This question is personal and there is no right or wrong. It all depends on how the person wants to live his life, whether to committing to a RM150k with a combined salary of RM9000 with the wife.

I have seen people going into debts by not having enough to pay for car installments, just to have the "status" of driving a BRAND NEW BMW car. In real life. Of course he chooses the way he wants to live his life. What are we to comment.

This thread is basically the same thing. At times one may struggle, but at the end of the day, you will sail through driving the BMW albeit the struggle. Worse comes to worst, the bank will just tow away your car if the owner cannot cope.

TS should make a poll rather than wasting 14 pages worth of time debating without a conclusion.

I still vote No buy.

wow thats scary indeed. I was looking at the new model yesterday and fall in love with it. now is the research phase and this really reduce my confidence lol.

btw ts, imo if you have to post here and ask for opinion, my suggestion is really don't go for it. If you are really confident you had already sign to booking form instead of posting in forum

The purpose of the post is not to discourage you from buying if you can afford. For flood issues, all cars face the same problem. To cover the risk, just buy insurance to include flood. When you see water level is high, don't garang garang drive through. Be careful in parking at flood prone area especially in KL city center. As bmw has more electronics and sensors, the cost to fix the problem is higher if one does not have insurance cover. Majority of the F30 problems have been resolved since 2013. The new LCI has quite a number of improvements besides the cosmetic. The suspension is more stiff now but I suspect the height is the same. Quite a number of pre-facelift owners swap to better suspension like Bilstein after BSRI expired. If you book the new LCI, you save that few k in changing the suspension.

I'm not going to encourage or discourage the TS from buying a BMW because ultimately TS has to decide if he can live with the idea of buying and servicing the car himself.

Realistically, maintaining a continental car, particularly a 2nd hand one isn't that easy as ongss has mentioned.

Sure, continental cars are great because of the driving and stability dynamics factored in, besides the brand. BUT after they are past their warranty and past 10 years, they do require a lot of maintenance & servicing time and charges.

I know this because I drive a 10 year old mercs which is a family car btw, so it's not mine. But I've seen it go to the car workshop many times (lost count how many times with my fingers) already for a number of problems and each time, it comes back from the workshop.. the bill can come up to RM1-2K+ depending on the issue.

Other than that, I would say continental cars are great to drive on the highway and city roads. This also gives you the safe feeling to drive partly because they have heavy body, steering wise is good. My only gripe is that the car side mirrors are small and non-retractable for me at least.

Other than that, if TS is totally comfortable with the cost of maintaining a 2nd hand continental car and paying off a 9 year loan (this is probably a big stretch on the expenditure IMHO), there's nothing to stop him from going ahead for it right?

This post has been edited by S'aimer: Nov 24 2015, 12:55 PM

An income of 9K is sufficient to pay the loan instalment and maintain a BMW 320i for normal servicing and wear and tear but you must have a strong financial foundation for contingencies. These cars can be very expensive to repair. If for some reason (touch wood) the car needs major repair costing say, 20K can TS bear the cost? If he cannot bear the cost can he afford to sell it? For sure the market value of the non-repaired car will will fall below the loan balance and TS needs to top up. So if you can't repair and can't sell you are caught in a bear trap.

I would advise TS to go ahead only if he has contingency funds of at least RM30K to draw on.

Finally, TS should consider:

1) How will my life improve if I drive a BMW?
2) How will my life be like if I don't drive a BMW?

I am not sure which part of my post gave you an impression that I claimed it is easy to maintain a continental car. I thought I have already highlighted, to upkeep a bmw in the condition of ultimate driving machine, one needs to budget 30k for next five years for a F30 produced in 2012. I also highlighted the need of additional insurance to cover for possible damage caused by flood.

I am not sure where you send your 10 years old Merc for service and maintenance. But, I have no big problem for my 6 years old Merc.

Nowadays, modern continental cars are fitted with electronics and sensors. Independent workshops need to invest in new equipments and training in order to give proper maintenance. Trial and errors type of solutions actually cost more in terms of total ownership. For an independent workshop to have equipment and training, the charging won't be far away from the authorized service centre.

