I owned one, long-forgotten because it provided me nothing but headaches. Don't want to knock on owners here but imo older Audi/VW have serious reliability problems, avoid them like a plague.

no, just make sure you have warranty, extended warranty or a good aftermarket warranty. either that or deep pockets

edit: that was in reply to stuff99

A good friend of mine has a B5 A4 with the 1.8T

He's pushing ~22pounds of boost with a turbo swap and a crap ton of other mods. Rode in his car a few times, pulls really damn hard and drives great/very well balanced. I really wanted to buy one, then I realized he's a mechanic by trade and has a garage at his disposal and his car is still out of commission most of the time.

tl;dr beautiful car but requires tons of commitment/time/cash

I should add, I wanted (Still do) a B5 S4 (Such an amazing car imho) But when i talked to a few people who had them, And even the salesman at the Audi dealer, Reinforced to me that a second, Reliable car is very reccomended. (ie lots of downtime for the S4) Now, I know the A4 will be more reliable but keep it in mind.

:badpokerface: buy my b8 s4 next year.

I don't have the money for a B8 S4 Unless you wanted to sell it for like 20 grand? :badpokerface:

I had a B5 Stage 2+ S4 and it was honestly my favorite car that I've owned. It never gave me any problems at all. Mind you it was expensive to maintain but it never had these major problems a bunch of the Audi forum guys had. I only did maintenance on it like fluid changes, suspension, timing belt, etc. The only non maintenance trouble I ran into was the vacuum pump for the powers door locks. A quick trip to the wrecker to grab a B5 Passat pump fixed the problem and that fix was cheap.

I also bought the car used and it was well maintained by the previous owner as well. I truly miss that car.
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Buy an E46.

^
E46 may not be as unreliable but it is $$$$ to maintain, especially if you get an M3 or a ZHP. Suspension parts are not cheap at all, and if you want any tuning related mods everyone charges a premium just because it's an e46

Personally had to deal with a cooling system breakdown on #1 highway during rush hour. Luckily it was summer so I could take my time fixing it on the side of the road. E46 always has a basic tool kit in the trunk (beyond what comes with the car lol) for random shit happening, which it always does.

you have too much money man. already selling?

as for reliability for a b5, daval can probably chime in. he has a sick one and knows lots about b5 and anything audi.. lets see if he sees this thread

if you want reliability, get a honda.