I have a 2007 Cooper S that I've owned since new. It has 92k miles on it. I take good care of all of my cars and repair them at first sign of anything starting to go wrong. Mine has been reliable but has had a few things replaced due to wear:

Timing chain/guides - replaced under warranty

water pump - plastic started to split

rear brakes

replaced windshield - seemed like it got all pitted out after much to short of time compared to other cars I've owned with similar age and driving. The paint on the bonnet seems a little on the thin side as well. Chipped up rather quickly.

Clutch is starting to get a little chatter when starting off when car is cold


As far as the clutch goes, mine hasn't seen any abuse other than the occasional sprint up the freeway onramp or a spirited run through the canyons. I don't downshift when making stops or keep the clutch pressed when waiting at a red light. From what I've read, they start to go between 80-100k miles. I will look into something better when the time comes to replace it. On my CRX, I have over 250k miles on that clutch and it's still good!

They are fine we see them often with over 100k miles and neglected with no problems fun cars. The problems they can have are mostly easy fixes the clutch is some work but last fine if driven right. I've had a couple that I bought and flipped with close to 200k and very little problems. 
Have one coming into the shop soon that may be having a hpfp failure with 290k. no problems until now just normal stuff.


 

Some VERY good points made here... travellering's  "vehicles targeting a driving public who's main goal is not to be driving" is brilliant and something I'd not considered before!  When one thinks of Toyota's mainstream offerings, yoga, yogurt, and soccer moms come to mind. Those folks just aren't going to try that hard to find the limits of their clutch and suspension, so obviously those Toyotas are going to have stellar reliability when compared to a car marketed as a pocket rocket go-cart!  Just look at the culture fostered by MINI compared to the Camry crowd!  Undoubtedly, a used Camry is much less used that a Mini Cooper S!

MINI's are not known to have the 'toyota' reliability - some have issues.  But there are also many that are at 200k without any major issues.


It sounds like the 2007 non-S that you are considering has a complete service history - that is a plus.  However, at 95k miles, you can expect some wear items to require attention in the near future - just like any car at 95K.

Some areas that some MINIs can have issues are:

Timing chain - was a Cooper S issue. 

High Pressure Fuel Pump - was a Cooper S issue. 

Auxiliary Water Pump - was a Cooper S issue. 

As you can see, the common problem areas are limited to the Cooper S models.  You have a much greater chance of avoiding major issues by going with the non-S.

Good luck!
Ken

Not to say of course that mechanical failures can't happen to BINI clutches, but I definitely feel like a lot of "failures" are because of the user. 
I have a real life example; I sold my 2005 legacy GT wagon (the very rare 2.5 turbo with 5MT) to a couple. The guy drove it and rode the hell out of the clutch, so much I had to tell him to take his foot off the clutch pedal. She drove it perfectly. He drove it again (this was a 1hr+ test drive), again, he rode the clutch after shifting. They bought it, then sent me a letter 6wks later claiming i knew it had a bad clutch and wanted me to pay for a new one. 

On a similar note; OEMs realise that awd and rwd cars get the drivetrain abused, and will often specify "adequate" clutch clamping force, instead of one with plenty of reserve. FWD cars of course are traction limited. 

The non S cars are really not bad on the reliability scale.

That said, driving a BINI is all about the fun, not the reliability.

Yeah, what TurboDave said.

The history bit about economy cars is really wrong. The countries mentioned already had economy cars in production when the Mini came out. Some of them also produced Minis under license or as subsidiaries of British Leyland - they were Minis, not copies.

A few examples of other economy cars: 
- Germany: VW 1937 "VolksWagen" means "people's car". (+ some older Porsches)
- Belgium: ? (offhand, I don't know of any Belgian car-makes) Some Belgian car-makes
- France: Citroen 2CV: 1948
- Italy: Fiat Nuovo 1957, Autobainchi 1955
- Japan: Datsun began as DAT around 1914.

Not to feed any under bridge dwellers, but TurboDave has made a great point that was reinforced by one of these creatures, namely that the previous driving habits of the owners determine the reliability of any car, and subcompacts especially.  These are cars marketed as being sporty in nature, and they will have been driven more enthusiastically than the average Toyonda Privic  beigemobile.  The "American Standard" is not to even have a clutch, so it's not surprising that many BMW MINIs experience short lived clutch components.  Jackrabbit starts chirping away from the lights, rocking the car on the clutch at uphill intersections because their driver's ed teacher kept calling the lever between the seats an "emergency brake," and people who are simply untrained to recognize the road ahead and plan accordingly are all driving behaviors that drastically shorten clutch and transmission component life. When your vehicle lineup includes larger more sturdily built vehicles or ones targeting a driving public whose main goal is not to be driving, then you can achieve an excellent image of brand reliability.  Every civic still trundling on after 200,000 miles offsets the public image of the comparatively poor reliability of the S2000 clutch or the Acura RSX'S reaction to teenage driver treatment.

MINI as a brand have no such image safety net, as even their bottom end cars are nippy, fun to drive hot hatches.  Therefore,  you're naturally going to hear more complaints per number of cars.  Just victims of their own success and the American driving public...

