a Couple things

1. Not all games move as fast as you think
2. Games with good/reasonable prices, move quickly
3. Games that are over priced move slowly
4. Games that are not big titles, projects etc etc can move slowly
5. All these for sale games are listed on website full of thousands of people that are looking to buy and sell games

have cash, be ready to pick up, lots of buyers.

Also, pins from established and trusted Pinsiders move quickly on this site. There are many good folks here who change their pin lineup regularly.

We're a relatively small, but EXTREMELY active group of enthusiasts.

Even if somebody tells you they already sold the pin within minutes or hours, give them your name and number anyway. Deals fall through all the time. Always have cash around in case one pops up . . that helps a lot.

Word of mouth is big. If you're on the lookout for a title, let everyone know and post it here on Pinside. I found my LOTR because I had a casual conversation with Marc of Elevation Games at the Texas Pinball Festival. Months later, he remembered that conversation and called me with a trade offer. You never know!

Pinballs priced to sell, sell. its really that simple. If it is priced too high, it sits.

Networking! I put a "want to buy" for Iron Man about a year ago, and a guy who'd been to a few of my parties brokered a deal for me (swap + cash for No Fear). Once you make some friends in the pin community, they'll look out for you.

Another thing to do is to watch for people asking what a pin is worth. That usually means they're thinking of selling it. I got my CSI that way - I sent a PM, and had CSI in my basement a few days later.

It seems pretty hard to get good deals right now, because retailers jump on them as soon as they're posted. Then the game shows up a week later for twice the original price...

Cos they are not made anymore... Collectables..

If you want a deal you better have cash, a vehicle and the ability to leave at a moments notice. This is the way it's been for the 20 years I have been in the hobby. I don't even look at ads unless I have all those things, been disappointed too many other times when I was not prepared. If you are slower you can still get pins, you will just have to pay a few bucks more.

Dont know about your area but you may have some "flippers" to compete with. They are the guys with the large bankrolls that wait until they see a pin up for sale at a cheap price and they swoop in, buy it, clean it up, and re list it a few weeks later at a higher price.

Your best bet as a newbie to get some pins under your belt is to make your way to a pinball show with a wad of cash. You WILL go home with a game at a decent price. This is where most of my games have come from. That and other collectors.
I rarely even bother with Craigslist or online markets anymore because there is always somebody much faster than me.

Simple economics. Low supply of good used machines. High Demand for good used machines. This leads to higher prices and potentially quicker sales.

This happened to me. I was debating selling my FGY, started a thread to just do a price check and I had a ton of interest generated that same day and sold to the first guy that met the price I thought it was worth without haggling me and he took care of all the shipping; he was a great guy to do business with by the way. Moral of that story is if someone does a price check and you notice they have that machine in their collection and you want it . . . pm him.

I had a good laugh last night on the thread topic of would you rather keep your wife or your pinball machines and someone responsed with: there are a lot more pretty girls than there are collector quality Attack From Mars (or something like that).

They do sell quick. I drop my price if it doesn't sell in a few days and the reality is for a big outlay of cash like that I should wait a month to drop price.

Without typing a ton of stuff... if it is a popular title priced fairly, it will sell quickly because there will be a lot of people looking for it. If it is not a popular title, or if it is priced too highly, it will not sell quickly because people aren't looking for it regularly.

If you posted a "FS: HUO Tron" and were looking for $4200 for it right now, I bet you'd sell it within 8 hours because seemingly everyone wants one, and few are being posted that cheap currently. If you took that exact same machine and posted it for sale for $5200, you'd have to wait for a while if you were refusing to budge on the price.

If you post a "FS: SF2" for $1000, even though I think that is a fair price for a machine that is much better than it's reputation is, I think it would probably take a while for it to sell.

As a first pin buyer, also buying their first pin - "you have to lose one to get one". I moved slow on a Fish Tales and High Speed priced well and lost (we are talking a day or two though). Losing one (or two) just makes you smarter and tougher and makes you pull the trigger faster on a pin priced right. You learn more quickly and do more research when you are pissed after you lost one. Let "the hate flow through you" and use your new found knowledge and balls to jump on a good pin, in good shape, priced reasonable. Good luck man and don't buy your first pin before me!

Because pinball rules!