If you find out you have to send your Merc frequently to workshops, you have to ask, did the workshops you visited really know the root cause? Did they give you advices for the preventive maintenance?

For me to maintain the continental, I do a lot of preventative maintenance. When I know it is about time (based on mileage) to change absorber shock, I will change. If I don't, the ageing s absorber may impact other components of the suspension such as the arms for strut assemblies or the wheel bearing. I also send my car for wheel alignment and checking. I keep Excel spreadsheets to track the problems and the maintenance history.

This post has been edited by ongss: Nov 24 2015, 03:57 PM


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instead of bmw low spec, i rather camry highest spec aka camry hybrid

Bro, I was referring to your statement in Post #268 "Having the experiences of maintaining continental cars, I know exactly how much they cost to be in good shapes." I am just expressing that the cost of maintaining an older continental car is not cheap, particularly a 2nd hand one because I can really relate to what you are saying. Of course it does depend on the age of the car and how well the owner take care of the car. My bad if I am expressing wrongly or giving the indication that you are expressing that it is easy to maintain a continental car though.

The 10 year old mercs in question is a family car so it doesn't belong to me. My parents send it to a workshop that specializes in both BMW and Mercs repair, maintenance etc. The costs is cheaper than the authorized service center charges from what I have heard, considering the Mercs has passed its warranty already. I also drive a 5-6 year old Japanese car and the maintenance interval for it is not that frequent as the merc's to be honest.

So based on that score, I believe that if TS plans to get a 2nd hand continental car, he will need to assess the condition and whether maintenance cost wise, he can really afford to upkeep for the next 9 years if he intends to get a car loan





This post has been edited by S'aimer: Nov 24 2015, 04:17 PM

That's another good point. If TS takes a loan for 9 years he probably plan to keep it for 9 years until the loan is settled. The longer the age of the car the more expensive to maintain. Although this is true of any car it is especially true of conti cars where cost shoots up far more than Jap or Korean cars. It's possible that TS may get more affluent as the years pass but it is unwise to commit to a future which is uncertain.

Very risky yoh. TS better off with jap car instead.

instead of this, better be like me

buy a vios cash and 9 years can save up plenty of money and go around the world for holidays instead eat maggie mee

Hows ur yogurt?

BMW = ultimate driving machine.

lol, what a load of bullshlt. Since when you guys are are marketing people now?

The thing is, it has nothing to do with being upper or lower variants/class of the BMW cars at the moment. Whether it is a ultimate driving machine OR NOT is not the main point now. Kinda a moot thing.

The question is can TS manage with maintenance cost since he sought advice about this, besides expressing his intention to buy a 2nd hand conti car. That aside, the cost of owning one is another different matter because it all boils down to whether the buyer has deep pockets to get one.

It doesn't matter. He's driving it in this country so the perception will be based on inhabitants of this country.

However the Ultimate Driving Machine isn't all that it is cracked up to be. Look into the secret world of BMW and you'll find annoyances you associate more with Proton than a luxury marque. If you think you'll get better service think again. Rude and barely competent staff and rapacious service centres ready to take you for a ride at every opportunity. In the end you pay extra for the badge only, not for quality. If you got money to spare fine but if you want value for your hard earned money look elsewhere.

tis tread still runnin? so long d, so ts sudah beli?

If bmw is UDM, this must jesus christ

depends on usage.. for me.. im saving at least 500 a month. If 2k a year then not worth it.

IMHO, save more and invest in dividend stocks
if lets say one month both of you can buy a annual dividend about 500 MYR shares.
12 months u already can buy 12 shares.
12 shares x 500 Ringgit = RM6000 per year.
use this to compound again into the next year.
each year + 6000 MYR.
1st year = 6000
2nd year = 12000
3rd year = 18000
4th year = 24000
5th year = 30000

Seeing money grow is better than letting money go into the drain... spend wisely

If 5 years paying RM2060/monthly (installment + service fees)
1st year 12 months = 24720 MYR
2nd year = 49440 MYR
3rd year = 74160 MYR
4th year = 98880 MYR
5th year = 123600 MYR

Comparing savings and spending ... see the difference?