What a rambling bunch of bollocks... 

Lets recall the lessons of history,  to begin with, sir alec issigonis created the classic minis as an answer to the ballooning prices of gasoline ( or petrol as our british brothers call it, dunno why?) anyway, and also issigonis made the classic minis for the Nurses, to go back and fort to the hospital with minimal use of gas, its not intended for highway driving or even off road driving, its solely a grocery getter as they say. The size and shape and the charm of this iconic litte cute car attracted so many proplle , politicians, famous celebrities etc.  Then it sprouted like a mushroom in the farm or fungus in the skin,  the germans immitated it,belgium,australians,the italians, and the japanese created their own, exactly the same body dimensions but different engine power output, ( good thing the Chinese didnt came up with their 99¢ version of the minis, otherwise the entire classic mini hype will collapse, i dont want my mini body shell to be made out of compressed soya milk pulp or anything,gosh)
 Yes, i agree, classic mini clutch is not that durable, and i really dont like the idea of transmission and motor sharing the same oil... Just not right, but alec has no choice tho, inside space is his priority.

I beleive the junk clutch thing was something BMW inherited from the early minis lol

Im glad i got away from that !!! I love my clutch now compared to what it ever was.

If you replace a part at 129K miles,definitely the problem wont come back, other problems comes up one after the other.
What dave is trying to say is that ,its all about the drivers driving habits, his mini has already 100+ miles with no problems while other minis has few miles but with problems,he is simply saying that  others driving habits are bad and his is ok. , it makes sense tho, and i believe hom

We had a 2008 R55 S manual with full history bought at 79k, sold at 129k.
The ONLY things I ever had go wrong, was the HP fuel pump (easy DIY $250 fix), and the front speakers quit working (another easy $50 DIY fix), and just before I sold it, I needed to change the header tank as it developed a hairline crack and I didn't want to sell something I knew had an issue ($45 on Amazon). Oh, and the clear coat on the hood started going milky; that cost me a grand in extra depreciation...
All said, that MINI was a blast. Plenty of power to have fun, but could have done with a little more IMO. I drove it hard whenever I drove it, and it was still on the original clutch, so my personal experience was clearly a lot different than what those above are saying. I always understood the 2007+ clutches to be strong; certainly they take a lot of extra torque when folks start tuning their R55/56 models, courtesy of the large diameter clutch disc...



If you do look at one, insist on seeing it start from cold. I mean, go there early in the morning cold. If it has the "death rattle" negotiate $1200 off the price there and then. But don't necessarily walk away; it's easy to change, and once all the latest tensioner parts are installed, the problem won't come back. 

BMW needs to be aware of this,,that the clutch design of their mini is a junk. They cant be selling cars that does not pass the american standard, otherwise it will turn out to be a scam.  Cars should not be all about beauty and cute-ness, it should be more on reliability.

miniman..    oh god that is funny.. just about blew STELLA everywhere.. thanks. bc

Two things come to mind straight away. Clutch life is short, very short  on the R56 more so the S but I'm led to believe it's all the same for all versions and its EXPENSIVE to change, an uprated clutch and flywheel ( To get rid of the awful stock flywheel) is going to cost a min $1000 plus labour and its a pig of a job. I know because I just did one. Second the thermostat housings have a short life also, they split, even the replacement ones split........Poor design rather than crap manufacture I suspect. 

Now, having done that in the first month of my Kid buying his 2007 Cooper S he's had no further issues at all and it's an absolute blast to drive.......Not a mini you understand.......they stopped making those in 2000! but a great little BMW at that

Do you know the difference between a BMW and a Porcupine?...................On a porcupine the pricks are on outside.......................

All i can say is that i have not seen any BMW Minis that has 100K miles on their odometer and has no mechanical issues.  They all have mechanical issues past 80K miles. 
My toyota now has 148K miles,and the only thing i replaced are the tires , oil and air filter.  Then i just had a 2K mile roadtrip to california nevada this past week....jPanese cars are awsome!!

Give it a little,maybe someone will chime in as some of the people on here are open minded and have both since these old minis are worthless as a daily driver and some want somthing more modern/daily use car.

I know they are not really that reliable, but was wondering are they that bad or they are kinda ok specially the new model which redesigned engine after the 2007? From what I read they have problems with EVERYTHING, engine,gearbox,clutch,cooling but surely some of that stuff must be fixed in the later model?
Looking at one 2007model now, fsh, 95k miles, really nice spec on it comes fully loaded , seems kinda ok car.
but just wondering if I'm just getting myself in trouble with it?


Looking at the non s model, went to see one today it was fully loaded, sunroof, nice leather, seemed really fresh car , almost no rust on it.
It's manual/petrol so at least no diesel or automatic gearbox problems.

The owner showed me a HUUUGE envelope of service bills, had a fresh oil in it as well.( Could be that it like others likes to drink oil or it was freshly changed? ) Either the car was actually really taken care of ( the condition really looked s or it genuinely just needed being serviced A LOT! Not really sure..


Also is there some stuff I must look at before buying one?