I always advise folks to look for rusty brake lines. You need to look straight up from below, to see the lines where they run up along the body, and beside the fuel tank, to the rear axle.
I hope you know these Escorts should get a new timing belt each 100,000 miles. He doesnt mention that, so I would assume it hasnt been done. Its a good idea to replace the water pump along with the timing belt, since you have to remove the timing belt to replace the water pump.
I recently got a 91 LX sedan with 137,000 miles on it, for $400, since the 'auto' transmission was worn out. I rebuilt the tranny myself, so only spent about $475 for that including a new torque converter. But if you needed to have the tranny redone in the next 50,000 miles and Didnt do-it-yourself, it would probably cost a couple of thous or more. (But at least you would know what you had.)
I think you will find an Escort is a nice simple & inexpensive car in contrast with BMW's. I had a used 501 sedan with the 6 cyl. 30 years ago, and bought a new BMW R69S m'cycle in 68 that I still have. Its got 200k miles on it so far.