Oooo how was the 135i???
That car must have been nice as a rwd car. What issues were you having though? German cars are more prones to electrical problems. My dad has 2 vw and 1 audi so its not uncommon to see issues everywhere but on these newer models you would think they would fix their crap. Interested to hear about the 135i experience as a car and the issues you faced!
For starters at 7200 miles the idler pulley snapped off the hub and took out the serpentine belt and left me stranded. I was in driving about 15-20mph when it happened. The other issues were electrical related. First one of the ballast burned out and the adaptive headlamp system went bad. I got that fixed and about a week after picking up the car for that, the adpative headlamp system failed again. They said they had replaced one headlamp but not the drivers side and for some reason the one headlamp was talking to the other one so I had to get another headlamp replaced under warranty. The next thing to break was the DMR "foot well" module. The module controlled a lot of things for ex. power windows, easy access for the windows, turn signals, DRL's, instrument cluster illumination, sunroof and reverse lamps. Luckily the brake lights at least worked but still was a pain to deal with on a weekend and finding out service closed 30 minutes ago and couldn't drop my car off to get a loaner. Before it had any issues the car was fun to drive especially being RWD but after that experience I will probably never want to own a German car again.
I originally was set on getting something I wouldn't want to mod for performance so I was looking at Jeep Wranger Rubicon's back on Thanksgiving last year. The longer my friend took to buy my SRT4 I began losing interest in the Jeep. I next began to look into the Focus ST. I test drove it and actually feel in love but that lasted about a month. lol The price for a Focus ST with a ST3 package costed nearly as much a WRX so I began looking into those and drove by a VW and noticed the Golf R. I set up a test drive for the Golf R. I really liked the R32's back in 2004 and really liked the Blue so I thought I was give the car a try and see what it offered. After the test drive I really liked how it drove but in the back of my head I was thinking this is going be another problem car for since it's German. The price of the Golf R was right around the neighborhood of the STI and thought why even look at a WRX if I'm shopping for a car that's close to what the STI is for a sedan. After doing research on VWVortex.com I read a number of issues on new Golf R's having slipping clutch and transmission issues right there I made my decision to go and order a STI.