Frugal Luxury car?

Q.I need to buy a new car because my place of employment is now 45 min away. My 85 GMC did trick when I only had to drive 10 min to work and the full size long bed truck will no longer do the trick in San Diego traffic. I would get another 4x4 all day long, however, my SO has a 4x4 and we do need a nice car for road trips, and now for my long commute. The price of new cars is absolutely ridiculous, I will not pay 18k for a gutless Honda civic with nothing on it. I am looking to finance 12k with 5k down which will probably creep up to 20k. The problem I am facing is that I really do not care for cars and the ones I do like are way out of my price range I think I have narrowed down the cars that think I can afford and would not mind spending time in. Those cars is as follows: 97-99 Lincoln LS or a 5 series BMW. I want to get one of these cars the most frugal way possible so I'll get pre-approved for 12k, plus my 5k down and search the auto trader and newspaper ads and I'll probably end up with 1998 5 series BMW for around 18k with 59,ooo miles. The only is problem I have with the BMW is that it gives the impression that you are rich or are a prick trying to be rich. I am neither, I'm simply looking for performance and safety and something I'll enjoy driving. Has anyone purchased a used luxury car that you were you happy with? What do you think of an "economy" car vs. a used luxury car for the same price? Does anyone have a BMW and if so, how expensive are repairs? I read a 1999 posting from Dennis (evil) saying that BMW stands for "Break My Wallet"

A.You could buy a 20 year old Mercedes 300SD for about US$3000-4000. Volvo 240s are pretty common and not too expensive (US$2000 for a old but well maintained one). Of course, a newer used car will cost more. With any used car, you'll want to check the maintenance history. Also, try to find web pages and forums about the car(s) you are interested in; they can give you ideas on what to look for when inspecting a car (e.g. make sure that the heater fan works properly if you are looking at a Volvo 240, because it is a lot of labor to replace). You'll also want to check insurance rates on the car(s) that you are considering before you decide to buy one. On the other hand, a new economy car may be nicer in many ways than an old luxury car, since technology does not stand still. You may also be able to get a new economy car with "low end" options like manual transmission, windows, and mirrors, in order to reduce long term reliability problems (some luxury cars from the 1980s and earlier may be available with these "low end" options, although newer used luxury cars may not be).

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