**The Never-Ending Story of My BMW's Trunk: A Cautionary Tale**

I'm still trying to wrap my head around how much trouble I've had with this car's trunk. It started when I bought it, and after making some big purchases with the Rolls-Royce Phantom and the Testarossa that ended up not working out, I decided to sell it again. But, as if fate had other plans, it broke again - this time, the trunk wouldn't release. I took a picture of the car listed for sale, but it was broken. Yes, you read that right. Broken.

I put the car in reverse thinking I could just get into the trunk to retrieve some new iPhone boxes and accessories for my fiancé's brand-new phone, but the trunk vibrated like crazy, almost as if it had a worn-out engine or transmission mount. It was then that I realized I needed to take matters into my own hands. Or rather, my wizardly skills. As it turns out, my friend who's now my fiancé has been trying to get me into this car for weeks, and he finally came up with the plan to just drill a hole in the trunk lid.

**A BMW Engineer's Nightmare**

Now, I'm not a fan of BMWs or this particular model. It's actually pretty fun to drive, but it's just my bad luck with these cars. It seems like everybody else has had similar experiences. My friends keep telling me, "It's an old car, you bought it cheap, it's gonna have issues." And you know what? They're right.

I've also had my fair share of experiences with other cars that should be inferior in quality to this one but turned out to be rock-solid. Like my 1995 Mercedes C36 AMG, which I bought for a steal and has only needed minor work. Or my 1996 Buick Park Avenue Ultra, which was a total surprise - it just started right up every time.

**The Wizard's Dilemma**

So, here I am, staring at the trunk of my BMW, wondering how to get into it without sawing through the plastic or hammering away with a hammer. The wizard has asked me for a favor: can I stop by his machine shop to pick up some Land Rover Discovery heads? It seems like he needs them bad, but I'm not sure if that's what's going on.

As I stand here, trying to come up with a plan, my fiancé is reminding me of the importance of getting into this trunk. "It has all of her iPhone boxes and accessories in there," she says. "At least, they're brand-new in-the-box." It's then that I realize I need to take action.

**The Solution: A DIY Trunk Fix**

So, here I am, pulling out the back seats like it's a scene from an action movie, trying to get into the trunk without breaking anything. There's a little plastic panel on the side, and if we can just pull that out, we might be able to access what's inside.

With the help of my fiancé and some fancy tools, I'm hoping to get this trunk fixed without too much damage. Who knows? Maybe this will all work out in the end, and I'll sell it for a pretty penny - like $5,000 for the nicest m3 in the world.

**The Wizard's YouTube Channel**

But first things first: my friend the wizard has decided to start his own YouTube channel, where he'll be doing some DIY projects and advice. I'm excited to see what he comes up with and maybe even contribute a video or two myself. If you're interested in checking out his channel and learning more about my BMW ownership experience, make sure to click on the link below.

