So in theory you are looking at 5 years before you really "break even" on your gas expense. Year 6 you can finally "save money" with your E30.

There are other advantages to a daily driver. Less wear on the X5, more fun to daily an E30, etc.

[THE VEIN]

Originally Posted by epdarks

Calculate the break-even point on a daily driver.

Let's say you drive 10,000 miles per year. Gas costs $4/gallon. The X5 we will say gets 18 MPG on average. Annual fuel expense: $2,222

Now let's try an E30. Same numbers, but 28 MPG. $1428/year.

Savings of ~$800.

Cost of E30 = $4k. Insurance, tabs, maintnence, misc = $1-2k per year.

So in theory you are looking at 5 years before you really "break even" on your gas expense. Year 6 you can finally "save money" with your E30.

There are other advantages to a daily driver. Less wear on the X5, more fun to daily an E30, etc.

Even more reason to buy a civic

[Ricky Bobby]

Originally Posted by THE VEIN

Even more reason to buy a civic

Originally Posted by Ricky Bobby

Want a more practical "daily driver" idea? Buy a beat to shit 20 year old Honda Civic beater for a grand with a stick, you'll get 40 mpg and insure it for bare minimum.

We share the same ideas! lol

[racingbmwm3]

Originally Posted by epdarks

Calculate the break-even point on a daily driver.

Let's say you drive 10,000 miles per year. Gas costs $4/gallon. The X5 we will say gets 18 MPG on average. Annual fuel expense: $2,222

Now let's try an E30. Same numbers, but 28 MPG. $1428/year.

Savings of ~$800.

Cost of E30 = $4k. Insurance, tabs, maintnence, misc = $1-2k per year.

So in theory you are looking at 5 years before you really "break even" on your gas expense. Year 6 you can finally "save money" with your E30.

There are other advantages to a daily driver. Less wear on the X5, more fun to daily an E30, etc.

I'd much rather have an E30 over an E36. E36 has good performance, but doesn't feel like it has the build quality the E30 did.
My commute is 45 miles one way, and I did the same math as above when trying to decide on my commuter. I started with an E30 325e (32mpg), lots of torque and very fun to drive. I then wanted a 40+mpg car and narrowed it down to either a Civic or VW Tdi; with a price cap of about $2000 that I chose to allow a ROI of 18months or less. Chose the diesel Jetta, averaged around 46mpg for the year I drove it and it paid for itself in less than a year. After owning/driving BMW's for 15+ years it was difficult for me driving the Jetta everday, so I decided I'd rather spend 2 hours/day in something that handled/braked/accelerated/more comfortable than the beater VW. I ended up buying a Mini this winter, and the only time I don't feel like I'm in a BMW now is when I try to power out of a corner (I still miss rear wheel drive), but 37MPG and 'BMW'ness have made my commute so much nicer.

You need to determine what your budget is and what kind of daily driving you do to figure out what car you should get, if you should get one. If you want something super reliable that you don't want to do any work on, look at Toyota pickups.

[THE VEIN]

If your looking for a daily driver and worried about gas prices, get a civic I got 40mpg on the highway no problem

[rolfi]

The X5 is my daily driver.
For joyriding I have a E28 528i (Which is getting S38B36 from E34 M5 this year) and a E12 525 (which is getting a M106 3,4 Turbo from a E23 745i very very soon.)
I've used both the E28 and the E12 as daily drivers, and bought the X5 to have a "sensible" daily driver. Diesel is "sensible" because it's a lot cheaper than gasoline, so I got the X5 diesel.

I've also had a E34 525tds and a E30 320i as daily drivers. Using old cars as daily drivers require more mainetenance than I had time and energy for. They're easy to work on, but there was always something that needed to be done. And I always had to have two cars registered, just in case one broke down, I could use the other one while I fixed the broken one.