Owen Reynolds Personal blog

Let’s do a blog post in the format of ‘the 5 W’s’: WHO / WHAT / WHEN / WHERE / WHY, for my latest car purchase, almost an annual event now. I’ll go through the W’s in a different order:

WHO: I’m 46 this July, I live in Laval (close to Montreal), Canada. I’m an IT dude, in my spare time, I do enjoy nice cars, though, I buy them used. I have an un-matched capacity in the western world for car shopping and test drives. What you call extreme, I call fun.

WHAT: I often refer to BMW as the ‘Toyota’ of German cars. Their B-series engines having drastically increased the over-all reliability of the brand from 2017 onwards. However, they aren’t quite Toyota / Lexus in terms of longevity as you get past the 130 k mileage mark

They are getting there, though, take it away, Mark in Alberta, Canada

You can read about my past car shopping adventures on the following set of posts:

Buying a used car after 10 years out of the game – Owen Reynolds Personal blog

Subaru WRX & Lexus IS 350 F Sport – Owen Reynolds Personal blog

Let’s buy an SUV – Owen Reynolds Personal blog

Traditionally, I’ve chosen names based on BIRDS, shown above. However, for the 2019 BMW X1 , I’m breaking from that tradition

Hello, WHITE LIGHTNING !

Now, I’ve never seen the movie I named the new car after. I do love Burt Reynolds car movies, so, it’s a good fit

The trailer LOOKS 🔥I’ve definitely made the below face when driving in Canada ‘white out’ blizzard conditions, so, I can relate, Also, RIP Burt. We aren’t related, but I do mention his name when advising people how to spell my name. ‘Reynolds’, as in Burt Reynolds

WHY: I car I traded in was lovely, a 2018 BMW X3 M40i. However, it was getting up in age at 127 KM mileage, and the extended warranty was up in a few months. I loved the power of the inline-six 355 HP turbo-powered engine, but with the condition of the Montreal streets (12 months of pot-holes) and a lot of stop signs / red lights / red light cameras / I could rarely ever drive it fast. I also bought this vehicle at a time I was doing tons of DIY, so, made good use of the larger interior, no longer, while I plan my next move, I’m in a rental, so am not doing DIY activities anymore.

For the time I had it, I grew to love the BMW driving experience. As I truly do enjoy the process of car shopping and test drives, in 2025, I tried out a number of other vehicles as it’s replacement planning ahead for the trade-in in 2026. They were as follows:

Tesla Model-Y, Volvo XC-60 PHEV, Hyundai Tucson PHEV, RAV-4 PHEV, Mazda CX-5 Turbo, Mazda 3 Turbo hatchback.

None felt suitable as a replacement for the BMW driving experience

My goals were simple, find a BMW X1 that was 1 year newer than my 2018 X3, with 30km less mileage, winter and summer tires, accident free. I also wanted retain some of what I was used to with my X3: Ambient lighting, M-sport package, Apple Carplay wireless. BMW has an impossible list of packages to remember that are per model/per year/per country, so finding the right combo was tricky. M-sport, for instance, is not so common here in Quebec. The last and most critical point, unlike other trade-ins I’ve done, I wanted the price of the newer (used) vehicle to be less than the car I was trading in, in this way, I would not pay any taxes on trade-in, and can lower my monthly car payments significantly

The base X1 30i AWD has significantly less HP than the X3 M40i, 228 HP vs 355 HP, however, as above, I wasn’t able to take advantage of the greater power in the X3, so, I was ok to lower the available HP. Also, if I want, I can avail of stage 1 tuning via software mods to increase my HP by 35-45 HP if I feel 221 isn’t cutting it. See: Bootmod 3 stage 1 ECU TuningIn

WHEN & WHERE: In January 2026, I ended up doing 3 test drives (2x 2018 X1, 1x 2019 X1), in the end I found the ideal car here @ St-Bruno Volkswagen | Volkswagen Dealership in Saint-Bruno-de-Montarville

The staff were great, and accommodated my work schedule and pre-purchase inspection requirements , shout out to Yves at VW St Bruno!

I completed my test drive on Friday Jan 23, 2026, then came back the following Friday Jan 30, 2026 for delivery day, the pix of which are shown above

Thanks for reading and have a great day ☀️/ night 🌓

Owen in Laval, Quebec, Canada