How I bought a 1976 BMW 2002 for less than half the seller’s asking price Pt II

Part II: BMW 2002 For Sale $1450 OBO – Mixed Emotions

It was a cold Saturday morning in late November. I took my driver’s license out of my wallet and put it in my pocket and headed to the bank. I went in and withdrew the $700. I didn’t want any credit cards, my ATM card, anything that might tempt me to get more money if my $700 idea didn’t work. I just had my license and seven one hundred dollar bills.

Not bad from 20 feet.

It was a gravel car lot about 30 miles west of Minneapolis, on the side of a rural county road. Just 30 miles outside the city and nothing but cornfields and a car lot. There were some old Volkswagen Golfs, an Audi or two from the early nineties, high miles, all used up for $5000. The car looked great as I pulled in. Metallic blue was always a good color for 2002s and 3.0CS BMWs. All the chrome trim bits seemed to be there, the chrome bumpers were in good shape, it had a sunroof, collector plates, there wasn’t any visible rust from 20 feet… it had about 4 inches of snow on it.

I parked my car and got out to have a closer look. The badges looked good, I peeked inside. The seats were tired, in need of restuffing, the dash was perfect, no cracks, it had a cool aftermarket Momo steering wheel, it looked good enough. I walked towards the cinder block building that housed the sales office and garage. Inside there were a few guys in there mid twenties standing around a desk, just hanging out.

“Hi, I’m here to have a look at the BMW” I announced.

“Uh, yeah, Chris isn’t here right now, you’ll need to talk to him about it, he should be here soon. I’ll get you the key” one of the guys piped up.

He got the key and gave it to me. “You can go out and have a look at it, Chris should be here in a little while.”

I walked outside, pretty giddy inside really, just at the prospect of the whole thing. I brushed the snow off the car. The paint looked really good until I got to the leading edge of the hood… some big rust bubbles on the front edge and front of the hood, I’m talking like 6” across 4” wide rust bubbles. I got inside, it smelled fine, I pulled up the carpet, no rust in the floors. I started it right up with the door open looking for smoke out the back, none. That was good. It did idle rough and at very low RPMs, it barely stayed running without a little gas, chuga, chuga, chuga, the RPMs bounced around but when I revved it lightly and kept the RPMs at about a constant 2800 it sounded fine. I shut it off and popped the hood.

Big surface rust bubbles on front of hood.

When I opened the hood I realized it had a Weber downdraft carburetor. That’s cool, a very common aftermarket upgrade for 2002s. There wasn’t any rust to speak of in the engine bay, a little dirty maybe, but nothing bad. There weren’t any of the manufacturer labels or stickers in the engine bay either though. 2002s have a black label with the official paint color printed on it in the engine compartment in addition to a variety of other labels. Those weren’t present. I had a look in the front wheel wells, behind the tires were baby blue and yellow Billstein shocks, another good thing.

Engine bay was okay, Weber carb.

I walked towards the back of the car looking down the doors as I went. There were a few rust bubbles at the bottom of the doors, almost under the car, nothing crazy from where I was, but some bubbles. I got to the trunk, remembering what I had read a week earlier, I opened the trunk and saw it… foot long rust cracks right across the shock towers with rusty water stains coming down from them like dried blood coming out of an old, nasty wound. In my heart of hearts I guess I expected it, but hey the original spare and jack were in there, that’s good, right?

Completely rusted out shock towers, not uncommon in a BMW 2002.

So what was in front of me? What was this car’s story? It looked to me to be a car that someone probably spent a lot of money on about five or seven years earlier. The carb could have been put on then, definitely new paint, new Billstein shocks all the way around, who knows what else, but it looks like it had been parked outside or somewhere with plenty of moisture because it was a rust bucket rotting from the inside out. It looked great from 20 feet, but those are always the most dangerous “affordable classics” because in the end, they’re anything but affordable.

Maybe I should have given the keys back and hopped in my car right then… BUT… I’m a hopeless car guy and I figured if I could just buy it cheap enough I’d be alright. My strategy changed right then, from looking for a fun weekend car to work on and drive in the Summer to a car I would buy really cheap and sell on eBay for a hefty profit! Right?