buying from out of state, have you done it? Options

[MiddleMan]

Somehow, most of the nice 914s I'm finding are located in states other than my own. I'm actually a little surprised by this, though I'm not sure why I should be...

Anyway, since it looks like I'll be buying from at least a couple of states away, I'm wondering how others have dealt with such a situation. I'm pretty nervous about buying a car without looking at it first (in person), but obviously I cannot make multiple trips around the country looking at cars, either.

If you've done it, have you had the car inspected beforehand, or do you just trust the seller? If you've gone with an inspection, how do you choose the person to do it? Just by asking on boards like this, or ??

Since I plan to get something nice, I figure that enclosed shipping is the way to go. I see there are plenty of threads here already covering shipping, so I won't ask about that.

Thanks.