**The Article: "A BMW Owner's Story"**

Check out my full article on Autotrader.com, where I share my experiences with buying and owning a BMW. From the initial purchase to all the repairs and issues that followed, it's been quite the journey.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enit's hard to believe that I've owned this 1997 bmw m3 for almost a year now and it really wasn't by choice since buying this neglected cheap m3 I've tried fixing it I tried giving it away and I tried selling it multiple times but I've never been successful at any of this my m3 it just won't stay working for long enough for anybody else to want it and has become a total pariah to my fleet now my bad history with BMW has been pretty well documented starting with a 2003 BMW x5 that I drove throughout college over ten years ago it became a nightmare the moment the warranty ended and I eventually traded it in for a Jeep Wrangler after a few years of it being continuously broken it never ended now during my car dealership days I purchased tons of old BMWs like this because they were cheap to buy and really easy to sell but keeping customers happy after the purchase since they would almost always break shortly after I sold them was really a challenge I worried that one day they would all come with pitchforks and burn my dealership to the ground but but it wasn't my fault the cars just big break because I never ever learned from my mistakes as all of you know I've continued to buy BMW cars from my personal hoopty fleet which yeah I don't know these cars have included a 2005 BMW 745 I which you know despite its really horrible reputation they're known as the most hated BMW of the modern era it turned to be one of my better purchases as I was actually able to keep that car fixed for long enough to sell it for only a small loss by 1991 BMW 850 I the v12 beautiful coupe on the other hand that was a bottomless pit of repairs which just kept compounding faster than the interest on my credit card I sold that Beemer for an enormous loss but I still have the massive oil stain in my garage to remember it by while my 1997 BMW m3 hasn't been nearly as bad as the v12 850 I had still been a very annoying car obviously I expected some repairs since I bought it so cheap and I knew about it's numerous issues such as the suspension was so worn it made the whole car feel dangerously unstable and the brakes were shot and the engine was making a really weird noise it wasn't too expensive sort out all these issues though as it only took a little over a thousand dollars for new brakes all around new rear control arm bushings and shocks along with a new alternator that was what's making the weird noise along with a seat motor and I had to replace a torn intake boot in here I also spent a few hundred reupholstering this passenger seat because it looked like someone had taken a blowtorch to it really it was just the Sun over the years but the leather and BMWs doesn't hold up really well now after I did all this I was really excited to surprise my girlfriend with this thing for Christmas but it didn't go well just turn it hey try it again one give it all gas a wondercolts app around the holidays illuminated a new issue with this car the engine really didn't like starting in the cold it would slow leak off and struggle to life eventually but the screaming of the alternator now that that had been eliminated I could hear some other really bad noises including a vacuum leak as well as a troubling ticking noise from around here so back up to my mechanic it went for another round of repairs and I decided that perhaps giving my girlfriend a badly aging BMW wasn't the best way to convert her into a car enthusiast yeah she didn't like it that much so another thousand dollars was spent on the next batch of issues which included replacing the cracked exhaust manifold as well as the crankcase vent valve which was causing the massive vacuum leak and keeping this thing from starting in the cold or really running all that great it took months to get this done as my mechanic and I were busy with other projects but once it was sorted again I decided to put it up for sale I assumed if I could get my $5,000 total invested back since that was still really cheap for a sorted m3 Ian for an undesirable automatic transmission car then people don't like the convertibles as much as the hardtop so the car did get quite a bit of interest but nobody would pull the trigger it didn't help that the battery would regularly go dead from sitting for so long and the power convertible top it started to get weak again I eventually ended up fixing that as well I spent two hundred and fifty dollars replacing these elastic giant arms looks like Stretch Armstrong in the top to get it to pull back but still no takers I actually ended up offering it back to the dealer that sold it to me he's a friend of mine in exchange for his help on the reality show with some logistics on the cars we were buying for it but he politely rejected it and took a really low amount of money instead which goes to tell you something really I didn't try very hard to sell it after that but after making some big purchases with the rolls-royce phantom and the Testarossa that ended up not working out I kind of got motivated sell it again especially since winter was coming up and having a convertible during winter would would be a really tough sell so I got it out I cleaned it up had it detailed and took pictures of listed for sale again and it broke again this time the trunk won't release I actually took this car with my now fiancé to get a new iPhone we put the box in the trunk lock the trunk so we could go to dinner and it's broken it's an electronic actuator so there's there's no way to get into the trunk anymore without breaking into it either drilling a hole into the deck lid like behind the license plate or tearing the rear seats out and punching a hole through the plastic to get to the trunk I know yikes there's no manual release on these cars another BMW horrible engineering flaw also when I put the car in reverse now it vibrates really badly almost like it has a