Episode 67 - Pinball Seller's Guide
Support the show: ko-fi.com/wedgeheadpodcast This is the finale episode of our 3-part trilogy of episodes that began with the first episode: Pinball Buyer's Guide, continued in our episode Pinball Maintenance, and finally culminates in this episode right here. Alex and Alex talk about coming full circle on a pinball machine and give you some hot tips for kicking that giant box of lights down the road. And if you're new to the show: we do all of that whilst swearing. This is your warn...
Kineticist’s take
Practical guide to selling pinball machines: fix first, price fairly, list everywhere, and sell in-person.
Synopsis
Alex and Alan discuss practical strategies for selling pinball machines, covering everything from fixing machines before sale to pricing, listing platforms, advertising best practices, and buyer interactions. They emphasize transparency, fair pricing, valuing your time, and preferring in-person sales over shipping to avoid scams and complications.
Highlights
- Everyone will eventually get bored of any pinball game they buy, even well-regarded ones
- Fixing a broken game before sale drastically affects resale value more than most people expect
- Pinside marketplace archives previous listings and calculates median/high/low prices over approximately 2 years
- Selling a pinball machine is significantly more annoying than buying one
- Facebook Marketplace general listings bring 'casuals' and 'normies' with tire-kick behavior; local Facebook groups have more serious buyers
- Most people do not price fairly; they list high expecting to negotiate down, which creates poor negotiation dynamics
- Older games (pre-2010) need extensive documentation with many photos; modern games need only a few good photos
- Shipping pinball machines is risky for both buyer and seller; in-person sales are preferable
Entities
- Stern Pinball· company
- Pinside· organization
- Wedgehead Pinball Podcast· organization
- Alan· person
- Alex· person
- Craigslist· platform
- Facebook Marketplace· platform
- Ko-Fi· platform