Good news - my Scared Stiff is only $6700.

I tried these guys a while ago and was disgusted by the way they were operating. They pulled that same bait and switch crap with me. They charge insane prices and try to take advantage of a buyer. How much do you want to bet the "homeowner" who had it was being given 4800, and they were gonna pocket 2k just for doing what pinside does everyday.

They don't have the games they are selling. When they find a sucker...I mean buyer...they then find a game to sell to that person. The price went up because they couldnt find a game to sell you that they could buy cheap enough to flip it to you and make money.

The owner is a clown. He is just a broker and once he has your money he then finds your machine. He doesn't stock much when I've talked to him.

This sh×tty business model has been in place for awhile. I remember reading the same thing about them a few years back. ~SpOoKy

I know it seems that way, but I don't think its really bait-and-switch. They aren't making another $900. Instead, it is taking another $900 to pry it out of the hands of an owner. I'm sure they still make good profit. Their business is odd. They work with a community of people probably all near them and when someone wants a game they go and try to buy it and deliver it to you. I am guessing the prices on their page are the prices that they queried a few owners of what they'd sell if offered cash. This probably went up since last query. It's still a sucky business model since it doesn't advertise as being that way. However, if you call them they'll tell you how it works on the phone so it's not so under handed. You could probably do just as well posting a WTB Scared Stiff $5900 here on Pinside.

It is called "Monkeys", after all.

Bunch of monkey business if you ask me.

Phantom flippers, they find a chump looking for a game then try to find one then beat the seller down so they can make a couple grand.
If they buy a project you get a project.
Good thing you didn't deal with them, anyone who has been in the hobby for awhile knows about these characters.

All the bad stuff is true. I bought two machines from them before I knew any better. You get whatever they buy from the owner, completely unimproved. I bought a TOTAN from them, waiting months for it. When it arrived, the playfield wouldn't sit in the cabinet straight and when I tried to put it up on the legs the legs bolts tore right out of the dry-rotted cabinet.

I would never buy from them under any circumstances. I don't think the business model itself is bad, but the way they implement it is. You buy a title from them, you wait for them to find one, then they have it shipped straight from the original owner to you, untouched, no guarantees. They get away with this because you get pictures of the title and have to "approve" before they ship. Pictures are often misleading, and because their business model is not known to you at the time, you assume there's some kind of quality control going on and give them the benefit of the doubt.

sounds like "dirt bags" would be more fitting . . .

I understand and am not saying they are a good company. But bait and switch usually involves some form of intent. They bait you with something attractive with the planned intent to switch you to something else to make more money. In this case, I don't think that's what happened. Instead, their crappy business model fell through and in order to make the deal, it would cost more money. They aren't making more off you. Plus, a $5900 scared stiff isn't really "bait" anyway. Anyways, they are a shady organization, and I suggest you do business elsewhere. I just don't think its a bait and switch routine.

how can this place exist? Pretty sure GAP has a scared stiff at that price. Hell, even the niles guy would probably sell you his SS for less than $5900
chicago.craigslist.org link

5900 is way to much for a ss anyways. Keep looking, stay away from retail.

Hilarious.

Wait. I can sell stuff that I don't even own? Brilliant!

Every now and then we go into that Replay arcade in Niles and check up on those machines. They finally fixed the TAF, sort of. It's awesome...the friggin' ruined No Fear still has a $3K price on it. The just-as-beat TAF doesn't even have a tag on it (I think they're going with the "if you have to ask" model). When I first called the guy over a year ago he wanted $50K for his inventory and like 8 pins, so I guess we can expect to look at those CL ads a while longer.

That arcade used to be nuts in the late '90s and it's a sad, decrepit, turd of a disappointment now. Niles must be paying their rent and expenses; they can't take in more than $4 a day at that place.... Strange, you would think with hot titles like X-Men and an Old King Cole puppet show machine they'd be raking it in.

And just how do you know what their intent is? Regardless of intent, still seems like B&S to me.

Deleting the content of this post as to not mess with anyone who doesn't understand my sense of humor. I have nothing for sale at the moment.

Wow. I haven't been checking Craigslist for a long time. So the Niles guy is still being... the Niles guy?

I took a look at Monkey's website. Hard to believe that they would sell anything at the prices they're charging. $6,163 for a Baywatch? Roller Coaster Tycoon for $5,337?? Sheesh!

Lol, well it says they will beat any price. Someone test them out and see if they will.

Two reasons: first, their business model is well known. They don't have any games and then search for them when an order comes through. And and second one. Their prices on the site are way high. You won't entice someone to "switch" without "bait". A scared stiff for $5900 or a roller coaster tycoon for $5337 is not bait. If they had intent to bait and switch then you'd see attack from mars $3995, scared stiff $2900, roller coaster tycoon $950 as baited prices.