worn engine or transmission mount so back to the wizard we go this is the song that does in and it doesn't it yes it goes on and on my friends some people started singing it no wing wood it was whoo now don't get me wrong I don't hate BMWs nor do I hate this car it's actually pretty fun a little underpowered but still really good-looking and engaging to drive I don't not like it but it's just my bad luck with BMWs but that seems to be a thing with everybody in BMW ownership not just me now I hear you guys saying oh it's an old car you bought it cheap it's gonna have issues and and you're right to an extent but I also have a 1995 Mercedes c36 AMG that I bought really cheap it has a lot more miles than this it's just like two hundred and fifteen thousand miles this one has 151 and after the initial sorting I haven't had any problems with it the same goes for my 1996 Buick Park Avenue ultra that car should be inferior in quality to this one but it's rock solid really it didn't need a whole lot of work to sort it and it just it just starts every time I wonder if the Wizards gonna be able to get into the trunk without sawing into things or hammering away at the plastic back there oh and I forgot the wizard asked me a favor I'd stop it as a machine shop to pick up some Land Rover Discovery heads yeah bad head gaskets but I'm thinking about it now I can't get into my trunk these are two giant heads off of a v8 and I don't know where I'm gonna put them you don't know when to quit on these things do you have it haven't you offered enough sacrifice to the gods on this thing I think so but I kind of have to get into the trunk at this point because anne's iphone bits all of her accessories in there at brand-new in-the-box so at least need that and now it's shaking I put it reversed it's like a motor mount or something that's gone bad and so I can't sell it that way hahaha so do you drill a hole in the trunk lid is that no maybe in South Broadway they do but South Broadway is a bad part of town yeah we're gonna pull the back seats out and then there's a little plastic panel that we can pull that out cut the carpet and we can get a long extension to the bolts back there lovely alright all I can do the first part here place is kind of the hall the dead for the hooptie sleep 3:55 hate looking at that the 911 my ass hills down for the count Viper there's a pipe over there I've sold the LS swap 911 somebody somebody else's problem oh okay well there's the trunk oh there we go iPhone okay mission accomplished here I have my iPhone case and accessories for and I'll sell it eventually for $5,000 whether I have 15 or 20 grand into it at that point then somebody's gonna pay me $5,000 for it it'll be the nicest $5,000 m3 in the world it's just it's just never going to end the wizard actually everybody's asked for it it's finally happening he started a YouTube channel where he's gonna do some DIY and some some other advice so I'll put a link in the description below for his channel you can check out his first video also linked below autotrader.com slash oversteer and article I've written about my BMW owner to experience there so click on that as well and thank you for watching why why am I so dumb wizardit's hard to believe that I've owned this 1997 bmw m3 for almost a year now and it really wasn't by choice since buying this neglected cheap m3 I've tried fixing it I tried giving it away and I tried selling it multiple times but I've never been successful at any of this my m3 it just won't stay working for long enough for anybody else to want it and has become a total pariah to my fleet now my bad history with BMW has been pretty well documented starting with a 2003 BMW x5 that I drove throughout college over ten years ago it became a nightmare the moment the warranty ended and I eventually traded it in for a Jeep Wrangler after a few years of it being continuously broken it never ended now during my car dealership days I purchased tons of old BMWs like this because they were cheap to buy and really easy to sell but keeping customers happy after the purchase since they would almost always break shortly after I sold them was really a challenge I worried that one day they would all come with pitchforks and burn my dealership to the ground but but it wasn't my fault the cars just big break because I never ever learned from my mistakes as all of you know I've continued to buy BMW cars from my personal hoopty fleet which yeah I don't know these cars have included a 2005 BMW 745 I which you know despite its really horrible reputation they're known as the most hated BMW of the modern era it turned to be one of my better purchases as I was actually able to keep that car fixed for long enough to sell it for only a small loss by 1991 BMW 850 I the v12 beautiful coupe on the other hand that was a bottomless pit of repairs which just kept compounding faster than the interest on my credit card I sold that Beemer for an enormous loss but I still have the massive oil stain in my garage to remember it by while my 1997 BMW m3 hasn't been nearly as bad as the v12 850 I had still been a very annoying car obviously I expected some repairs since I bought it so cheap and I knew about it's numerous issues such as the suspension was so worn it made the whole car feel dangerously unstable and the brakes were shot and the engine was making a really weird noise it wasn't too expensive sort out all these issues though as it only took a little over a thousand dollars for new brakes all around new rear control arm bushings and shocks along with a new alternator that was what's making the weird noise along with a seat motor and I had to replace a torn intake boot in here I also spent a few hundred reupholstering this passenger seat because it looked like someone had taken a blowtorch to it really it was just the Sun over the years but the leather and BMWs doesn't hold up really well now after I did all this I was really excited to surprise my girlfriend with this thing for Christmas but it didn't go well just turn it hey try it again one give it all gas a wondercolts app around the holidays illuminated a new issue with