The latest Which review reckoned that BMWs are not particularly reliable.

It very much depends how the car has been looked after, has it been driven cautiosly or like it's just been stolen?

My Vauxhall Vectra reached 210,000 miles and 12 years then I gave it to my father-in-law.

My 9-year old Mazda 6 is at 161,000 and still running fine. Neither car ever let me down, just routine maintenance and things like replaced wheel bearings etc given the mileage

Both diesels. I make sure thay are serviced on time/mileage.

Which proves that Mazda's 2.2 diesel can be reliable if used under suitable circumstances!.

To the OP. Most people I know would aspire to a BMW if they could afford it. They are one of the worlds leading car makers and what they don't know about engines and transmissions is probably not worth knowing. Their service regime actually makes a lot of sense, it is based on the cars use monitored by sensors as you drive. The auto box is a torque converter, reliable and one of the best. It is sealed for life and would not normally require servicing. Like most cars when the warranty is up probably worth servicing by a decent independent. They are no more complicated than any other modern car on the road. The fit and finish of the interiors make them a nice place to be. Some think that because it is a BMW it will cost an arm and a leg to run, this is not the case compared to other makes

Whether premium brands are inherently more reliable than "cooking" brands continually crops up. This allows people to air unsubstantiated opinions, or cite individual experience as evidence of a generality. There seem to me to be two possible explanations:

1. The design and manufacturing process:

• component tolerances - but they are all made on similar machines
• tighter quality control - plausible but component accuracy is generally high if made on modern machine tools
• design for longevity not minimum cost - specify cheap vs higher spec materials, use two components if better than a compromised one
• more robust service regime - but this does not seem a differentiator
• more product testing at the design stage

2. Owner behaviour

• servicing strictly to manufacturer recommendation - or missed
• driven with mechanical sympathy - of thrashed even when cold
• fixed when falts become apparent - or left until failure
• owners take more care of premium cars because they cost more
• cheaper cars more likely to be unreliable as their low market value makes repairs less easily justified.
• owners take more care of their own cars than those provided by employers

Whilst I would tend to favour "owner behaviour" as the principle determinant of long term reliability, more objectively we should probably look to the warranty companies for actual data. They need to understand what cars actually costs in repairs, irrespective of why one car costs more than another.

People seems to like them as they are like weeds here. In the west country.

My gut feeling is that most owners of Beemers don't keep their examples longer than 8 to 10 years, seems inline with the rest of the stuff around here, considering how numerous Beemers are here there are plenty of 12-15 years old Focuses, and not many BMW products of that vintage.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=kXKhZievmSI

My gut feeling is that most owners of Beemers don't keep their examples longer than 8 to 10 years,

Most 'owners' of BMW's don't actually own them, they just rent them. And those BMW 'keepers' wouldn't generally keep them for more than 3 years, never mind 8-10.

considering how numerous Beemers are here there are plenty of 12-15 years old Focuses, and not many BMW products of that vintage.

As for numbers of old BMW's vs Ford's still around, here is an interesting stat. On Autotrader right now there are 1307 BMW's for sale which are from 2005 or older. Using the same criteria, there are 928 Ford's. And just to be clear, that trend isn't just nationwide, but the West Country too. Using a random Exeter postcode, there are more older BMW's than Ford's for sale using both a 100 mile and a 50 mile search radius.