First Road Trip In My 2017 BMW M2

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After picking up my new to me 2017 BMW M2 in Houston, Texas, my wife and I hit the road for home. Since it is a 12+ hour drive to Atlanta, GA we decided to make an overnight stop in New Orleans, LA. Thanks to COVID we were able to get a hotel room right in the French Quarter during Mardi Gras with just a few days notice.

Leaving the dealership in a high performance car you have only driven once for 5 minutes to head out on a road trip is a bit un-settling. The roads around Advantage BMW in downtown Houston were under construction and in terrible shape, coupled with the stiff suspension in the M2 it didn’t add much to the driving pleasure at this point. For the first 10 minutes I was wondering if I made a mistake giving up the adjustable suspension in my old M235i for the more driving focused setup in the M2.

Hitting the on ramp, running the M2 through its gears as it quickly builds speed and darting into the flow of traffic make the M235i a distant memory. It becomes like most of the traffic, a fading image in my rearview mirror! Unfortunately, it started raining shortly after we left Houston and I didn’t want to push a new car in the wet on my first drive. This provided a great opportunity to put cruise control to the test and safely make our way to the Big Easy.

One of the things I was looking forward to in the 2017 M2 was the addition of Apple Car Play to the BMW iDrive system. I don’t know if it was operator error or cell signal interference being surrounded by tall buildings, but as we made our way into New Orleans it seemed like Siri was giving me turn-by-turn instructions a little too late. After a few extra trips around the block we made our way towards our hotel.

The narrow and rough roads in the French Quarter are not the best place to drive in a new car. I was quickly reminded of the stiff suspension in the M2 after hitting a pot hole while trying to avoid vehicles and pedestrians on either side of the road. We made it to the hotel safe and sound with no damage to the new car and then I was hit with the reality of having to hand over the keys to my new toy to the valet. With thoughts of the scene from Ferris Buller’s Day Off of the valet drivers racing around in the Ferrari, I reluctantly handed over my keys.

After a few beignets at Cafe Du Monde and a couple drinks on Bourbon St my mind was at ease and I could enjoy our night out. Aside from the absence of parades you might not know that COVID caused Mardi Gras to be cancelled. The French Quarter was packed with people in the carnival spirit and we ran across several groups having their own parades.

After a fun night out we headed back to Atlanta the next morning. Being a New Orleans native I couldn’t leave town with out a King Cake so we headed to Metairie to find a Tastee Donuts that sells McKenzie King Cakes during Mardi Gras. These taste like my childhood and there isn’t a substitute. This also gave us a chance to head home via the Lake Pontchartrain Bridge, the worlds longest bridge over a body of water. I have crossed the Causeway many times as a kid, but my wife had never seen it, so we took the long way home.

Buying A Car Online

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Car shopping has certainly changed over the last few years. You no longer have to go to the dealer or used car lots. The internet brought us services like AutoTrader that make finding a car with all the right options a breeze. CarMax took the “fun” out of car buying with no haggle pricing and many dealers have now followed their lead. Now with services like Carvana & Vroom you can buy and sell a car from the comfort of your own home.

All these options come in handy when you are looking for a car like the BMW M2 in a manual transmission. When searching in my price range I would typically find 100 cars to choose from nation wide and several of those would be in the metro Atlanta area. Filtering my search by cars with manual transmission reduces the list to 30-40 cars around the country and most of those weren’t actually 6-speed manual cars but DCT (Dual Clutch Transmission) cars.

The car manufacturers have worked hard to convince the public that dual clutch transmissions are manual transmissions you shift automatically without the use of a clutch pedal. Porsche kicked this off with their PDK transmission in 2009. By all accounts the modern automatic transmission is faster than the manual version as shifts only take a fraction of the time a human can row through the gears.

