Quoted from 27dnast:What’s all of this talk of new money buyers? Are you talking about folks that are willing to pay $7.5k and up for a NIB game?
I know this comes across as "angry man shouts at cloud" in many ways, but man, for those that were around 10 years ago, the current scene in pinball can be really frustrating when dealing in the secondhand market. You have so many self-proclaimed experts that have less flips under their belt than my 5-year old that are all too eager to make their bold statements on pinball and pinball pricing. New people in the hobby are great, but loudmouth newbies with big wallets are often a bit tough to handle. From my "Pinball has Been Gentrified" article:
"If not for the money infusion brought into the hobby by the new blood pinball machine collector, NIB pinball could very well have died off. With operators decreasing in number, NIB sales weren’t exactly healthy just a few short years ago. Today, each new release has a willing and ready buying audience, and games are selling in numbers that are more in line with pinball’s better days, even with the prices of current games skyrocketing. I do appreciate being able to see a steady stream of new games.
But the lack of taste, tact, respect, and knowledge that many of these new bloods bring makes dealing with them hard. These new collectors value theme and collectible nature over gameplay and fun factor. When a new game is being announced, these new collectors tend to value the theme first and foremost, the art second, the sound third, the number of LE versions produced fourth, what others will think of their purchase fifth, what video clips show up on the LCD sixth, how many layers of clearcoat it has seventh, and a few other things before we get down to questioning whether or not it’s any fun at probably a distant 12th.
The new blood collector has a pinball memory that extends back to Stern’s Lord of the Rings at the earliest, with some passing knowledge of the “A list” games from the late-era Bally/Williams catalog. Despite this fundamental lack of pinball knowledge, they’ll be the first to tell you all the reasons why LCD displays are a true “game changer for pinball” and playing any games with DMD, alphanumeric, or *gasp* mechanical reels, is a giant waste of one’s life.
The new blood collector is also an aggravating individual to deal with when buying or selling a machine. Everything they have for sale is listed above NIB pricing and they’re quick to point out that they’ve managed to shoved three aisles of Toys R Us products onto the playfield, all the superbright purple LEDs they’ve put in the GI, their wicked cool topper, and that the game has less than 300 plays. Heck, less than 100 plays is common. But when you’re listing your well cared for machine, they want extreme close ups of the shooter lane, because if there’s an even tiny mark, it’s hard pass for them (or they want to knock like $1000 of asking price).
To put it clearly, the new blood collector tends to be a know nothing know-it-all with a loud voice. Sure, they have money, but they’re miserable to be around. They put some shine into the hobby with their money infusion, but they trample over so much in that process."