Some automakers produce a luxury appeal to consumers in high society, like Mercedes-Benz. Some cater to royalty like Rolls Royce. BMW models draw in a sportier crowd with a high purchase price.

But, as many owners will tell you, costs go way beyond just buying a vehicle. It includes parts, labor, and repair work as well. Consumer Reports surveyed owners of various cars and how much money they spent in three-, five-, and 10-year increments. The results show that BMWs continue to be most expensive cars to own.

Is BMW really that expensive?

All BMW vehicles are expensive to purchase whether you choose an SUV or a car. It’s an imported vehicle, so that fact alone makes it one of the most expensive in the new car market. When it comes to buying a used model, however, drivers can go either cheap or on the expensive side, depending on the age and mileage of the model being sold. You can count on insurance costs being high too because replacing a BMW, should it get into an accident, would cost insurance agencies a ton of money.

The biggest problem, though, comes from the maintenance and repair work of the car after you purchase it. BMWs, known for poor reliability, can provide endless opportunities to shell out money. Plus, working on one usually takes someone who knows what they’re doing when it comes to BMW technology.

Parts are also expensive because they’re sometimes imported here, so you’re paying for shipping as well as the production cost. Then, when you add the labor cost, you’re forking over a ton of money for one job. That goes for normal maintenance as well unless you feel confident enough to tackle these kinds of jobs yourself.

What this study tells us about BMW

Consumer Reports pulled their data from a survey they sent out last year. The results they came up with are a bit surprising for some cars, but others pretty much hit the mark on what you would expect to see from them. BMW has interesting results.

For the first five years of owning a BMW vehicle, average costs for regular maintenance and repair fell in the $59 range. While these results reflect only a small percentage of BMW owners, it still shows that the first three years of owning one usually requires small jobs, like oil changes.

When you get to the five-year mark, repair work will start creeping in, adding up to a large amount by the 10th year. The older a BMW gets, the more work it will require to keep it running smoothly. While that’s true for other vehicles as well, the cost of BMW parts, and labor costs for specialized technicians, makes a big difference when adding up the cost of ownership.

The total tallied from their surveys for the BMW turned out to be $910, making it the most expensive brand from the 25 brands surveyed.

The history of BMW reliability

As Scotty Kilmer explains, BMWs used to be pretty reliable back in the day. But, with modern production lines, they’re taking shortcuts like adding cheap plastic parts to the interior. Those pieces may be cheap to produce for the assembly line, but because they’re made for BMW cars, you’re going to pay more for the name.

Because of the shortcuts BMW is making, parts are wearing out and breaking much faster than they used to as reported by many owners complaining of the cost of fixing them. That makes them the ultimate money pit – as repair guys call them – because you end up fixing one thing, and not long after, something else goes. You shell out a lot of your hard-earned money in a short amount of time.

BMWs are nice luxury vehicles to have, but they’re very expensive to own and not just because of the purchase price. Once you add up insurance costs and repair bills, you can almost double the price you paid for it in the first place.