BMW turns back the clock on M3 pricing

THE price of entry to a BMW M3 coupe in Australia has hit its lowest point since 1994, with the Bavarian company’s local arm announcing a $125,000 starting price for a stripped-down limited-edition called the M3 Pure.

This makes the Pure more than $30,000 cheaper than the regular M3 coupe, which will continue to be available during the special-edition’s three month production run.

The M3 cabriolet will not be offered in this guise.

The announcement comes in the same week as BMW previewed its next-generation 3 Series-based coupe range at the Detroit motor show, to be called 4 Series.

Standard versions of the 4 Series will hit Australia at the end of this year, but the M4 will not surface until 2014.

The company has released cut-price Pure Edition versions of the M3 coupe before – in early 2011 and 2012 – but unlike those versions, this year’s edition does without a suite of luxury features found on the regular model.

Deleted features include the six-stacker CD player, adaptive headlights, the no-cost sunroof option (the glass roof option now costs extra), seat heating and the high-end Harmon Kardon sound system.

Still, the Pure is far from a bare-bones track special, with standard gear including Bi-Xenon headlights, satellite navigation, Bluetooth and USB audio connectivity, parking sensors all-round and a carbon-fibre roof.

The regular full-leather seats have been downgraded to cloth with leather inserts.

Unchanged is the standard M3’s 309kW and 400Nm 4.0-litre V8 engine, matched to either a standard six-speed manual or a seven-speed automatic (the latter adds $7300 to the price).

Despite shedding a few kilos over its better-specified regular M3 sibling, the Pure officially records the same 0-100km/h sprint time of 4.8 seconds.

M3 Pure production kicks off in March and runs for three months. BMW Group Australia managing director Phil Horton said there was no limit on numbers during this period.