Call me old fashion but I wanted to learn to push my car to the limits with an “old fashion” manual transmission. So my list of BMW M2 search results would only yield 10-15 cars with an actual 6-speed manual. Color and options were secondary to the transmission and the price of the car. After searching for a month or so, I found two 2017 Long Beach Blue M2s with 6-speed manual transmissions that might be winners. Both cars happened to be in the Houston area.

The first one was at a non-BMW dealer that came in on trade. It didn’t have the option package (in 2017 you either got the options or you got the standard car) but only had 19,000 miles. It did have a small ding on the rear bumper. On paper and in pictures this was a great car for me as it was priced to sell at $38,500. The second car did have the option package but it had 34,000 miles and was priced at $40,000. I couldn’t put my finger on it at first but I liked the look of the second car better.

For a car that will get used at the track, I was still leaning toward the first car with a lower price and lower mileage as I knew I would have plenty of expenses getting myself and the car track ready. As I looked closer at the second car, it was some of the cosmetic changes the previous owner did that made the car look better to me. It had the all black grill, black M logos and the body color side reflector delete. It also had tinted windows along with the Dinan performance exhaust system already installed.

Since the first car wasn’t at a BMW dealer and wouldn’t get a complete overhaul by BMW techs I had a PPI (pre-purchase inspection) done at a local independent BMW specialist. While the car was mechanically sound it had several other minor blemishes to the body and paint work. The kicker was major curb rash on the front splitter. After the dealer was unwilling to take a few bucks off or have the car repaired I went with the second car.

Ricardo and the team at Advantage BMW Midtown in Houston took great care of me. I called him to make a deposit on the car on Thursday with the caveat that the car would be ready to pick up on Saturday afternoon as I was already planning on being in Houston. They ran the M2 through their pre-purchase reconditioning in a couple days. This process typically takes a week or more. When we arrived at Advantage BMW there was my freshly washed and waxed M2 ready for delivery. After a quick test drive and signing a few docs, my wife and I were on our way to New Orleans on the M2’s first road trip.

Damage Discovered By PPI

Get A Pre-Purchase Inspection (PPI)

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Looking for a high performance car often means selection is limited in your local area because these types of cars are sold in low volumes. Options and color choices for your performance car reduce your selection even further.  After considering Porsche 911s or Caymans, I decided to stick with BMW and started shopping for a M2 in my price range.

My budget for a daily driver/track car was $40,000. I was looking for a six speed manual car in Long Beach Blue with less than 50,000 miles. I found a great looking car with 19,000 miles at a Chrysler/Jeep dealership in Houston, Texas listed for $38,500. After speaking with the sales person at the dealership and having a few questions answered this appeared to be the car for me.

Dealer Front Picture

I was very nervous about buying a car site unseen, so I offered the dealership a deposit on the car and would purchase the car pending a pre-purchased inspection (PPI). I found the most highly rated independent BMW specialist in the Houston area and made arrangements for the car to get transferred there for a pre-purchased inspection.  While the pre-purchased inspection wasn’t cheap at almost $300 it turned out to be well worth it.

Some Basic Maintenance NeededThe car was mechanically sound, drove great, and only needed a few minor engine services like an oil change, air filter and brake fluid. However, the exterior condition of the car was in worse shape than the dealer pictures indicated. The sales person had told me about a small ding in the rear bumper which I could live with.

The PPI showed many more areas of exterior damage especially to the front bumper. The clear bra on the front splitter needed to be replaced and there was serious curb rash all along the bottom that would require repainting. In addition the PPI showed several other places on the car with minor dings and scratches.

minor damage that doesn't show in dealer pics

The dealer was unwilling to adjust the price or fix the blemishes on the car. With the car headed to the track, I could live with a few scrapes and scratches for the right price. Since we couldn’t make a deal, it was time to move on to the next car.

If you are purchasing a car site unseen and especially a high-performance car I can’t recommend a pre-purchase inspection at a local specialist enough. $300 for a PPI saved me several thousand dollars in repairs to a car I was about to purchase!