BMW 3 series - worst car ever owned

11 year old BMW needing new shocks & springs is not a surprise with 300K on the clock.

Presume you have model with 19" alloys as you bought the car for the looks as you know nothing about cars as you admit.

If you did your research, you would easily find that the E90 19" 225M alloys are notorious for cracking.

I don't have a bmw now but had plenty over the years (3 x 3 series and 3 x 5 series) and had very little trouble with any of them. Some were in around 10 years old when I had them but none had that mileage. I wouldn't buy a car with that much on the clock, I'd just buy a fresher example of a cheaper brand. No real right to expect trouble free ownership at that stage.

It could have had a tough life and not looked after too.

I'd had a 2014 F30, it was always giving some kind of trouble be it sensors,modules,seals, suspension parts and a host of other things. Was doing all the work myself and always got what it needed but it was spending too much time on the lift for my liking. Got rid of it for an A6

Without being a smart arse 300000km is high millage even tough it maybe average for its age.

Mileage is not the only yard stick for measuring wear or reliability especially on an 11 year old car. That car could have had a hard life or had a lack of maintenance over the years from numerous owners and now your paying the price for that. Your Passat was good to you but there are plenty of them out there that were just as troublesome as your current car. I had a Passat CC at one time that developed an oil leak in the gearbox that resulted in it needing to be replaced along with the clutch and flywheel at 3 years old and only 65k km so no car is impervious to being unreliable at any age or mileage.

Sounds to me like you bought a dog though. Mechanic should have recommended replacing the shocks in pairs on the same axel rather than one at a time. Cracked alloy wheels are a very common problem on that model if just researching common problems rather than having to search specifically about it. Water pumps are classed as a wear and tear item and they tend to fail eventually. Turbo could have failed for any number of reasons which needs to be investigated.

I have an E36 since 2005. I went thru hell between 2007 and 2010 (approx 150K miles on it then) with a load of issues but on the far side of that, its been relatively ok. I wonder if that's indicative of cars in general. In that 3 year period I went thru new brake lines, 2 rear wheel bearings, a burst coolant pipe, the gearbox died, vanos rattle (1200eu fix), cat converter needed replacement & the usual wears.

im sure the car wasn't a 'bad' one when new... trouble with any car that age and mileage is wear and tear.. and service history... who knows how it lived before you got your hands on it. its probably a little unfair to judge all bmw 3 series as worst car ever owned when its particular to your experience. From my limited experience with cars ive found anything over 5 years thats been driven a fair bit even with good service history is going to start giving various unpredictable problems.. if you wanted a car with less issues within your budget you should probably have went for something a little more boring.. lower mileage honda or something.. its quite hard to get a sporty car on low budget with high miles that will be trouble free.. the fact that its an m-sport means its more likely to have been driven harder... you don't buy an m-sport for sunday afternoon lazy slow drives

You spent 6.5k on a car that likely cost near seven times that brand new. I think a 320 Msport started at 35k.

Have an E60 with 250k km on the clock.

In my time I've replaced all the rad hoses, water pump, replaced front shocks and springs, front wishbone, brake pads and disks, battery, fixed oil leak (all BMWs leak oil)

this is just part and parcel of owning a "performance" car. Msports are likely driven a bit harder than the standard version too.

186,000 miles is high. If you agree with it or not , at that age most cars would have had multiple changes of suspension components. And the water pump would be definitely done or done even twice in some cases.

Your list to me just looks like conventional maintenance that is expected at high mileage. Unless it was done prior to your purchase and you checked those items were not original. I.e the service book or receipts then you should maybe have moved on to the next car that had them done.