Hey guys needed some advice. After living away from home for a few months I am realizing it would really be a help to have a car out here. I really don't want to ship my cooper over here as it may not be taken care of like it was back home. It will be used to haul friends around, go to the beach all the time, etc.....you know how that goes..i'd like to keep that thing as cherry as I can for a long time.

other option: found a 2001 3 series babied by its owners with only 50,000 miles on it for $8,000 in which I could sell 2 years down the line (when i'm done with college) and get a lot of that money back. living on the islands I would probably put ~5k give or take every year on the car, so it'd still have pretty low miles when i sold it, so i'm thinking I could unload it for at least 5k when the time comes. shipping my car here is around $1,200. also keep in mind won't have a car back home if I ship mine out here, and i will eventually have to ship mine back which will be another 1,200

sorry if this is long, hoping I could get advice from some of the people who have more knowledge on me, i'm just in college

 

I'd say get the local car. The transaction costs of buying and selling will likely be less than that of purchasing and selling a car there.

 

Buy the 3 series. Shipping your MINI back and forth would end up costing you $2400 or 30% of the BMW's value. Sell the BMW after you use it...I doubt there would be much depreciation from the $8000 once you're done with it.