Used 2008 BMW 3 Series Consumer Reviews
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For a used car, a great value.
Al Powell, 02/25/2016
updated 08/28/2018
2008 BMW 3 Series 328xi 4dr Wagon AWD (3.0L 6cyl 6M)
48 of 53 people found this review helpful
I do a lot of my own minor maintenance, and that matters when you own a German car, especially a used one. My 2008 328xi Wagon came with 98K miles, but was in beautiful condition. I've driven it for a year and haven't had to touch it other than an oil change and to mount winter wheels, which I did myself. If you have a German car, stay away from the dealer except for specialized work and find a good independent shop that knows German cars. Basic maintenance like brake pads, rotors, filters and other normal stuff is pretty easy to DIY, so I'm not interested in paying labor rates for that. My 328xi Wagon and my wife's 09 328ix Coupe drive pretty much identically. I've never driven a wagon that handled so much like a coupe; it makes my eyes light up when I find a twisty road! The handling is excellent and great fun, but if you stay with the factory run-flat tires the ride will be a bit harsh. The seats are firm, but somehow they're still comfortable after 8 hours of driving. BMW has that exactly right, and the 3-series is fantastic on long trips! The instrumentation is too minimal (speedometer, tach, gas and but fuel mileage) but it's not a problem for those who trust lights and don't want lots of gauges. The driving experience is why you buy a BMW. The turbos have higher maintenance costs and more issues, so I bought the normally aspirated 328, which is a very reliable engine. I am also one of the fortunate few who have the six-speed manual transmission, which makes driving at least 2x more fun. The shifter is quick and smooth, and the pedals are well set up for heel-and-toe shifting. BMW clutches tend to last a very long time, and my car has the original clutch at 105K miles. Clutch replacements will be expensive since BMW uses an unusual dual-disc flywheel that's expensive. Gas mileage is great for a sport sedan/wagon (mid to high 20's) for highway cruising, and in-town mileage depends on how heavy your right foot is (mine is heavy) and how much stop-and-go driving you encounter. The wagon model has enough room for four people (five only in a pinch) and a reasonable amount of cargo. If you're packing for a sports event and bringing a fold-up canopy, you'll have to drop the smaller side of the 60/40 back seat to give yourself room for it. For groceries, trips with carry-on bags and a reasonable amount of cargo, you'll have no problems. Update in 2018: After three years and 27,000 miles I've had the oil and filter changed, fluids changed, installed front brake pads and rotors, changed the spark plugs and cabin filter, replaced the original 9-year-old battery, and had a front end alignment done. The clutch is original (as far as I know) at 125K miles and appears to have substantial life left. I installed standard high performance summer tires and got rid of the Yokohama run-flats, which had a terrible ride. The car is much more pleasing with the standard tires. I carry a 12V air pump and a plug kit in case of a flat. Oh yes, I had the AC refrigerant topped up after three years of driving. That's the total maintenance required to date, and the reader will note that most of it is routine stuff done to every car at appropriate intervals. This car has been among the most dependable I've ever owned. I hope to keep it for years.
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Great combination of sportiness and luxury
mpt2222, 06/13/2011
2008 BMW 3 Series 335xi 4dr Sedan AWD (3.0L 6cyl Turbo 6M)
11 of 11 people found this review helpful
I recently traded my 02 325i for an 08 335xi and must say, it's been a great decision. This car is so smooth and quick and handles corners with ease. There are several nice touches in technology added from the previous version that are really nice. For example, the exterior LED door handle lights are very cool and useful. I don't use the can chiller often in the console, but it's nice to have it for the long trips. This car represents one of the best balances of luxury and handling I've had the pleasure of driving. I'm just glad I bought this used as the original pricetag is just out of my reach.
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It's an absolutely fantastic fun car to drive
Marcello, 04/20/2017
2008 BMW 3 Series 328i 2dr Convertible (3.0L 6cyl 6M)
11 of 11 people found this review helpful
I love convertibles and I have owned a lot of them... having a hard top convertible is the best of all worlds. This car is amazing... I have owned it for over 8 years and the maintenance has been minimal. I have the paddle shifters and the sports package and have to admit I was not happy with how harsh the ride was at first UNTIL I realized that it was due to the horrible ride and harsh lumpy drive I was getting from the original run flat tires. Run flat tires are an abomination. Think about it for a minute... what good are they really?... they ride horribly and handle poorly, they wear poorly and if you get a flat they are only good for one thing... to drive to a tire store and pay twice as much as you should for tires! I got rid of the run flats and got a great set of Michelin's got a good tire pump on Amazon for 50 bucks and a can of safe tire slime (make sure you buy the good one that doesn't hurt the tire pressure sensors!) and I have had one flat tire that I pumped up went to my tire store... had a nail pulled out and patched for free! After ten years I starting to have a bit of a navigation DVD issue so I may need a new one but besides standard maintenance (I'm diligent about changing oil and filter often 3-5K miles) I have not had a single problem. I love this car... and if you can find a clean used one believe me it will put a smile on your face!
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Officially a BMW loyalist
BTTampa, 12/05/2010
2008 BMW 3 Series 328i 4dr Sedan (3.0L 6cyl 6M)
11 of 11 people found this review helpful
Never understood the BMW fans out there until I got mine. I used to trade in my car every couple years, I've had this one for 3 years and still get excited to go out and drive it. It just rides and drives different than any car I have had before. You really feel like you "know" this car, and it "knows" you. The handling is incredible, fuel economy is very good on the highway, and it still gets stares from others. As with many German cars, its had a few electrical glitches, but the warranty covers everything and its been a couple minor inconveniences more than anything else. And to include all routine service for free for 4 years?? You more than get your money's worth with this car!
