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> I recently learned that there's a boutique car shopping consulting industry where you pay a few hundred dollars for someone to provide advice on models (including family haulers, not just high-end sports cars), and then to solicit and secure offers on your preferred models. I might try that next time around.

I can't recommend these services enough. I've never actually paid them anything upfront to search for cars, but many of them are semi-retired car enthusiasts from finance or tech who can afford to get used dealership licenses and start their own business. They'll help anyone but their inventory is well curated and often priced for velocity rather than profit maximization. They'll hang onto $100k classic to get the right price but will happily take a client's low mileage 201x Toyota as a low risk trade-in to get them into a the right Mercedes they want and then flip the Toyota a week later for a few thousand under blue book just because they've got limited parking space.

Any specific names you can list?

I used https://mycarguy-sf.com/ in SF and http://halo-motors.com/ in Seattle (latter are actually in Bellevue). Ironically both sites look like used car lots with very limited inventory but I discovered the former from a yelp search for "car consultant" and ended up buying a Mini Cooper from his lot. The latter was recommended to me by a friend whom Halo Motors helped find a semi-classic but I again ended up buying an underpriced Toyota from their lot.

A nice side benefit is that most of these mom and pop dealers will sell you secondary warranties at cost, which was a big deal when I was a first time car buyer with a post-BMW acquisition Mini Cooper with a CVT but I drove that car into the ground so it wasn't a consideration the second time around.

I did this with a Honda minivan a few years back. Got one of these buying agents to negotiate and get the deal. Just went into the dealership and got the car. In and out within 15-20 mins to sign paper and pick up the keys.

I can relate about the dance though. The popular Japanese imports last basically forever and the salespeople’s tactics aren’t great. I’ve said to myself more than a few times I’d get a Tesla so I could just get everything done in a web browser.

I really love my Model 3 and the new Model Y looks pretty nice too.

Not having to deal with the dealership model and salesmen to get the price is a lot better.

I don’t think I’ll buy a different brand for the foreseeable future.

Do you have any referrals or links to those types of places? I'd pay that gladly.

I saw some names recommended in the leasehackr.com forums, but only the forum handles. I haven't gone back to track down proper contacts. But that piqued my curiosity and when Googling one of the first hits was https://automatchconsulting.com/. I haven't dug any deeper since then. The other recommendations else thread look promising, too.