I had so so luck with WTB on CL, mostly people looking for me to overpay. I had great luck with a WTB ad on here, got my F-14 from a great guy at a great price.

usually the little old ladies aren't scanning the ads, usually its flippers or other collectors.

Most the time when I post for a specific machine I get no response at all. Did find my TAF this way from a pin collector not on pinside who had two of them. He wasn't necessarily looking to sell but saw my ad and responded. Got a good deal.

WTB has worked quite well for me here on Pinside.

It worked once for me on CL, but it was very targeted. I was trying to get a guy who was selling a machine to reply to my email since several went unanswered... I posted a "To the guy selling the XXXXXX machine, please send me an email. I'm interested."

He sent me an email about an hour later, and we made a deal.

WTB on CL is hit or miss for me. I put one out for Gottlieb Wedgeheads recently and have found one promising lead, but the rest are crazy people wanting $3000 for beat non working games.

It all depends on how persistent you are and if you have somebody flagging your ads 24/7. I haven't had any luck with pins, had a few hits on other things but mostly not much luck at all.

Yes.
-mof

Crapshoot but I have bought games from wtb CL ads.
Maybe 5-10% of my wtb ads paid off.

It helps if you live in major city.

What about the thrifty nickel or something like that? I would imagine more "grannies with pins in the basement" types would read something like this.

Same here actually and for the same pin.

But yeah, mostly people wanting to charge $3500 for their fish tales lol

I tried a blanket WTB ad, and it was flagged down nearly immediately. I reposted several times and it just got flagged down faster and faster. I posted a WTB ad for a specific machine, offering to pay full retail, giving a dollar amount, and that was flagged down too, but it took a day or two compared to hours (or minutes).

The hate email responses you receive after posting a WTB ad are amazing.

Craig's List WTB ad is a total waste of time. In 3 years of trying to keep one up I have basically been flagged over 1000 times and I really have NEVER bought a machine from a Craig's List WTB ad. I just keep posting them to piss off who ever is flagging it and sometimes I'll have to re-post 6 or 8 times a day to keep it up.

But local newspaper & other ads seem to work great. Just not Craig's list in our area thanks to a few jack asses.

CL has become a total waste of time, just like Ebay. Heck I cant even get a reply out of someone thats selling a game at a high price let alone a cheap or fair price. But yet they keep listing it for sale. This not only goes for pinball but usually anything thats listed on CL these day. Why do people bother, or not bother for that matter ? Do they like getting emails after the item has sold a month earlier asking them if its still for sale and then not answearing back ? I dont get it ?

John P. Dayhuff
Battle Creek ,Mi.
269-979-3836

Sometimes they do. People will post ads just to mine legit email addresses. Craigslist JUST addressed this. Now all email goes through their server, you never see the email address of the person you sent an email to and vice versa.

I would agree with Mr. dayhuff. Craigslist is full of flakes. People list items and won't respond when you email or if they have a phone number, they act put out when you call them. They always answer the phone angry for some reason. Lol

I think the days of posting WTB ads on craigslist and getting any kind of legitimate lead are over. As others have said, most of the folks that respond to the ads have steaming piles of crap and they think it should sell for at least as much, if not more, than a fully restored machine.

Dave

Mine did. I posted I was looking for a pin 1200 range. Somebody hit me up and I nabbed a decent dr dude for 900

Been thinking about doing this for a BSD or Goldeneye.

I posted a "WTB" ad on rgp, for a machine on my wishlist, stated the amount I was willing to pay for a nice one, and found a good deal.

It worked great for me when I was looking for a T2 two years ago. I posted exactly what I was looking for in condition and price range, and the person who responded was about to list his on CL when he saw my WTB ad first, so called me up and we had a deal. I think luck/timing has a lot to do with it. May have to do with region as well. Can't hurt to try .

