Quoted from CrazyLevi:$1500 is a low budget at this point, unless he's interested in an EM (which is fine by the way). I don't get the whole "play as many machines as you can" angle when that's pretty much what he's already been doing his whole life as a pinball fan already.
Buy a game. If you don't like it, sell it. How many $1500 games you think the guy is gonna be able to find anyway on location? Likely very few if any. So why should he spend time and money trying to hunt those down to play when he might as well just buy one?
Some EMs are now selling upwards of $1200.
Bringing one back to life and buying the parts for them is no longer cheap.
Project EMs are selling for $500-600.