This £30k BMW E36 M3 Is Another Sign The Car World's Gone Mad

This is without a doubt one of the nicest E36 M3s I’ve seen for sale this year. The paintwork - the sought-after Techno Violet shade, by the way - looks to be immaculate, it’s apparently rust free, and it has done just 39,000 miles. Hell, even all the wheels perfect - either the three previous owners have all been very careful near curbs, or the rims have been refurbished recently.

The price for this slice of E36-shaped near-perfection? £28,995. Wait, what?

Yes, damn near £30,000, for which you could get an extremely tidy V8-powered E92 or - as a quick search in the classifieds confirms - a super-rare E36 M3 GT.

It doesn’t come as much as a surprise; prices of ‘modern classic’ cars like the E36 M3 are on the up, which means lower mileage examples are often put up for madly ambitious figures. In fact, we also found a ‘regular’ 3.0-litre E36 M3 with around 20k on the clock which is up for £29,940.

That’s a bonkers figure, especially since low mileage isn’t necessarily a good thing. 40,000 miles over 18 years - and most certainly 20,000 over 22 years for that 3.0-litre example - could indicate a car that’s spent a lot of time sat around. If you have any mechanical sympathy, you’ll know that cars generally don’t appreciate being sat inactive for long periods of time.

Our advice? Budget about half the price tag of this car, and go searching for a tidy, slightly higher mileage example. This E36 looks amazing, but it’s not £30k amazing.