MINI Ownership Experience?

lupinsea · 12-15-2008, 04:03 PM

Edjumacate me on the whole MINI thing.

Now that a bunch of you are MINI owners. . . how is it?

As you all know, I lust after an MX-5 Miata. But with your rave reviews of the MINIs you have. . . well, those sound like a ton of fun, too. But with a BIG difference over the Miata.

They can seat 4 people and offer hatchback practicality.

With having a new member of our family, the 2-seat Miata wouldn't be as useful. Basically, it'd take over the ZHPs job which has devolved into a commuter car for me since I'm really not going on weekend, or even evening joyrides with it. The last dedicated driving "thing" I did with the ZHP was the big 2 week road grip down to california 2.5 years ago. I love driving the ZHP but opportunity for sporty driving comes only during the commute, errand running, job-site visits, or other select times.

Anyways, I think a MX-5 would work ok in a few years. By that point my son would be forward facing and I'd be able to turn off the front passenger airbag for the 2 mile ride to daycare. For family trips we'd do what we do now . . take the Volvo. I suspect that even with a MINI, we'd still take the Volvo on family trips.

But . . .

Anyways. Some questions - this applies to the second generation (R56?) cars, specifically, the S's:

Q1 - How is the whole reliability, maintenance, support thing. I'd have no qualms about upkeep on the MX-5. But how easy/difficult is the MINI for user maintenance?

Q2 - The MINI is a "premium" small car made by BMW. . . does that mean it has the same "premium" repair costs that the bigger BMWs have? Are parts and labor going to be more expensive for the MINI than the MX-5?

Q3 - Are there many independent repair shops or are you locked into the MINI dealer (or BMW dealer) for all service? I think we have only one MINI dealer in the NW and it's close to 50 miles away.

Q4 - Used MINIs. Ok? Anyone have an idea how well the MINIs hold up as used cars? Are they built pretty stout? I'd prefer NOT to by new, on any car, just to avoid the initial depreciation hit. But is it worth getting a used MINI?

Q5 - Used MINI premiums? For a while used MINI prices were pretty much the same as new MINI prices. Odd, but that's what it was like in the Northwest? Has this changed? It was like this with the S2000 for a while but eventually the market saturated a bit and the used S2k price have dropped. Have the used MINI prices come down a bit?

Q6 - Longevity of the brand? They seem to be doing well. Any chance the company will not be around in 5-10 years? Though given the recent gas price panic and their reasonably good MPG rating it would seem like they'd be well positioned for future economic conditions.

Any other comments?

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IndyMike · 12-15-2008, 04:22 PM

Lup, I'm sure you'll get a lot of traffic on this from others, but just for clarification are you considering only the 'regular' Mini, or also the Clubman?

JST · 12-15-2008, 04:23 PM

Ours was bought new and only has 9K miles on it, so I can't really speak to longevity. It's only been in the shop once, and that was for the one-year scheduled oil change (which Mini/BMW paid for). That service experience was fine; while they kept the car for three days, they gave me a loaner (ironically, a Dodge Caravan, which turned out to be remarkably handy to have for a couple of days).

Haven't had any warranty issues yet (knock wood). Still love driving the car--it's a more pure, more fun experience than even the M3, and it's a lot more fun around town (and it gets easily double the gas mileage in city driving).

Minis are easy enough to service. Like older BMWs, they have a dipstick, so you can actually use an oil pump to do an oil change without getting your pants dirty.

Minis seem to hold their value quite well, though the last time I looked was during the oil price spike which artificially inflated residuals for cars with good gas mileage. See this Edmunds article as a datapoint (but again note that this was during the gas price spike and before the current recession really hit): http://www.edmunds.com/insideline/do...ticleId=121998

Quote:

Originally Posted by edmunds

In the wake of this year's escalation in fuel prices, news reports have circulated that the Mini brand is sold out for the remainder of the year. Both the standard Cooper and the wagon-style Clubman have order lists extending through 2009. This means that prospective Mini owners will be looking elsewhere for pre-owned cars, and the result is reflected in the True Market Value (TMV®) of our 2007 Mini Cooper S of $24,207.

This figure is only $1,013 lower than the MSRP of this car. Moreover, if we had calculated the TMV with the dealer resale value instead of our private party resale factor, the depreciation would have been only -1.0007 percent, a $28 net increase in value after 18,000 miles.

They are solid enough on the resale market that I wouldn't bother buying one used--I'd order a new one, get exactly what you want, and be comfortable that you could turn around and sell it without losing your shirt if you decided it wasn't for you in a year or two.

lupinsea · 12-15-2008, 04:38 PM

Thanks JST.