this car the engine really didn't like starting in the cold it would slow leak off and struggle to life eventually but the screaming of the alternator now that that had been eliminated I could hear some other really bad noises including a vacuum leak as well as a troubling ticking noise from around here so back up to my mechanic it went for another round of repairs and I decided that perhaps giving my girlfriend a badly aging BMW wasn't the best way to convert her into a car enthusiast yeah she didn't like it that much so another thousand dollars was spent on the next batch of issues which included replacing the cracked exhaust manifold as well as the crankcase vent valve which was causing the massive vacuum leak and keeping this thing from starting in the cold or really running all that great it took months to get this done as my mechanic and I were busy with other projects but once it was sorted again I decided to put it up for sale I assumed if I could get my $5,000 total invested back since that was still really cheap for a sorted m3 Ian for an undesirable automatic transmission car then people don't like the convertibles as much as the hardtop so the car did get quite a bit of interest but nobody would pull the trigger it didn't help that the battery would regularly go dead from sitting for so long and the power convertible top it started to get weak again I eventually ended up fixing that as well I spent two hundred and fifty dollars replacing these elastic giant arms looks like Stretch Armstrong in the top to get it to pull back but still no takers I actually ended up offering it back to the dealer that sold it to me he's a friend of mine in exchange for his help on the reality show with some logistics on the cars we were buying for it but he politely rejected it and took a really low amount of money instead which goes to tell you something really I didn't try very hard to sell it after that but after making some big purchases with the rolls-royce phantom and the Testarossa that ended up not working out I kind of got motivated sell it again especially since winter was coming up and having a convertible during winter would would be a really tough sell so I got it out I cleaned it up had it detailed and took pictures of listed for sale again and it broke again this time the trunk won't release I actually took this car with my now fiancé to get a new iPhone we put the box in the trunk lock the trunk so we could go to dinner and it's broken it's an electronic actuator so there's there's no way to get into the trunk anymore without breaking into it either drilling a hole into the deck lid like behind the license plate or tearing the rear seats out and punching a hole through the plastic to get to the trunk I know yikes there's no manual release on these cars another BMW horrible engineering flaw also when I put the car in reverse now it vibrates really badly almost like it has a worn engine or transmission mount so back to the wizard we go this is the song that does in and it doesn't it yes it goes on and on my friends some people started singing it no wing wood it was whoo now don't get me wrong I don't hate BMWs nor do I hate this car it's actually pretty fun a little underpowered but still really good-looking and engaging to drive I don't not like it but it's just my bad luck with BMWs but that seems to be a thing with everybody in BMW ownership not just me now I hear you guys saying oh it's an old car you bought it cheap it's gonna have issues and and you're right to an extent but I also have a 1995 Mercedes c36 AMG that I bought really cheap it has a lot more miles than this it's just like two hundred and fifteen thousand miles this one has 151 and after the initial sorting I haven't had any problems with it the same goes for my 1996 Buick Park Avenue ultra that car should be inferior in quality to this one but it's rock solid really it didn't need a whole lot of work to sort it and it just it just starts every time I wonder if the Wizards gonna be able to get into the trunk without sawing into things or hammering away at the plastic back there oh and I forgot the wizard asked me a favor I'd stop it as a machine shop to pick up some Land Rover Discovery heads yeah bad head gaskets but I'm thinking about it now I can't get into my trunk these are two giant heads off of a v8 and I don't know where I'm gonna put them you don't know when to quit on these things do you have it haven't you offered enough sacrifice to the gods on this thing I think so but I kind of have to get into the trunk at this point because anne's iphone bits all of her accessories in there at brand-new in-the-box so at least need that and now it's shaking I put it reversed it's like a motor mount or something that's gone bad and so I can't sell it that way hahaha so do you drill a hole in the trunk lid is that no maybe in South Broadway they do but South Broadway is a bad part of town yeah we're gonna pull the back seats out and then there's a little plastic panel that we can pull that out cut the carpet and we can get a long extension to the bolts back there lovely alright all I can do the first part here place is kind of the hall the dead for the hooptie sleep 3:55 hate looking at that the 911 my ass hills down for the count Viper there's a pipe over there I've sold the LS swap 911 somebody somebody else's problem oh okay well there's the trunk oh there we go iPhone okay mission accomplished here I have my iPhone case and accessories for and I'll sell it eventually for $5,000 whether I have 15 or 20 grand into it at that point then somebody's gonna pay me $5,000 for it it'll be the nicest $5,000 m3 in the world it's just it's just never going to end the wizard actually everybody's asked for it it's finally happening he started a YouTube channel where he's gonna do some DIY and some some other advice so I'll put a link in the description below for his channel you can check out his first video also linked below autotrader.com slash oversteer and article I've written about my BMW owner to experience there so click on that as well and thank you for watching why why am I so dumb wizard\n"