I bought my second one a few years ago for $8500 with 70K miles on it, with the 2.5L and near-mint condition. You can get the older ones with the 1.8L engines even cheaper, maybe around $5K or so. I’ve driven most of the roadsters at least once and I think the Z3 is at the top of the list in terms of bang for the buck. Miatas are not bad but they cost around the same (or more) and they don’t really have the power and handling of the Z3, although they’re generally cheaper to maintain (especially in terms of tires - the back wheels of a Z3 have a severe toe camber so tires barely last 10K miles even with regular rotation). I think a Z3 is easy to find as long as you’re willing to buy on eBay or Autotrader (I’ve bought one on each) and fly somewhere to pick it up. If you’re only buying local it would probably be very hard to find one.
My holy grail car is an M Roadster, which looks almost identical to a Z3 but is apparently an entirely different car from the ground up.
RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
Yes. We’ve had two. Still have one. The only major problem with them is that sometimes the unibody starts to crack above the rear end. It doesn’t happen to al of them. You can still buy them for $3k-$10k in ok to pretty good shape respectively depending on the miles and engine type. Maintenance costs are reasonable for an older car.
They are really fun little cars, even the 4 cylinder is great.