High satisfaction, but even higher operating cost!
Len D, 01/30/2017
updated 08/02/2022
2008 BMW 3 Series 335xi 4dr Sedan AWD (3.0L 6cyl Turbo 6M)
18 of 19 people found this review helpful
Bought my '08 in May 2015. It was pristine with only 38k miles on it then and still ran and looked like new. It had Cold Weather, Premium and Sports packages, 6-spd manual. The run-flats were ditched by the previous owner and despite the extra weight over the nose from AWD it carved corners like a Ginsu knife with quick, responsive steering; highly tossable. Yet it also had that legendary combination of sporty handling with ride comfort, although being the 3-series it did tend to follow road perturbations more than it absorbed them, making the ride along PA's crappy roads 'busier' than I'd like at times. The car had that classic German horsepower swell where, the further along the tach the needle goes, the harder it seems to pull; third gear was nearly frighteningly quick and I swear it had way more than 'just' 300 hp. All that said, I kept my fingers crossed every time I got in it. Three months after getting it, it stranded me; I had to have its third high-pressure fuel pump installed at under 40k miles. Thankfully, BMW had years before acknowledged the problem and extended the warranty on that specific part to ten years or 120k miles, which meant I would be on my own in another fifteen months. Still, warranty or not, three fuel pumps in under 40k miles is a joke. And then there were the dainty little piezo fuel injectors that also reputedly might have a short life and the twin turbo wate-gates and of course, the self-imploding water pump (every 55k miles!). The tech at my local BMW dealer, as well as the owner of the indie BMW shop I take it to, both told me that the N54 in-line 6 was “..the best engine BMW ever made..” and that its foibles are grossly exaggerated on the internet. The dealer tech was able to tell through the BMW database that my specific car had “..already had the injectors addressed..” at around 20k miles although he was unable to explain exactly what that meant, and so he assured me I was “..good to go..”. I hoped they were both right. But even if they were, that still left me with the frequent and expensive maintenance charges. I spread-sheeted the planned expenditures according to my much-trusted indie shop’s schedule for the car, (which BTW included changing differential and xfer case oil that BMW claims never needs changing; yeah, right!). Including the guaranteed-to-fail water-pump, and it was going to cost me about $1,000/yr to keep her maintained and running ‘like a BMW’. The online BMW forums dismiss this as ‘..pay-to-play..’ and the cost of ‘being in the club’. I suppose that’s really not so bad, but if the other of its notorious bits start to ‘pop’ it’ll be a LOT worse than that. So I started shopping for something less fussy to maintain and repair, while keeping my fingers crossed. The problem was, once you’ve become spoiled by the car’s unparalleled combination of power, handling and comfort (for a 4-door sedan anyway), most every other sedan felt inferior by comparison. Darn Germans!! UPDATE 2/1/2022 This car has been long gone for 5+ years now. I first replaced it with a a naturally aspirated 530Xi which proved to have equally high maintenance costs. Now I’m driving a 2017 Infiniti QX50; their compact cross-over SUV hatchback. It had been in production since 2008 (called the ‘EX35 then} and refined/perfected over these its ten years. 325 hellacious horses under the hood in a naturally aspirated V6 that has been named one of the best engines ever for many years. It pulls like a freight train, mimicking BMW’s performance, and sounds great doing it. The car, based off the company’s earlier ‘G’ series sedans, has nimble handling like the 3-series but ride quality like the bigger 5 series; I kid you not! Its dynamic performance limits are not as high as the BMWs, so it’s not as track worthy. But for my daily driving needs, which sometimes include spirited driving on twisty roads, I’m every bit as satisfied as I was in the Bimmers. The technology is way better than those older Bimmers. My fully loaded car has all the modern toys and driver aids, but also incorporates actually push-button controls for radio stations and A/C control along with actual knobs for volume and station tuning. These are big pluses in my book. I wish it got better gas mileage, and that it also had Apple CarPlay so I could see my Waze nav directions on the screen. I also wish it had come in a stickshift, although I find I don’t mind the automatic at all, which has a sport mode and can be shifted manually. But these shortcomings are all small prices to pay for a car which should cost a fraction of the BMWs’ long term operating cost while sacrificing nothing in day-to-day driving satisfaction, at least within the less demanding limits of my driving needs. Japanese reliability is well proven and my peace-of-mind/car-anxiety levels have both improved by a factor of ten. I’m never going back to BMW, nor other equally finicky European cars. There’s truly no need to anymore as the rest of the world has finally caught up to building cars having whatever elusive magic only the Europeans seemed able to engineer into their cars. Before getting the QX50 I had a brief, and wonderful, stint in a Lexus ES300h hybrid which rode and handled almost as well as that 530xi I mentioned, while getting 40+ mpg. And none of this will matter anyway in a few more years as we’ll all be driving EVs anyway! 8/2/2022 Still loving the Infiniti!! As hoped, expenses over the last two years have been routine maintenance only; oil and filter changes and one brake fluid flush. Now at 44k miles, the car still performs as new. Unless I choose to lease a car (which is unlikely), I will never again go back to a BMW.
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