Current market value is still about $14K ~ $16K.

HEP machines, add about $4K ~ $5K to those numbers.

That's crazy. Even the fresh Chris H. MM barely sold for that much. And that was only a couple of months ago.

Start at 15k and keep dropping the price $500 every 2 weeks until it's gone.

13k / 16k

I've been saving for a MM.

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I would hang on to it till next year and ask 1.2 million for it?

I just sold one that I restored for $20k

"Is it just me or do these sure seem to change hands a lot even at crazy high prices?"

Absolutely, because new owners and collectors make consistent foolhardy decisions, and sellers "feed the hog pen".
Many sellers "flip the game" when they run out of money, max out their credit cards, cannot pay their rent, or want a new motorcycle or car.
Some just fell on "hard times" for sad reasons.

Others simply attempt to use this game as a mechanism to inflate the secondary market, which is still done to this day, regularly.
Sometimes, successfully.

Brokers clammered for overseas MMs, beating on each other to re import as many as possible, before some other broker got them, even if they were trashed. Largest container of MMs I saw was around 25 or so in one shipment from Europe.

This has been going on for games such as this title for over 15 years, starting around 2 years after Williams folded up their "pinball apple cart".

The game has always been difficult to find in nice condition, as distributors on the ORIGINAL game, would not let this game go for a closeout price and held onto them after Williams production ceased (for those that had actual had their orders fulfilled), and they moved on to their final DMD titles. Operators did not let them go, because they make MONEY on the game, just like TAF.
This remains unchanged today, even with MMrs.

If you wanted it, you paid full MRSP +/- a few bucks, but usually could discount on the shipping.
There was no overstock on this title.

This got really bad at CC "finale" as distributors refused to sell at all, in some cases, for rainy day hoarding.
Other games such as NGG and CV, did have close outs overstock among other earlier games starting as soon as 1995.

The better question is why are you trying to bring a 3 year old price check thread back to life?

I love my remake mm

It was referred in another thread for "sale price justification" for artificially price bumping values of MMrs to mislead less knowledgeable people, which is complete horse!@#$.

The remake was also referred in the same sentence as "nearly identical" to the original for the same above purpose.
It is not identical, does not have the Williams brand name, does not use the same parts, and QA/QC is lower. Gameplay is nearly identical and that is where the comparison should stop.

The realities of asking prices, negotiated prices, market prices, and actual sale prices are not synonymous, not original versus remade machines.
This is also propagated by less ethical dealers, brokers, and sellers.

When asked for an estimated value of any machine, I give the direct fair market price based on title, condition, region and market demand, not some type of made up value based on nostalgia or wishful dreams.
It does not exclusively come from a price guide, CL, auction houses, or Ebay.

This is helpful to new collectors, so they do not get a first sour taste, and let them stay in the hobby.
Everybody should be able to afford some type of machine if that want one, this is not some type of elitist club.