Hello, and welcome to the club Good luck with the hunt for the MINI, and I'm sure you'll keep Emily drooling with all this talk of the Elise

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Hi and welcome to MCUK..........
Just picking up on your comment ref dash rattles..........due to one thing and another im now in an early (52 reg) Cooper S it has circa 60k on it and im luvin it........Funny thing is it doesnt rattle from the dash half as much as both of my new R53's which were at the time an 05 and a 56 reg and they were said to be the 'better' built cars.
Also i retro fitted the 3 spoke steering wheel too as i hate the 2 spoke....its a straight swap and so easy to do too..........The only issue is trying to get an airbag.........perseverance does pay off!!! and make sure the wheel is for a R53 as the R56 wheel is different!

good luck with ya search...........

Hi Paul - cheers for the comments and welcome - funnily enough, the wife's 57 plate Cooper suffered dash rattles on and off - it's one of the reasons I got 'the fear' when I heard the early cars were potentially worse. Good news on the steering wheels - do you know if the multifunction ones are transferrable (with audio and cruise control or just audio alone)?

Emily - any Elise is a great car, and you'd be amazed how affordable some earlier cars are now. Just make sure you get it checked over by a reputable specialist such as Steve Williams (ggogle is your friend). The best thing is, they hold value so well you've every chance that you could sell for the same price 6-12 months later - giving you a year of ownership for nothing more than the usual running costs/petrol.