Not everyone has the opportunity to buy out such a large quantity of arcade games in one swoop. There can be a lot of mystery surrounding the purchase price, some excitement over possible collector sales, but after some time, the deal is forgotten-never to be remembered. I’m sure some people wonder what the motivation behind such a large deal could be. Would a buyer of all this stuff purchase only to flip all the items or does he keep a few? Basically, what happened to it all? Here, eight months after my initial deal and still not completely rid of all of it, I reveal everything.

As mentioned in a former post, after dealing with a current laundrymat owner and former arcade operator, I purchased the entire contents of the basement of his old house. This happened in April, 2008. With no power, only an initial runthrough and some pictures I had one weekend to come up with an offer. The offer was made based on only the quantity of machines, and to my slight regret without an in-depth inventory of quality of the machines. That said, in my initial run through I counted 20 arcades and 6 pins. I found out I was slightly off once I finally pulled everything out, but that didnt’ matter. I made my offer for any and all gaming equipment the following Monday. Knowing Bob is still in the coin-op industry (laundry) and looking to make $$, I included a quality gun game into my offer.

My bulk deal cost me $1200 and a Zero Point Arcade Game.

The best part of the deal is that when we did the initial walk-through of the basement, Bob decided to give me any conversion kits we found to me for free on the spot. He knew I was a collector and got excited about seeing things that people couldn’t find anymore. He gave them to me in appreciation of making him get off his butt, purge things he’d never use, sell some games, and fix several games that were now making money in his laundry. I ended up getting about 9 NOS (new old stock – read: never used) conversion kits. It would turn out that the conversion kits he gave me would sell for slightly over my purchase price. Essentially, he gave me all the games in the basement for free.

Check out some pics from my buyout (I wasn’t too great at documenting back then) along with my initial post on KLOV.

I rented a storage unit for $100 per month to store the games in, but was allowed as long as I needed to get the games out. However, I wanted to get them out as fast as I could to get away from that dank environment (a portion of the basement would flood every time it rained, there was mold everywhere, and it SMELLED!) and to show these machines some love that they hadn’t seen in over 10 years. I was also propelled by the fact that I had to first clear out the basement buy before I could even get a chance to see the warehouse that in my mind was filled with untold wonders.

As you’ll see below, I am still not finished with the items that came out of the basement deal, but as it stands, here is a complete list of all the games involved and their fate along with any chee$e scored along the way:

Death Race - $150
I had high hopes for this game, but it was right by the door where water came in. When I lifted it up to try and get a dolly underneath it – the whole bottom fell off. Since this game is so rare, I didn’t get too many hits for parts on this, but I was able to sell the bezel, speaker grills, and boardset for a total of $150. I had an offer of $200 for the marquee, but I decided to keep it and hang on my wall.

Gorf - $80
An unfinished conversion to Battle Lane Vol. 5, this too sustained massive water damage. Sold the pulled boardset that was sitting on the counter nearby (not still in the bottom of the cab) for $40 and the PERFECT glass bezel for $40. Ended up giving the cabinet to a friend who wanted to try and bring it back from the dead. I don’t know if he’ll succeed, but I helped him cut off the bottom foot of the cabinet.

DK Junior
This was a Donkey Kong conversion that was in a cab that needed serious help. Someone kicked the coin door in and broke the entire front panel. The side art was removed haphazardly with tons of residue. The marquee was missing as well. The game was working, but the sync was off. I recapped the monitor (there is ZERO burn), replaced the front panel, hammered out the dent in the coin door, sanded, primed, and painted the cabinet and topped it all off with a PERFECT original marquee that I got off of eBay. This is currently in my collection.

Konami Super Basketball
Dead. Still in storage.

Ms. Pac Man - $450
This game was dead when I got it – or so I thought. It turned out that the monitor was firing up, but I just couldn’t tell since there was NO game. I opened her up and saw the filter board still attached and promptly removed it. What do you know? She worked 100% after that and the monitor colors were so bright with no distortion so I didn’t even have to do a cap kit. I stripped the old torn cpo off and painted the control panel. Once there was a new repro overlay on there, I sold the unit for $450 on Craigslist.

Ms. Pac Man Mini - $50
On my initial run-through I thought this would be complete, but it turned out that this was a cabinet only with no control panel, monitor, or PCB. I ended up trading this to another Local for some nintendo marquee brackets which retail for about $15 each. I also got about 7 working Nintendo transformers that I sold as a lot for $20 when I got tired of tripping over them in my garage. Total estimated value ~$50.

Tempest Mini
This one is still under the knife, but is in my collection.

Frogger
Played blind. It only needed a new monitor chassis. Am giving this to a friend for Christmas.

