If my seller wants to take less for the stuff and wants to deal with Lloyd that is up to him. At that point it is the Pinside communities loss and the sellers loss - not my loss. I got what I wanted for our collection in the first load and with the exception of a couple machines we passed on in the first load (because we already own them) so I don't much care about the rest. I will not be making a lot of money on this venture, I really don't need the machines or the work, so what ever happens is OK with me.

My entire idea with doing this was - once I got what I wanted - was to keep the machines in the US instead of just turning it over to Lloyd and then reading on Lloyd's Facebook about more containers of this stuff being shipped out of the country forever. If that is what happens with it there is not much I can do about it. But I truly doubt Lloyd will be willing to pay near what I have offered seller for machines I have seen. And I have a good track record with the seller so I don't see any logical reason he would change his mind now. Lloyd will get plenty of machines out of this if he wants them. It just will not be many (if any) pinball machines. Once I have the pinball machines I will be offering the rest to Lloyd if he wants it. If not I'll sell it myself.

But even if the rest of this deal falls apart we have decided it is a good time to sell off most of our "stash" of project machines & a big part of the collection. We want to remodel the basement in 2017 and need it empty to do that. So even without this deal we will have over 50 machines for sale and another group of machine to pick up Monday or Tuesday.

I guess the good news for anyone following this thread is I just did a quick count of stuff I'll likely be selling off - even without the rest of this most recent deal - and I came up with at least 50 machines that will need to go to get down to our "ideal number" of 10 in the basement - which is what we will have room for once we get the basement gutted and finished again. And that number does not include the 15 or 20 project EM machines I have set aside for Allentown in the Spring or the hand full of other stuff I currently have "in the works". It also doesn't include several earlier SS machines that fall somewhere between "project and parts machines" for anyone looking for "extreme projects" or machines to re-theme. No wonder I am so broke right now!

Anyway - once the ice finally melts in our driveway I'll start getting the first load moved into the garage to get this party started. I don't know why but it seems like our little development is the only place there is still a half inch of ice on the ground. I can go 5 miles north, east, south, or west and everything is clear yet I can't walk on our driveway and I almost wrecked my van and camper yesterday just trying to get parked. I had to get a running start to get up the little hill at the sidewalk and then once I got on the driveway my van didn't want to stop. I was really concerned but after it happened I got a laugh thinking what if I had to call my insurance company to tell them I just wrecked my camper & my wives mini van by running into both of them with my van. Then I got to thinking "I 'll bet my rates would have jumped a little more than a little and it wasn't so funny"!

So guys & girls all I can tell you right now is keep an eye on this thread because sometime shortly after the first of the year machines will be leaving Carlisle in a big way. I'll keep you posted about both the deal in progress and the list of what we decide to sell from the collection. The only thing I can say for sure at this point is nothing will happen until after January 2nd or 3rd. We have guest coming in for the Holidays so I will not be playing with this puzzle until they are headed back east.

If we start with some stuff from the collection first most of those will be sold as fully working machines or light projects. If we start with our "project stash" those will be sold as-purchased. It is kind of a long story how we got here but the past 3 years I have not had time to mess with pinball machine projects but for some reason I never stopped buying project machines. SICKNESS I GUESS but I can't say I wasn't warned when we bought our first pinball machine! The guy said "you will never stop with just one" and then he said "no matter how many you have you will figure - whats one more". I hate to say it but he was beyond right!

Thanks,
Skip

Nothing that good here! At this point I think the "best" machines will retail for under $3000 once fixed up. I don't want to start listing titles till I am sure what will be for sale and what will stay but I will say no MM, SS, MB, etc in this lot. The two "best" machines are Addams Family and Champion Pub and the way things stand right now the nephews want to keep those. But even if I did get either of them I would likely keep either of those titles at least long enough to enjoy them for a few months.

In our current collection I think our most valuable machine is likely RFM or Doctor Who and I think our Doctor Who is already spoken for to a guy who has been saving up money to buy it since this Summer. I do have another Doctor Who project machine that looks pretty nice also but I don't know a lot about that one yet. RFM might be for sale but we have not decided yet. If we do sell that it will be later this Spring and one of the last machines we sell from the collection unless someone puts a very serious offer on the table for it sooner. It is super nice & I enjoy playing it so I am in no hurry to see that leave!

