I bought a my bmw 535xi in a 6 speed. Just do a little digging up on the history of the first owner, your entitled to speak with him, not hard to get his info its on the title history. Guy who owned my car was 54 year old accountant. Garaged since day 1 I had maybe 2 small scratches on bumper, everything else was absolutely MINT

And you can tell if the car was beatin on or not. You can tell by how high the clutch lets off, OR, open the oil gas cap and if its black with crud everywhere you can tell it was ragged on. Just check it out, it looks CLEAN as hell to me though!

 

The auto/SMG or manual were all no-cost options on the 550. In fact, the manual was EPA rated at 1 mpg lower than the Auto and thus had to have a $1300 gas tax. Really P'd me off that BMW would do this because the test cycles are easy to manipulate and they didn't want the AUTO (the bigger seller by 25 times) to endure the tax.

My car has returned 22 mpg lifetime (5 years) with 28-29 mpg easy to achieve on trips. The EPA cycle is a joke.

That said- people really don't like the 6MT so if you find one really work the price down so you can get a short shifter and a CDV installed so you can really enjoy it ($400)!

 

It took me about 3 months to find my manual 550i. It seems, that at any given time, there are about 30-35 in the nation. That number dwindles as you rule out the cars that are too far, then ones that have had accidents, then high mileage, then options. Today, I'm still seeing cars advertised that were on sale when I started looking 4 months ago. Example - the one at Select Imports that someone sent you a link to - they've had that car since 8/2010!! And, they have never dropped the price!

Best strategy - just keep searching Cars.com, AutoTrader.com and eBay about 2 times a day. I would often find new listings added throughout the day. Just keep searching and be patient - you'll eventually find what you're looking for. Good Luck!