I'd hope that with only 9k on the odo you wouldn't have any warranty issues. Perhaps Rumatt is the one to ask about higher milage MINIs? Last I heard I thought he was driving the snot out of his car.

If we get one I'd probably end up keeping it for 5 years / 100k+ miles of our own ownership. We're going to try to limit the automotive turn over in our household.

Quote:

Originally Posted by IndyMike

Lup, I'm sure you'll get a lot of traffic on this from others, but just for clarification are you considering only the 'regular' Mini, or also the Clubman?

Regular MINI.

The Clubman is, well, just seems. . . . wrong.

It'd be a "regular" MINI S or nothing. I wouldn't bother with a base model. And I'm not familiar with all the various performance packages availble (JCW, Stage 1, 2 or whatever dealer upgrades, etc.). I'd need to look into those to see if any would be worth the cost of upgrade.

For as much drooling and fixation I've had with the MX-5 I haven't taken a close look at the MINIs. It's just been a thought that you guys (bastards!) have popped into my head more recently.

How's the FrontWheelDriviness of the car? My understanding is that it's not as noticeable as other cars .. . something about the comparatively short wheel base or something? The Volvo FrontWheelDriviness is quite annoying at times. It's funner to drive than I thought it would be, I think mostly due to it's stiffer suspension. It's fine when driving normally but get on the power and the FWD characteristics show up. But, wow, Hadn't really driven/owned a front wheel drive car in the last 10+ years. The Volvo is bringing it all back, though.

How's the MINI do in the twisties? Can it be a fun commuter?

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Rob · 12-15-2008, 06:17 PM

You can have as much fun in a MINI as in just about everything. It handles like a go kart, more or less.

I traded mine in for $500 less than sticker after 9 months and 12k miles. Yes, $500 less than sticker as a trade in value - remarkable. I don't know if they are still that good, but I know they hold their value a lot better than a lot of other cars.

Refusing to consider options when you haven't driven any of them seems a bit odd to me - especially coming from someone with your jeep. Go drive them. All of them, including the clubman versions. The side door will make a world of difference for getting the kid in and out.

JST · 12-15-2008, 07:41 PM

I haven't driven a Clubman but definitely would have considered it if they were available when we bought ours. I may still end up with one if we have a second kid.

As for the FWDness, I am not going to lie to you--the car torque steers more than I would like, particularly with the LSD. But it is still hilarious fun to drive, and as rwg says, it handles like a go kart, even with crappy all season tires.

Rumatt doesn't have a MIni, though--I think you are thinking of Plaz.

JST · 12-15-2008, 07:44 PM

Oh, and the Mini's diminutive size and large glass area means it flat out rules as a commuter. Very easy to place.

lupinsea · 12-15-2008, 08:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JST

As for the FWDness, I am not going to lie to you--the car torque steers more than I would like, particularly with the LSD. But it is still hilarious fun to drive, and as rwg says, it handles like a go kart, even with crappy all season tires.

Rumatt doesn't have a MIni, though--I think you are thinking of Plaz.

Yeah, I think you're right. . . probably Plaz I was thinking of.

Hm, ok. Cool feed back on the FWD thing.

RWG (and/or JST), I simply don't like the form factor and proportions of the Clubman. There's one in our neighborhood I drive past every day. . . and every day I can't help thinking how bad it looks. Just can't imagine owning something like that where as I can easily imagine owning the standard size MINI which looks great.

As for refusing to test drive options ? Hm. . . well I don't ever want a minivan so I'm not going to test drive one. Not interested in the clubman so why would I test drive that, either. If I wanted something a bit bigger than the standard MINI I'd probably get something like a Mazdaspeed3 or perhaps one of the VW hatches (if they're considered reliable enough).

However, I should probably take your advice (and mine reguardeing recommendations to FC on the test driving the 2-door Jeep) and test drive it, if for no other reason than for the experience and comparison.

Quote:

Originally Posted by JST

Oh, and the Mini's diminutive size and large glass area means it flat out rules as a commuter. Very easy to place.

Cool. Yeah, felt the same way about my Cherokee when I had one. . . boxy with lots of glass = easy to place. The ZHP I drive now . . . well, it's harder for me to get a sense of the rear passenger-side corner with the bulk of the c-pillar in the way. In that regard, I liked my Miata a lot better. Looking over my shoulder I could see the corner of the back deck through the rear-view window.

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ZBB · 12-15-2008, 10:28 PM

We sold our MINI just about 2 years ago. We owned it for just about 4.5 years and put ~44k miles on it. My wife still misses it...

Ours was a first-gen, but I'll attempt to answer your questions:

Quote: