[benton0311]

I hope this is in the right forum, too specific for off-topic but maybe too general for E90 or E60 specific.

I have an E90 335i that I love to death but I have kids and it's getting a bit small. My wife's Honda Pilot is the primary kid mover but if I'm working and she's not or if for some reason I need/want to drive my BMW it's getting pretty hard to cram everything plus two car seats in the 335. On top of that we've been thinking of having a third child.

Anyone put three car seats in an E60 M5? I just test drove one and, while sort of impressive, I wasn't blown away compared to my tuned 335i. It wasn't like "gee wow, this car is fast and handles like it's on rails" it was more like "okay, it's a little faster and it's nice to have posi again but okay." I did really miss the torque that I had but the V10 seemed to come alive past 5k and was a lot of fun up top. I had to keep it around 3500-4k driving around just to feel "normal" though.

The 5 series definitely has enough space and a much bigger trunk. I thought about a 535i but if I'm going to trade i'd like to at least go up in performance instead of down, even if I'm getting a bigger car. The maintenance sounds horrendous and while I never cared much about fuel economy it's like it might as well have a hole in the gas tank.

Any thoughts? My choices are to keep the 335i and only rely on her SUV to move the kids or get an M5 and be able to fit three car seats plus stroller and gear. I've though about the X5 and Cayenne as well but the rear seat is about the same size as the 5 Series/M5.