Had a crossfire (which brought me to the forum), got rid of it due to lack of back seat, and wisconsin winters. So I bought an '04 G35 coupe. Well, as usual, I have grown tired of another car, and have been looking to go back to getting a little 2 seater sportscar. BMW has great lease offers right now, and for about $450/month no money down you can get into a relatively base $40,000 Z4 3.0. Similar hp and torque numbers as the crossfire, but quicker by about a second to 60 and about .5-1.0 seconds through the quarter with a better trap speed. on a 3.0i, my insurance would only go up $5+ every 6 months. not bad given the msrp of the car, and three model years newer. Has anyone driven the 3.0si? If so, what do you think. Oh yeah, the BMW comes with run flats unlike the xfire, and has a free maintenance for 4 yrs/50,000 miles. Includes brake pads, rotors, wipers, oil changes, filters, and etc. the 3.0si ($46,000+) with $2,500 down is about $490 a month. Any comments? Any chrysler sales managers (please, no salesmen) here that can offer me a really good lease offer on a srt-6 to persuade my decision? I'm leaning towards the z4si.

 

I traded an '04 Z4 2.5 on my SRT6. There are a number of things very nice with the Z4, but you wouldn't want a base model if you had an '04 or limited.

The new 3.0i has decent performance especially with a stick. Get the auto and it is definitely slower (though the auto has a manual mode and paddle shifters). If you get the auto you will want to shift manually and I used to do this all the time. It actually works better than the Xfire auto, but not the SRT6.

You will probably want both the Sport group ($1K) to get better suspension wheels and tires (16" is standard, this gives you 17") and the Premium group ($3.2K). Leatherette is standard (read that as vinyl) and you will want to upgrade to performance leather ($1K) If you are in a cooler climate the heated seat option will run another $500. The base radio w/CD is OK but you will probably want to upgrade that.

As far as maintenance goes, there isn't any for 4 yr/50K miles. This is very good. They will push oil changes out to 15K miles, but they are free as well. Now about the run flats. The idea is nice and if you pick up a nail and they deflate, you can drive them up to 100 mi at 50 mph. BUT, pick up a nail and you will find no one willing to patch the tire. I had it happen at 1,500 miles and the tire never went flat just 5 lbs lower. I had to get it replaced AND THE TIRES ARE NOT COVERED, NOT EVEN ROAD HAZARD. $250 for an ordinary 16".

Overall they are fine cars and I enjoyed mine until I discovered that to add a little horsepower cost as much if not more than the Xfire. The Dinan stage one kit that added 11 HP cost around 3K.

They do hold their resale fairly well and that is the reason for the good lease deals. In '04 they were $399 per month for 36 months till the end of summer then it dropped to $299 per month for 24 months. The '04 model was over produced (sound familiar) but not nearly as bad as Chrysler did with the '05 Xfires. This car sells between 10-15K a year (like the Xfire does).

Get a macho color. The Z4 has been the number one choice of professional women since it was introduced (several magazines have borne this out).

The 3.0Si will get you more grunt and bigger wheels/tires but will also cost you more (it still won't match the SRT6). But of course you can always opt for an M Roadster for another $10K.

Don't ask me if I would get another one, because I am just too happy with my SRT6...but if I would have had the 3.0 instead of the 2.5 from the beginning, I might honestly still be driving the Z4 with another year left on the warranty.

If you are going to lease, you should probably go with the Z4 (just make sure to option it right) as the SRT6 on a lease will cost MUCH more because of depreciation. However, if you are going to buy and keep it a new (or low miles) SRT6 will be more fun for a LOT less money.

 

From what I have been reading, the SMG transmission actually sucks, and I that I read only about 6% of Z4's are ordered with this option. I have drove an '05 3.0i, and an '07 si. I won't even consider the 2.5i, even though cheaper, might as well just buy a used crossfire for around 16k. But, I love the feel of the z4 when I drove it and the look. The Z4 I'm looking at is the 3.0 si, with premium package ($2,100), sport package ($1,300) heated seats ($500. Any reason that it says heated front seats??), m sport seats ($500) retractable headlight washers ($250?? What do I need these for?). Total, $46, 270. Yeah, the best part is the no cost maintenance, and the great residual. Even better I can take my lease payments (36 months x $560 w/no money down (20k total paid), and actually get a 60 month no interest loan.) So my payments could realistically be in the $350 a month range for a $46k car!!

 

I used to work at a BMW dealership for a good amount of time (not a salesman so no flaming please). I have driven all the Z4 models...2.5, 3.0, 3.0i, 3.0si. I must say the 2.5 sucked...the 3.0 was alot of fun with a stick. As far as the new ones go...the 3.0i is alot of fun (comparable with the old 3.0 model) with a stick and has plenty of power. The 3.0si has even more (almost unneeded hp).

A must is the sport pkg...I see you have the m-contour seats on the one you are looking at, also a plus. Most of the 3.0si have prem and cold weather pkgs.

I would recommend you lease it b/c of the high residual...lower payments(bmw has some of the highest in the market) and when the warranty runs out, although the z4 does not have too many problems, BMW's are VERY expensive to maintain and repair. Plus you will want a new one anyway.