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Analogue I also agree with some minor differences. I was there in the beginning waiting for a 1M two years before March 2011.
I am one of those driver owners you speak of so so while the internet is full of opinions I will just throw mine out there.
In the beginning there were many people that got the 1M simply because it was the next M car. You can tell because they didn't get what the car had been intended for and ordered them fully loaded despite the car being a reaction to the bloated M cars that preceded it. Anti bloat was the raison d'etre for the 1M.
Many of these M fans simply got a new M car every 3 years. There were a few that saw the greatness early on and held them as collectors cars too but my sense from speaking with many people looking for one NOW is that they are fans that want one of the last of the gunfighters.
This warms my heart.
I was there in the beginning having to see idiotic posts about why BMW didn't offer the DCT or EDC or Sunroof or Corinthian Leather or a more luxurious interior. One poster or poser if you drop the T even complained about the vanity mirror in the visor not having a light. Now I hear people that want the naughty behavior or no longer available hydraulic steering and it warms my petrol loving heart that had lost faith listening to the edc or vanity light idiocy.
People are willing to pay big bucks for this and the vast majority see the greatness in NOT having DCT and EDC.
Finally while I generally agree that cars should be driven and my first 1M was a daily driver. I don't begrudge anyone that only drives only weekends. These cars are special because that can't be replaced and there is no joy driving them in traffic.
It takes me 10 minutes to get to work at a university where I have been rear ended twice by college kids speeding or on phones. It takes 15 minutes for the 1M to warm up so you do the math.
There is no joy risking my rare ride when it's not even warmed up by the time I pull it into the parking structure of death with parking lines 6 inches wider than the car and college kids using your car as a door stop.
Weekends are another story and I'll volunteer to drive 20 miles away to a bakery just because the drive is so nice.
So yes drive these cars but people shouldn't cast ///M stones because there are different situations for everyone.
In any case I see the cars holding their value as a bonus not the main driver but it is also fair for many to use it in the calculus as to why they would spend $50k on an 8 year old BMW whose 135i brethren are selling for 15k.
Finally I see another upside to the high value. Many are taking care of these cars for that reason!
I am sad to see so many amazing cars that were inexpensive becoming extinct because they ended up in the hands of kids that destroyed them. Think of the 1980-1981 Scirocco S, 1983-1984 GTI, 1991-1994 Nissan Sentra SE-R and soon every old Miata that ends up as a disposable car and there are none left. I was watching a documentary about the P-51 Mustang. Most were sold cheaply and some for scrap at one point. If the values had been higher how many more surviving examples would we have today?
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