This guide operates under the assumption that you already are familiar with the basics of Import/Export and focuses on improving your efficiency when operating this business.

For those completely unfamiliar, I'll provide a short rundown. There are other guides that explain in detail how you can get into the business. If you guys want, I can modify this section later and add detailed steps for a more complete guide.

So how does it work?
Similar to special cargo, you source vehicles through various missions, and then sell them at a price. These vehicles are split into 3 ranges, each with a different selling value. Once in stock, you can choose to sell them piece by piece, or within a collection.

When you sell them piece by piece, you must modify the vehicles at your own cost, which will lower the profit.

When you sell collections, the vehicles don’t need to be modified. Not only that, selling a collection will grant you a bonus, so the profit sees a decent increase.

When you are at the very beginning, any vehicle warehouse can do just fine.
But for easier deliveries, I consider the best location to be the La Puerta warehouse.


It is the second most expensive warehouse, but it does come with some advantages, even compared to the most expensive one:

• Quick access from the highway.
  Just like the Murrieta Heights one, this warehouse has a quick access to the highway, but the truth is, you won’t be using the highway most of the time.
  
• Quick access to a helipad.
  Less than 1 km north there is a helipad. Any Pegasus helicopter called from this warehouse will spawn there, including the Cargobob, which makes operating this business a lot easier.
  
• No yard to go through.
  The entrance of the warehouse is right on the street. There is no yard or any kind of obstacle that would make the delivery harder than it should be. Furthermore, the airspace is relatively open, so you won’t have issues delivering the vehicles via Cargobob either.
  
• It is outside of any gang area.
  There’s zero chance of any NPC (besides triggered enemy NPCs) to shot you out of nowhere.
  
• There is a straight line to almost every major city exit.
  Unless the car is driven by an NPC to the Southern side of the city, you will be approaching this warehouse from the North.
  
  
  As seen in the picture I provided, driving vehicles to/from this warehouse will require the minimum number of turns, regardless of the city exit. This means faster speeds on the ground with less risk of hitting/getting hit by a traffic NPC.
  The distance is almost the same from every side. Statistically speaking, granted the fact that traffic is avoided without stopping, players will reach this warehouse faster than they will reach other warehouses, as the speed would be constant.
  

Although these vehicles can have different values, the cooldowns after sourcing and selling remain the same across the board, so ideally you want to constantly source top range vehicles. When you acquire your warehouse, and start sourcing vehicles, the vehicle targets seem to be completely random, but there is an actual algorithm in place.
Below you can find a table with all the vehicles that are able to be imported and exported.


As you can see, there are 10 standard range, 10 mid-range and 12 top range. Together they amount to 32 different models, and each warehouse holds the maximum of 40 vehicle slots.

The vehicles can vary in model and license plate. In other words, you can have the same car model in 2 slots, but they will have different license plates and visuals, as seen below:



The TLDR version of the entire thing is this:
You need to have 10 Standard range models and 10 mid-range models in the warehouse to source only top range vehicles. You will keep getting top-range vehicles until the warehouse reaches 80% capacity.

Here’s a more detailed explanation:
When sourcing a car, the system decides the model first and the license plate/colors after.
When the warehouse has no vehicles inside, each vehicle model has an equal chance of being sourced.

Once a certain model is sourced, its drop rate decreases considerably depending on the number of available plates remaining and the number of other ranges present in the warehouse. If the warehouse contains all the vehicle models from one range, the player will not source the same range until the warehouse is equally filled with cars from the other ranges. Once that happens, the drop rates go back to normal.

This is why having 10 different standard range models and 10 different mid-range models will cause the system to give out 12 top range models consecutively.

10 standards + 10 mid ranges make 50% of the warehouse storage. Adding the 12 top ranges will result in 32 vehicles which is 80% of the warehouse storage.

Note: You can still source top range vehicles beyond 80% storage, but the chances won't be 100%.

Now that you know how the system works, you can use it to your advantage.

Import/Export is very solo friendly, so you can just go for single car sales, if you don't have people to play with. However, if you do have one or two friends, you can sell collections for more money.

There are several collections you can operate with, and the method will work with all of them, but I personally like to focus on 2 specific collections, as they both contain only top range vehicles:

• End Of Empires consists of a Roosevelt Valor and a Z-Type;
  
• Uninsurable consists of a T20, an Osiris and an X80 Proto.