Philly isn't really much of a road trip! I can be to most areas of Philly in a couple hours and that is just warming up as far as road trips go!

I don't think handle will ever go to "too-few-pins" with all the other stuff going on in our lives right now but I might be able to change it to "just-enough-pins" sometime shortly!

Being very honest I pretty much have a FULL LIST of what I am going to be selling off from the collection, project stash, and the first load from this warehouse find. But as soon as I post a list of any type people will start asking for prices, want me to hold this or that for them, want to come see them, etc. And over the Holidays I just don't have time to deal with all of that. So the easiest way is to just keep things to myself until I have the first lot of machines in the garage. In my life family is FIRST and the Holidays is family time so the pinball stuff can just wait till the Holidays are over.

As far as "spoken for machines" everyone will have the same chance to come grab what they want once I get the machines listed. No favorites - past customers, friends, etc will be treat the same as someone I never have talked to in the past. First person to email will get first shot at what they email about and right on down the list until everything is sold or moved to storage for each lot of 10 machines I list. Once that first group of machines is picked through (maybe about every week to 10 days) I'll post a second list of 10 machines and the game will start over again. Once all the lots are done with I'll post a list of what is still for sale & prices. If no one wants to pay my price for one machine they will be grouped into lots of 3 to 5 machines at a price and sold in those lots ONLY. Anything that doesn't sell at that point will go into my Allentown load or back into storage and I'll fix them up when I have time and sell them as finished machines. NO "BS" - NO "I'll give you this or that" - etc. I DON'T need to sell any of these to eat - I don't play games - I price things fairly and sell at my full asking price or I keep what doesn't sell.

The only machine in my collection or in the stuff I am picking up (other than the 10 machines we are keeping for our collection) that will not be included in this is the Doctor Who that is currently in my collection. I was contacted back in the Summer by someone who wanted that and has been saving up money for it ever since. Last week they contacted me and told me they finally got the funds together and want to come get it from me shortly. I WILL NOT GO BACK ON MY WORD - THAT GUY OWNS THE DOCTOR WHO IF HE WANTS IT ONCE HE SEES IT IN PERSON. That deal was something from a long time ago but is the perfect example why I don't want to post a list of stuff for sale or anything at this point. The only reason I even spoke about it is because someone asked about more expensive machines and I said what I though were the two best (or most valuable) machines in my collection at this point. I did this just to let people watch this post hoping for high end "A" list titles to surface know that is not the type of machine I collect.

Anyone that knows me or has done business with me in the past knows I am more than fair with people but I just don't have time to play the games some people think a transaction needs to be. I am not going to knock $50 off a machine because the flipper buttons don't match. If you want a machine you pay my price - otherwise the next guy in line will have a chance to buy it. I KNOW THIS SOUNDS KIND OF HARSH - but I have been buying and selling antiques & collectibles and other stuff since I was about 12 years old and I am just tired of the BS some people think they need to make every transaction into. So we are not playing that game here!

SORRY FOR THIS POST but sometime someone pushes me a little too far and I get a little pissed about it. I am sure at some point some of the people who have done business with me in the past will speak up and let you know what I am all about. Tod did that earlier and two post later someone doubted what he said because he spelled Xenon wrong. If you are one of the guys that feels a need to bash people take it somewhere else - I don't have time for you! If you want to be treated fairly by someone who keeps their word - keep in touch and come grab some machines. My goal is to get machines to people who will enjoy them NOT to wholesale a few groups of machines to a couple "flippers". I will sell to anyone but you have to play the game my way if you want my machines.

Thanks Gerry!

Don't worry I'll have plenty more for you. But you might want to sell that trailer I sold you and buy a bigger one just in case there is more stuff down their than I already know about. When I picked up that first load the nephew started talking about the "stuff at his uncles house" and I didn't know about that. So you might be headed south with me at some point if I can ever get things finalized with these guys. For now you will be treated just like anyone else once I post the list - that is only fair. But once people are done picking I might make you a deal on the balance of the stuff and as you already know my bottom of the barrel stuff is better than a lot of what is getting sold as good machines by some sellers. You know what I do with my junk!