Kangaroo
Thought this was complete, but it was in the process of being converted. All the pieces eventually showed up, but with an untested PCB and the wiring already stripped, I went ahead and made the call to turn this into a 48-1. It is currently on Craigslist for $850, but I’ll probably pull in closer to $700 for it.

1942 - $600
This was the only game that was fully working right out of the gate. Monitor was bright, and game played perfectly. This was in a pretty ugly old Slither cabinet, and seeing that as-is, the game would probably only sell for maybe $200 in the Atlanta market…I decided to recondition it and sell it as a 48-1. I figured it would be ok since the game is actually on the multigame board. I sold the working PCB for $40 online and the entire game for $600. (Before and After Pics)

Donkey Kong
Was about to be converted and was missing its PCB, had no sideart, and had some laminate peeling off. So far, the only profit made was for selling the cig-burned Bezel for $20 and the monitor and wiring for $20. I have this in the garage with an original marquee in great shape ready to be installed (the original had a big corner missing) along with a repro cpo I got off of eBay. I plan on stripping this and turning it into a 48-1.

Omega Race - $100
Sold this for $100 off of Craigslist dead-as-a-doornail, missing the back door, and with crazy acid damage.

Roadrunner – $50
Sold on CL for $50 dead in a pretty heavily-worn cabinet.

Venture - $400
Plays, but monitor has vert. collapse. Great cosmetic shape. I sold this for $400 as-is

Gauntlet
Badly water damaged (beyond repair), but working pcb (vert collapse on monitor). I gave this to my friend to part out to help him make some $$

Gunfight
Non working. Broken back door. Missing sides of one gun handle, completely missing other handle. Also missing the bezel. I gave this one away on craigslist along with drag race.

Zaxxon
Needs a new monitor chassis. Is otherwise working. Currently in storage and will sell once I make repairs.

Drag Race
This beast was impossible to move, was undesireable, and there was a fully working one offered on ATL craigslist at the time for only $100. This one was dead so I offered it up for free on KLOV. No takers. I finally got someone to take it for free from CL along with Gunfight. A funny side note: I had someone cuss me out from craigslist because I said in my ad that i would not help move the game as I just hurt my back. They blessed me out for being lazy and refusing to help with something I was giving away for FREE. Now there’s a first.

Pinball Machines Bulk Sale - $850
You would think the pins would have been great, but being in such a moist environment, they all had crazy white mold all over the playfield and inside the cabinets. Since I had never before dealt with pinballs (although I always wanted one) I contacted a local pinhead who flips pins all the time to see if he would be interested. My one contingent as part of the deal is that he fixes the Elektra for me. He ended up taking 4 and paying $850:

Hardbody
Motor Dome
High Speed
Superman

Meteor
Massive battery damage to boards and, of course, the intense white mold all over everything. Traded to a local collector (along with Black Knight – see below) for a fully working Little Chief EM pinball that is still in my collection.

Black Knight
Battery damage just like meteor. In addition to the damage on the boards, this one was missing the glass to the playfield, was severely dirty, and was missing some targets. Traded to a local collector along with the Meteor for a fully working Little Chief EM Pinball. I heard from this collector a few days ago that it took him a total of 75 hours to get this one back to 100%. He says he plays it everyday.

Dealer’s Choice – $125
Was DOA with mold on playfield. Sold on CL.

Entertainer - $75
DOA sold on CL to same buyer as the Dealer’s Choice.

Bulk Sale to Chattanooga Pinball - $750

After selling what I could and realizing I would be covered up for quite some time trying to fix and repair all of these games and find individual buyers for each, I jumped on a chance to sell all remaining games in one lot to Rick at Chattanooga Pinball. He pulled up with a box truck and took all of these (none were fully working) off my hands for $750. Could I have gotten more selling individually? sure? Would it have taken several months? Probably. However, I am glad to get what I did seeing as how the market for games has gotten even crappier. I don’t know if I could even give away a working blockade anymore.

Enduro Racer
Stocker
Hang On
Tempest
AsteroidsStar Castle
Atari Football
Blockade
Elevator Action
Eliminator

Total Sales to Date: $3680 (this figure does not include any of the NOS kits, so this is pure profit)

Added to Collection: Tempest Mini, DK Jr, Elektra Pin, Little Chief Pin

Still Left to Fix/Sell/Trade: Kangaroo Multicade, Zaxxon, DK Multicade, Konami Super Basketball

I am still in the process of working through my current warehouse bulk buyout, but plan on revealing it all several months down the road. I’m interested to know what some of you other collectors have scored in a bulk buyout. How much did you pay? How much did you make? Did you keep any? Inquiring minds want to know.

Tags: Arcade, basement deal, bulk arcade purchase, NOS