Scottsbluff, NE
So im sure everyone has their crazy storys of buying pinball machines. I wanted to share with you my story. Like so many of you, I dont have the cash to buy mint pins that have already been gone through and play perfect. So I tend to go after ones that need work and repair them, and ones that need work are often in interesting places. I figured I would wait a few months until after picking it up to tell about it. So Stern Pirates has been on my wishlist ever since i got into the hobby 4 years ago. Never looked into one real hard because they are kind of expensive, especially if they are in excellent shape. Im sure everyone's definition of expensive is relative. Also I live in Nebraska, pinball machines just don't show up for sale here at all...
Last fall an ad for a pirates shows up thats 2.5 hours away from me for the excellent price of 10k. Well shit that dude isnt going to sell it for that price. There must of been 80 comments on the ad with everyone price bashing it. Next day after thinking about it, I went ahead and shot a message over, hey im interested in it but im only going to be between X-amount of dollars and I have cash. No bull cash on the glass, i just dont want to drive over and waste both our time. He said yeah that should be good.
Before I even hit the road this thing has sketch all over it, first he was wanting 10k for it. Then the guy was listing it for another friend which wont be around when we will look at it. Plus the pictures on it didn't give me the warm and fuzzies. So, my buddy and fellow hobbyist who has gone with me on 80% of these "retrievals" was coming with me, I definitely like having him along especially on some of the stuff i get myself into. So we drive over and find out the house is in a "less than perfect" neighborhood no big deal. Pull up to this "less than perfect" house with younger two guys in the driveway waiting to meet us. We walk up and greet them, they seem nice enough. One of the guys is open carrying a 1911, even in Nebraska its a little unusual to open carry. So they escort us into the house, its "less than perfect" inside. We head into the living room where there are two younger women, lets say they were not able to focus and a bigger older guys in lazy boy that looked like he was the Don Boss and watching Harry Potter on Tv. Next to the Tv was Pirates... sitting on a mound of garbage. We look it over, and play a game. Its about 70% operational, so i talk to the Don Boss. "So where did this come from?" It was odd it was even here. No one seemed to really know where it came from. I told him I dont know if we can come to a deal, Im only going to be able to give X-amount for it. He said he will take it, Im like wait...what?? He surprising wrote a bill of sale for it, i gave him the cash. We broke it down, and booked it out of there. I was shaking by the time we got in my pickup, told my buddy...boy do i know how to pick-em... Get it home and noticed it has 2022 Tax sticker on the front...Yeah um ok
