I cant remember my old name here and I have a different email address. So I guess I can start over.

I made a mistake. I bought a used BMW M3 E36 4dr as a daily driver. It is to NICE! I can not stand the though of subjecting this car to the indignity of shopping carts and door dings.

I use to own a 1st gen Protege so I am thinking about buying a used 3rd gen as a daily driver since they are fun to drive and cheap. I noticed a local 2003 DX 5spd in "Cop Invisible" Sand with 8,000 ml for $8500 OBO. I assume it would take between $7000-8000 to buy this car with a lot of factory waranty left. Is this a good buy? It seems like it but I know there has been a lot of heavy discounting of new Proteges that may have effected price more than I realize.

Any and all thoughts welcome.

 

Yes and no, it's a great price for the car IMO, I bought a 2003 ES and LOVE it to no end. However, the price is only going down b/c the protege has been replaced with the Mazda3. If you're the type of person who gets all squeemish about owning a car that's not in production then that would be a problem. For your purposes I'd say it was a great buy though, you could prob. get it lower too using some haggling skills. You lucky so and so......I want an M3 soooooooo bad. Want to trade for my ES? =)

 

Well the E36 isnt anywhere near as fast as a E46 as it is only 240 bhp (US Spec) but it is a very well balanced car. It is also after they upped displacement to 3.2L which helped torque. It also has the 4 doors I needed. It was a super clean low mile car for less than the price of a Mazda 3 so I figured why not.

I would say that the closest car in the current BMW lineup is the 330i Sport.