They will beat any price.... with the exception of their own.... They'll raise that one.

I think his point is that he clearly sees this company as BS as well, however he doesn't believe their intent is to bait and switch or scam. They just have a really poor business model, which we all agree on. They simply couldn't buy a scared stiff right then for xXx amount,so they found one elsewhere for more money. Point being, they aren't making more on it probably, but the other one they found was more than the first one, that is now no longer for sale

It was an interesting smell to it too... I couldn't last long enough to play a game it was so bad.

Sorry boys, we aint gonna agree on this one. Regardless of the bait price, it still got them a customer looking for the game at that price. That's the whole idea of bait, right? It got someone nibbling at that price. Then they switch up the price on ya. I don't really care to keep talking about it, just pointing out that it fits the description, IMO.

How did they get a customer? He didnt give them money and they pissed him off with the bait. You can't dangle a product infront of someone to just yank it away. That is how you lose customers and get bad feedback.

Ok, a potential customer, a sales lead...jeez

Although I am pretty sure that I overpaid given their condition for a WW and TAF from RePlay a couple of years ago, I did enjoy bringing both of the games back from the dead and learned a ton (albeit spent a ton as well) in the process, and it was great to drive away with somewhat instant gratificaiton. That being said, I did pass on his remaining machines.

Had a local flipper beat down a guy for a TAF. Person ended up selling it to him just to get the guy to leave him alone.

I am surprised the Monkey Guys are still around. They have been doing this for at least 10 years now.

Here, I will save several people from having to repeat themselves...




http://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/monkeys-arcade-bad-deal

Just as well, I've seen the pins you linked and they are all CRAP anyway.

Apparently not, as a lot of people wanted to buy them for reals!

Let's just cut Todd out and do the deal ourselves...

When I got in to buying machines I contacted them since they are located right by me. They said they have a warehouse with their stuff. I told them a few I was looking for and asked to see them they kept saying sure you can come see them but we need to pull them from the warehouse and clean them first. They just kept saying that until they said they were tired of us asking and tell them the exact game we wanted and we could not see it.

Lol

That warehouse is old lady O'Briens house on Maple Street and 3rd Avenue

Back when Monkeys was first starting out(They were located on Ogden Ave in Downers Grove). I ended up dealing with Tim(owner) and he explained his business strategy was to put crazy prices on stuff and when someone offered lower, they were still making money and they would find the item then.. I ended up making a couple of Ms Pac cocktails for him which he said I needed to put them on consignment in his store. I stopped dealing with him after the 1st one sold and he said he needed to 1099 me at the end of the year even though he made $800-1000 over what I wanted. I figured if he did not have the cash to pay for them outright when I finished them, he wasn't getting anymore.

I believe he does have some inventory, but no where near the amount on the website. His business strategy has not changed over the years.....

I sold a very nice No Good Gophers to them about two years ago for 2500. The NAVL guys picked it up and that was it, about three weeks later my exact pin was on his website for 4500! It is fair what they did, but I much rather sell to a pin head instead of a hustler! no more sales to them

You know I'm really getting annoyed by the flood of pinball resellers in the chicagoland area lately. I won't name names, but all you have to do is troll craigslist for a couple weeks to know what areas because the same exact pins get listed over and over at inflated prices.

GAP's prices might be a little high, but at least he sells REALLY nice restored pins. If you're looking for a good deal, Paul Reno in wisconsin is really fair with prices (and will sell unrestored pins if they're sitting in queue to be worked on). Seems to me the ones that don't advertise are the ones that are doing well (GAP posts on CL, but rarely and when he does it's one ad with a list, not separate ads).

Lol that guy in Niles is nuts. I had no idea about this thread and I called him at lunch. He wasn't interested in sending me pictures but wanted an offer to be made.. He got pissed when I told him the range the machines were selling for. He told me no way his beatdown FT is worth any where near 2200 more like 4400. There has been a FT locally on Craig's for months at 2200 with no errors. He is not in tune to reality ATM apparently.

That guy has been trying to sell the same pins for years. He was trying to sell them all as a package and wanted like 50K a couple of years ago. Just not in touch with reality.

I went to that place some time ago and the people working there gave me a hard time for nudging the games.

Back when namco owned that place the games where better and they fixed them on reports of them not working I use to go there tell them this is not working and they fixed it / tried to fix it.

It was definitely a pretty hopping arcade back in the day. I used to go there in the 90's to play Mortal Kombat with my buddy. The last time I was in there with my son, probably a year ago or so, water literally started pouring in through the ceiling. It missed us by only a few feet, and came cascading down on to a couple of the games. I bet those mold infested games are still sitting there in the exact same spot.

Question: did they update the price online or did they just leave it at 5900?