Thank you so much for your responses.
We did got test drive the cars today and my husband thinks the S is the way to go. We have negotiated on a 2010 Mini Cooper S and should be able to pick it up mid-week. We are having them add an armrest so they need a few days to do the detailing (just came off the truck last night) and install the armrest.
The car is Laser Blue and the only qualm I am having is the wheels. They are black web and I'm just not sure about them. I can't decide if I will like the black wheels or would rather go with the silver. The car has black trim, black side mirrors and a black roof so my husband thinks I should stick with the black and I just can't decide. They said they could switch them out for any silver ones they have on the lot. So when I go to get it I might ask them to change one of the tires to a silver wheel and see how it looks. Don't want to offend anyone but I told the saleswoman it looks like the car was on Pimp my Ride.
I was not surprised to here your reports about maintenance cost. My husband has a Volvo and service/maintenance is not cheap but it doesn't happen often and it sounds like it happens even less with the Mini. I think his car goes in every 7,000 miles and they said this one goes 12,000 to 15,000. I live out in the country and I put quite a few miles on my car. It is 20 miles round trip to the school each way so that's a minimum of 40 miles a day I am putting on the car. That doesn't even take in to consideration the trips into the small town to the West and Fort Worth to the East. My car is a 2006 and I have 81,000 on it. I know when I put new tires on the car in December of '08 I had 55,000 on that car. So they add up quickly around here! When you live in Texas you have to plan on driving quite a bit.
My daughter thinks we should name the car Dory but I keep saying we should name it Ditka (my husband said Ditka himself is bigger than the car). I'm fairly certain Dory will be the name we go with. My husband just says we are crazy to even think about naming a car. But it's just so cute it calls out for a name! LOL!
). Not an S, though, and to be honest I don't remember test driving an S so I can't really comment on the difference between. The only things I remember are the S has more horsepower. That said, we've never found the Cooper lacking in pep - the CVT is particularly handy when you need to control the shift points, say, for merging on the freeway or whatever. Granted, if you're looking at a standard transmission that's kind of a moot point anyway.
