Buying a car thousands of miles away

[xRide]

The furthest ive purchased a car was in virginia from my brother so I dont even count that as anything. Ive also purchased in NJ and CT. I live in NY. But how about purchasing in say California from a dealership? I know that its easy to say you can fly out and drive it back or how would you ship it back if you dont decide to drive it back? What do you guys do in terms of inspecting the vehicle to make sure its in proper mechanical state to drive back, making sure its actually in the that it was advertised, price negotiation....etc,.

Im always curious about this phenomenon because ive seen too many car which does not stood up to their advertised condition when actually looking at them.