I love system 9 machines. One of the machines I have always been sorry I sold was a nice Sorcerer that I had shortly after I started in the hobby. And Space Shuttle is one of my favorite machines of all time. Space Shuttle has it all - neat backglass, just enough going on for almost anyone to understand but still deep enough for long term enjoyment, and just a great all around pin. I messed up and sold a super nice one a few years ago and have been trying to replace that ever since. Right now I am in the process of putting a nice one together from 3 OK machines and a nice cabinet I bought a few months ago from my buddy Gerry. But even after all that work it will not be as nice as the one I sold.

Looking back at past mistakes is easy but not making mistakes can be hard. Sometimes you don't realize how nice something you had was until it is gone and you try to replace it!

Later,
Skip

I have only seen a couple overview pictures of the storage unit that has the arcades in it. That unit is a 10x40 or 10x50 packed and pictures were taken from outside the unit so I don't have a clue what might be in it at this point. SORRY!

Never a problem! I don't mind answering the questions I can answer but I can really say much about stuff I don't know about yet.

Anything other than me selling these one at a time just will not work. I paid the same as most of you would have for most of the machines I am selling so wholesaling as a lot is out of the question because of what I have invested. But more importantly my idea here is to give 40 or 50 people a chance to buy decent machines at decent prices - not to sell them to one person so that person can inflate the prices and resell them.

To me pinball is a hobby and I want to see as many people as possible be able to enjoy this hobby. Hoarders & flippers have taken a lot of fun out of the hobby by making the supply of nice project machines all but dry up. I am as guilty as anyone with the hoarding part but after seeing the machines I picked up this week that have just been sitting in storage for 10+ years that are now getting sold off for less than 10 years of what the storage cost was --- it really got me thinking on the LONG ride home. And after a lot of thought I realized I don't want to be part of the problem anymore - I want to be part of the solution. Hopefully other hoarders will think about what I am saying & doing and do something similar in their region of the country. It is time to get these machines back to people who will enjoy them and stop paying storage to keep machines you will never have time to do anything with. But if you are a hoarder in my area PLEASE wait a few weeks before deciding to do this!

CLIMB INTO MY SHOES AND SEE IF YOU WOULD POST PICTURES YET. I asked people in my first post please do not PM me about these and yet I have gotten over 50 emails so far in less than 2 days. What do you think would happen if I posted pictures and people actually knew what titles I was selling?

As far as people who keep emailing. I don't mind replying when I have time but please understand - I will not give any additional information out about what is being sold or hold anything for you - etc. NO ONE is going to get ahead of anyone else on this stuff. I know I am going to have a few of my pinball buddies mad at me but I want EVERYONE to have an equal shot at every title.

THE WAY THE GAME WILL BE PLAYED IS:

First email about a title gets first chance at it, and so on. For each machine I list that someone emails about I will hold that machine for 48 hours once I promise it to that first person (if you are driving a long distance we can figure something out but otherwise 48 hours). Once that time is up I move on to next person on the list for that machine.

I will set up appointments with a 2 or 3 hour window for people headed to see a machine - if they are not here on time and someone else is here and wants that machine I have to sell it. A kiss & a promise just will not work here and I have played that game in the past with bad results. I took 8 machines to Allentown that I had held for people and only two of the eight people ever showed up. Worse yet one of the two guys just came over to tell me he decided to buy something else he found before he came to see me. NEVER AGAIN! (With that said if you are tied up in traffic or something just give me a call and we will work together to figure it out).

If the first guy who contacts me says I'll take all of them I am just going to pass by his email. This isn't about selling everything to a couple people - it is about spreading these machines around for people to enjoy. With that said I also know some people don't want to drive for just one machine - for those people here is the deal. Send me a list of up to 3 machines with your first choice at the top of that list. If you are the first one to email about that machine and either of the others are not already spoken for I will put you on the top of the list for either one or both of them. So I am going to limit the number of machines from each lot to 3 per person.

For you guys that have to travel a long distance - I am sorry but I just don't know how else to be fair with everyone. If anyone has any good suggestions to help with this let me know!

If I had a warehouse or a ton of space I could do things differently but I am limited to one side of a two car garage so 12 or 13 machines total is my limit in each lot. Ten would be idea but I might try to push that up to 12 or 13 if I can figure out a good way to do it. I'll be working on that over the next few days! Ice on the driveway is finally starting to melt so by tomorrow I should be able to get underway getting first load ready.