My wife and I are planning to get a Countryman. I've had an R53 for ten years now. In 2006 I was faced with the same dilemma. It was around this time of year, and I needed to decide between the current 1st generation or waiting on the 2nd generation. I'm confident I made the right decision 10 years ago. My 2006 MCS was made the final year of that generation, so a lot of the quirks had been worked out. I've been very happy with it, and that car is still my daily driver. My wife will drive the Countryman. We're in the market for an All4 with an automatic tranny. MINI has a pretty amazing zero finance deal running through this month, but I'm wondering if we should wait and see what the 2017 has to offer.

We're going to the dealership to look at a Countryman or two on Friday. (We are not getting rid of the R53. We're getting rid of a 4Runner. I can't part with my old MINI.)

Are there any words of wisdom out there that may sway us to wait until 2017?

 

Probably be some leftover R60's when the new ones hit the street. Making even better deals. Or just buying a lightly used one saves a ton of cash. Also did you consider the Clubman, seems like the Countryman won't be all that different?

 

Hmmm...I hadn't thought about the Clubman. I've been out of the loop for a bit, so I didn't even realize there was an All4 option on the Clubman. We will definitely consider that. I like the rear doors of the Clubman. I realize we could save money by buying a used MINI, but we haven't had the best of luck with used vehicles. We'll be keeping what ever we get...for around 10-15 years most likely, so I feel like we get our money's worth out of a new vehicle. Are you a jazz guy? I love Minnie the Moocher!

 

Love Jazz as well as other music.

I bought my Countryman used with 24K miles, seemed like new and the other guy had to deal with the downtime at the dealership.

Just bought a used 2014 HT with only 6700 miles, seems brand new except for some paint chip dings, was $13K less than new price - couldn't pass that up.

Agree though that if you keep it 10 plus years the extra cost doesn't mean much.

 

We test drove a Clubman and a Countryman. We were really impressed with the new Clubman. The design is classy, and it felt fast. (It was twin turbo charged.) It had a ton of clever gadgets as well.

However, we are set on the Countryman. Believe it or not, the Countryman feels more like my R53 than the Clubman. We found one that we like, but we're going to sleep on it. It was a loaner, so we would be getting a pretty good deal on it. (It has a couple of thousand miles on it.) We'll be going back up tomorrow to see it once it's cleaned up.

 

We came home with a Cosmic Blue Cooper S All4 Countryman last night! Pretty excited...a little jealous that my wife gets it as her daily driver

 

Congrats!

Wife happy, next you can get a new F56!

 

Congrats! Either choice would have been a good one. I just picked an R60 S 4 weeks ago and I love it.