Repairs are starting to depress me.. when is enough?

[entropy]

Hi Guys,

I have a 2001 4.4 V8 which has been maintained incredibly well by its previous owners and currently by me. I've had the car 2 years and have enjoyed every minute of it. However, due to her age she is having to have a few things replaced which sadly aren't cheap.

The car is worth probably around 4.5k if i'm lucky but in the last 2 years i've spent £2,300 on repairs such as drive shafts, ball joints, rear bushes etc and I think when I bought the car I was expecting maybe £500 a year for misc things was reasonable.

My question is when do you walk away? I keep saying to myself nothing else can go wrong and then it does. Has anyone done the math on maintaining a old x5 over 3 years v a new car? In my head I figure once you factor
in the depreciation of a new car and servicing costs the X5 could still be the winner?

Anyone else in same predicament? also on average how much do you guys spend a year on keeping these beasts road worthy?

[X5Sport]

I called it quits on mine after 7 years.  I got to the point where I no longer trusted it even though it was low mileage.  Once the extended warranty only began to cover an ever more limited range of parts and with an annual mileage of around 9k it was a risk I just could not afford to take anymore.

Don't misunderstand me, it had been a great car (2005 E53 3.0D) and I had it from new, but it suffered a host of silly faults as well as a premature gearbox failure.  Every time it needed looking at it was another £500 and an intake of breath from the Dealer (the local Indy could not cope with 4x4 BMWs) which meant my bank was going to be hit again.

So I bought a new X6 instead - which to date has been a vast improvement.

Richard

[Horizon]

I've just got rid of my 3.0d sport, December 2005. It never missed a beat, had the gearbox serviced,  stupidly fitted new handbrake shoes and discs 2 weeks before I sold her, as I thought it wouldn't pass the MOT as the handbrake was useless,had an oil service, fitted a new battery out of choice as it was 7 years old. 106k on the clock when it went.
I sold her before the she started getting too old, as in years gone by 100k was the time that you were endlessly putting things right for something else to go wrong days after. Loved the car, but she had to go.

[Smeeagain]

I think there is no simple answer. I had a VW Golf tdi 150bhp Brand new back in 2002 - inside two years it had £9500 of repairs all fortunately covered under warranty. Equally I bought a ten year Peugeot 405 with 120k miles on it for a grand and then put another 130k miles on it and the only repair other than general wear and tear, tyres , brake pads etc was the fact that the alternator packed up within a week if buying the car. Eventually when the fuel pump went at 250k miles I let it go.
My point is that you never know what you're buying - if you pay out for repairs then you at least know what's done and what isn't
My x
E53 3.0 d sport 2094 auto has 166k miles on it - if/when the turbo/gearbox go then I'm panning to recon/replace but it really is personal choice.

Good luck- let us know what you decide to do
Smee

[AW8]

A grand p/a or 10k miles -  maybe less I'd lucky I have owned my 2002 4.4i for 7 years and 60k miles between 60 and around 120k ..... Had new thrust control bushes , aux fan,water pump, alternator, pas pump, pcv hose, expansion tank, rocker gaskets, cv boots to outer front shafts, rear subframe bushes, batteries, final stage resistors a radio module window regulators, tailgate catch, some belt, fluids, discs, pads, various tyres plus normal servicing xenon bulbs  a window control unit and some mirror glass .... Off top of my head that is.

Other than that its been fine.

Probably not the cheapest car I have run but a good  one when its behaving. I think I should add that I am fussier than some re maintenance issues.

[fenj66]

i think as cars generally get older they are all bound to start having parts fail more often. in the case of a bmw, being well built in my opinion, they should approach 10 years old before major things start failing, whereas other marques might start failing sooner.
if you are competent enough to tackle major jobs yourself, then you can keep costs down to just the price of the parts, which if bought outside of bmw, can be much cheaper.
also, with a car getting to 10 years old say, does it matter so much if the service history starts be non bmw?
i certainly dont think so.
ive done all my own servicing since owning the car 5 years ago, ok so a prospective buyer might want to knock a few hundred quid off for the non bmw servicing, but ive still saved in my opinion.

if something drastic like the gearbox failed on me now, i would prob just throw a second hand one in it rather then spend £2k plus on a recon.

[AW8]

I appreciate each owner/car experience is different but having owned since car was 4 years old I don't recall  significantly lower maintenance costs before it's 10th birthday (though alternator & pas pump failure this year weren't welcomed).

[Steamyrotter]

I'm not even going to join in on this conversation...................
O:-)

[X5Sport]

No, you really do have the patience of a  O:-)

[Greydog]

I brought our 2002 X5 initially to just pull a horse box so usage/mileage would have been low, however I have enjoyed driving it and so have the rest of the family so mileage is far higher than anticipated.
Rear subframe bushes were changed by the dealer at purchase as was the hedgehog, though it had a full history I had a full service and fluid changes (including gearbox) carried out by a recommended BMW specialist plus front suspension bushes. Not actually required but my choice so that both he and I knew where we were coming from for the future.
In 20 months as a family we have put 21k on the X5 for just £945 in servicing and parts, it went through it's MOT with no advisories and the way it drives I would expect it to do so again. By comparison my AMG CLS cost almost double that for a service alone and we wont even begin the discussion about the frustration caused by niggly things that seemed impossible for the dealer to fix.

So new or used cars can have their problems with the X5 it appears I have a good one with the CLS not, so it is now sold.

[pvr]

It all shows again why I am not keen on buying second hand, everyone seems to dump the car when repairs are getting too expensive and I don't fancy being the next mug  :'(

[shadrack]

[quote="Steamyrotter"]
I'm not even going to join in on this conversation...................
O:-)
[/quote]

lmao

[AW8]

In terms of spec choice & reliability I accept it is normally beneficial & desirable to buy new.

Must work harder ::) 

[pvr]

... or in your case, less talk, more work  )

[shadrack]

but does the work under the warranty cost more than the depreciation lost in the same period?