Friend of mine has the BMW 530 diesel estate as a company car, and is in almost the same family position Officedesk with two very young children only 13 months apart.
Frankly, i found it a quite astonishing machine - the acceleration is excellent, it's quiet and feels as if hewn from a solid billet of steel. Lets just say the build quality rather highlights a few "character traits" of my TVR...
He spent some money and had a media pack installed with t.v's in the rear headrests....non stop barney dvd's but it certainly keeps his offspring quiet; overall he feels the car provides almost as much fun as his '95 plate M5 once did in years gone by, but with drastically reduced running costs.
Methinks you could do a lot worse