Once you got 12 top range vehicles in your warehouse, you can open the collections tab and see if you have any of the required vehicles. If you have one or more missing cars, it means that the ones you have in stock are not the right model variations. So, you should start by selling them.



Since the warehouse contains all the other possible car models, when you start the next source mission (after selling the unneeded vehicles), you’ll have 100% chance of getting the right model, and 33% chance for each model variation. Therefore, you can sell and source that car model, until you get the right model variation. And when you get the right model variation, you can sell the entire collection with 1 or 2 friends (depending on the collection).

And that’s all there is to it.
In short, have 10 standard range vehicles, 10 mid-range vehicles, and between 1 and 12 top range vehicles in the warehouse, and when you decide to sell a vehicle (or more), focus on the models that are part of the two high end car collections. And whenever you complete a collection, sell it with help from other people.

There are several pieces of equipment that help a lot when doing Import/Export:

1. Cargobob or DH-7 Iron Mule:
   
   
   
   
   • The Cargobob becomes the bread and butter of the Import-Export business, because it will allow you to pick up your vehicle and fly to your warehouse in a straight line. Furthermore, if the game spawns enemy NPCs to chase you, they will focus on hitting the vehicle you’re in, which is the helicopter, instead of hitting the cargo vehicle.
     
   • The DH-7 Iron Mule is pretty much a Cargobob on steroids. It has more power, more armor/HP and a higher top speed than the Cargobob. It also has a more stable hook that prevents the cargo from wobbling uncontrollably, decreasing the chances of damages caused by transport. The little downside is that it’s not a Pegasus vehicle. That means, if you request one from your warehouse, it will spawn at the western end of Vespucci Beach, so you’ll have a little bit more to travel in order to get it.
     Update: Owning the Higgins Helitours business, will allow you to spawn your personal Cargobob or Iron Mule at the helipad.
2. The thermal sniper scope for the Mk2 Heavy Sniper:
   If the target vehicle is driven by an NPC, you can get an easier headshot on the NPC from a distance, before approaching the vehicle, sometimes preventing the vehicle itself from registering damage costs (more on that in the next chapter).
   
3. Tear gas:
   If you have to steal the target vehicle from a car meet, instead of shooting at the enemy NPCs, risking hitting the target vehicle, you can just throw tear gas from cover and neutralize most of the enemies without having to shoot.
   
4. Armored Kuruma
   There aren’t any NPCs that shoot explosives during the sourcing missions, so a Kuruma is the perfect vehicle to have, when you drive to an area that’s filled with enemy NPCs. It has small windows, and bullet resistant glass to protect you from most of the incoming fire.

If more stuff gets added that actually helps, I will add it later.
Do feel free to post your ideas in the comments as well.

1. The police chase sourcing mission:
   
   This particular mission requires you to get the car that is used by an NPC in a police chase. If you approach the target vehicle directly, the NPC will start to run away followed by the police, and the car is guaranteed to get damaged in the process.
   
   Instead of a direct approach, you should get a vantage point at least 400m (1300 feet) away from the vehicle, and kill the NPC. A sniper bullet should do the trick. And this is where the thermal scope can make it even easier.
   
   Killing the NPC will get you a 3-star wanted level, but it will also prevent it from running away from the car. I should also point out that the damage counter is only enabled when you approach the vehicle, so killing the NPC from far away will not cause the vehicle to register any damage costs. The vehicle CAN get damaged, so try to kill the NPC as few shots as possible.
   
   After killing the NPC, lose the wanted level without calling Lester. Once you lost the cops, approach the vehicle and call Lester before entering it. Once you get in the vehicle you will get another 3-star wanted level. But as soon as you get in, you can lose the cops by selecting Lester’s option in less than a second, giving the police no time to react.
   
   After that, you will be driving the vehicle with zero damage and no wanted level. All you have to do is get to the warehouse without crashing.
   
   Below is a youtube video that demonstrates this strategy.
   If the embed doesn't work (it didn't for me), click here to go straight to youtube.
   I'm also open for advice on how to fix the embed.
   
   

I only have tips for one particular mission, but I can edit in later, if you or I get more ideas.