I've been running a "WTB your old pinball machine $100" ad on Craigslist for about a month. I'm in Hawaii and there are not too many pinballs around. I've had a couple of calls from guys that have a broken machine and think they can get top dollar for it. But I'm obviously not going to buy some early 1980's pin that is broken for a $1,000!!! However this Sunday I get a call from someone that has a Data East Back to the Future. So I went to check it out on Monday and the guy just gave it to me for FREE!!! It's pretty dirty, rubbers are all shot, and the MPU board has major battery damage, otherwise it is in pretty good shape. The GIs do light up and there is a "Back to the Future" call out coming off the sound board when you switch it on. The MPU however does not boot up. Since the MPU is so badly damaged I figured it would be best to simply get a new board. It's been ordered and should be here by the end of the week. Hopefully she will fire up once I get the new board in. Then all I need to do is clean and shop the machine.

So to answer this thread's question if Craigslist WTB ads work I must say YES!! You just need to have patience and, even in a pinball desolate area like Hawaii, a great deal may just pop up!!

Gotta love this hobby!!

Free_BTTF.jpg

Congrats, I hope to have a YES for this sometime. Until then, I'm doing pretty well.

I've only put a few WTB ads out there on CL. One was for a Scared Stiff. Got a response from a guy who had an HUO that he would sell. Not only did I buy it, but also a routed Monster Bash which has since been restored.

I've got specific titles by placing wtb ads on CL. In my city those are the only ones that don't get flagged immediately. But I did meet one of my very best friends by running a wtb pinball ad years ago.

I once posted a spoof ad of another WTB ad that gets posted in the OC/LA CL constantly...

I BUY (half broken) PINBALLS

I'm looking for pibnall machines that are only partially working. If you have completely broken or fully working pinball machines I'm probably not interested. For examples, I'll buy a Swords of Fury but only if the flipper don't work--a common problem on Swords of Fury due to the special "fury flippers" that were used in it. I can fix the flippers on that one. For another example, I'll also buy a Gorgar but only if the talking sounds aren't working right. Who wants to play a Gorgar that doesn't talk right? You don't but I do. Plus I'll fix that and sell it for more money. If the flippers are borken on Gorgar I'm not interested though because I don't know how to fix Gorgar flippers. I'm not going to make a huge list of games that identify which specific broken pieces I can fix (and am interested in) so it's better if you just emaul me through this ad with the link Craigs List puts in and tell me exactly what pinball you have and exactly what part isn't working. If the stars align I'm sure we can work soemthing out that's awesome for me.

Some guy responded that he had a pinbot and I thought he was just joking my joke. Turns out he was serious!! Of course then he wanted me to make him an offer without seeing the game and disappeared. But yeah, I suppose it could work from time to time.

A guy I know had someone contact him that had a AFM, bought from the guy for less than $3k.

That is pretty damn funny!

FYI Here is the simple ad that I've been running that scored me that Back to the Future:

WTB Your old & broken PINBALL - $100 (Island Wide)

I am looking to purchase any old or broken pinball machines here on the Big Island. If you got one I'll come and get it and pay you $$$!!! Just give me a call!

Eric
808 987 5247

Here is the link:

honolulu.craigslist.org link

Simple but effective!! I couldn't run an ad for any specific pin because the odds are against it that it would be here on the island.

I see that some of you have the problem of getting your ads flagged. Why would someone flag your WTB ad? Is it against Craigslist policies?

Did not have much luck running a pinball machine wanted ad on craigslist because I kept getting flagged. There are a few professional "pickers" in the area that run ads all the time so they can lowball people and then resell the pins for more money. They flag other people wanting to buy a pinball so they can corner the market. Just my opinion.

because the lowlife scourges* of the pinballs world flag them...

* better known as flippers...

I got a great HUO LotR from a CL wanted ad. Better yet, the seller is an awesome guy and I've bought more pins from him since.

Although we don't have many pinball machines available out here in Hawaii at least we don't have a problem with "flippers". The only "flippers" we have out there are the dolphins in the ocean!

Got my HUO LOTR from a WTB on CL, so it does workout sometimes.

Todd

It worked for me on CL. I got my LOTR this way from a collector now known as Panzerfreak.

Still have it. Thanks!

For a while we had an overabundance of WTB pinball ads. Fifty ads to buy your broken machine for low bucks from flippers, and 10 over priced pins actually for sale. I guess everyone got sick of it and started the flag wars which have continued to this day. War is hell man...