who has sold a house with a dedicated arcade?

parabolic

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Im looking into selling the digs in favor of bigger, better, etc. Who here has sold a house with a room or rooms dedicated to a arcade? I dont just mean games in a room, but a room that has been modded (even just painted) for the full "arcade" experience. What were peoples reaction when they were looking at the house? Did it make it easier or harder to sell?
I have mine painted with a black ceiling, and gray walls with marquees hanging all over it. just wondering if I should paint it nuetral and put the games outside or leave it for a conversation piece.
 
At first I thought you were asking if anyone had sold their house and left all the games. I always wondered if I were to sell my home if a potential buyer's offer would say "games need to stay".

Wonder what I would do...
 
Did it make it easier or harder to sell?
I have mine painted with a black ceiling, and gray walls with marquees hanging all over it. just wondering if I should paint it nuetral and put the games outside or leave it for a conversation piece.
I'm guessing harder. If you could turn it into a theater/family type room without too much effort, you might have better results.
 
If you leave it painted like that then you will greatly reduce the number of people interested. Very few normal people would like a black ceiling in any room in their house.
 
general advice on selling homes is to make it as simple and generic as possible so potential buyers can "envision" the house with their stuff and style, a blank slate so-to-speak. i know when we were looking at houses last year we both preferred walking empty homes to ones with furniture or obvious signs of occupation. we didn't see at any places that had been staged, but then again we were looking at the lower end of the market and at a lot of foreclosures which were mostly or completely empty.

it might look cool to a few people but the chances that you'll find a video game or pinball person are pretty slim.
 
ok...let me rephrase.
who HAS sold a house with an arcade room - as is.
Ive been over all the above points already. I was just wondering if there was anyone who did sell there house with the arcade room as is.
Dont get me wrong, I fully understand about the blank slate, and buyers envisioning their stuff, etc. I was just lloking for people who have done the deal so to speak.
 
my realtor said remove the games so i moved them to a storage garage, she said as stated above the new owners need to envision what the room could be... and she was not impressed with my collection...
 
Not me... I did go look at a house when we were home hunting just because one of the photos had a Joust cocktail in it. The machine wasn't there when we walked through though.
 
I have never sold a house with a dedicated arcade room, but both houses I have bought had "arcade rooms" The first house had a air hockey table, basketball game, kids pinball machine, and a few other little things in a separate room in the basement.

The new house I just bought has a finished basement that had a pool table downstairs and a bar. Plus easy basement access and an extra living room for my pinballs and air hockey table.

Both houses did have neutral color paint. Before I would change anything I would tell potential buyers that if they wanted it painted you can paint it for them or give them money towards the house and they can paint it themselves. (I've been looking at houses for the past 6 months and almost every house came with a "paint credit", that way home sellers don't spent the money on paint when the person buying the house is going to change it anyway.)

I would definitely leave the machines in the room if you are going to leave it arcade themed and if you paint it a neutral color then empty it out.

With the arcade you may just get the couple that may want to turn it into a video game room with a big screen tv instead of arcade machines.


Also I'm billybob2236's brother. He bought my old house and after 2 months were still moving stuff into both houses and working on setting up an office and work space so we can start printing again.

Hope this advice helps.
 
general advice on selling homes is to make it as simple and generic as possible so potential buyers can "envision" the house with their stuff and style, a blank slate so-to-speak. i know when we were looking at houses last year we both preferred walking empty homes to ones with furniture or obvious signs of occupation. we didn't see at any places that had been staged, but then again we were looking at the lower end of the market and at a lot of foreclosures which were mostly or completely empty.

I *hate* seeing staged houses... WTF... nobody lives like that, and how much did they just pay to have that done -- and if I buy, I'm really the one paying...
 
When I sold my house 4 years ago, I had the basement still set up. I did not have as much of the stuff that i once had, but still had alot (i had to sell alot of machines to pay for the lawyers in the divorce)

In the room i had 4 pinballs machines, a dartboard, a coke machine, 5 video games jukebox, and a pool table. The room was laid out nice and not cluttered with to many games, and spaced out enough so that you could envision the size of the room if it were empty. Having games side by side takes away the size of the overall room, but spaced can show how big a room is.

When people came to look, all the men were drawn to the room, many making comments about how they would like a room like this (even some saying the actual word "mancave"). I do not know if the gameroom helped or deter the sale of the house. i did have a few offers that wanted the pool table to stay. Several of the prospective buyers that i spoke to personnaly asked how much i wanted for a few of the machines so that if they bought the house that they might get a few games.

I did not have black paint, but i did have a few things that made the room have a bar/gameroom feel. The walls had paneling up 3 1/2 feet with a 8 inch ledge on two sides ofthe room to have places to set game memorbilia and drinks. The carpet was an indoor/outdoor type to not show tracks of moving machines around, and it was an eggplant kind of color. The ceiling was actually 1/4 inch wood with 1x4 to cover the seems to give it an old bar style look.

troy
 
Thanks for all the input.
I REALLY hate this new forum with the "one email until you log in" bullshit!! I check my emails on my phone, so I usually miss out on alot of the replies until I get home to log in - or log in from my phone which can be a PITA!!
SO MODS FIX THIS!!!

Anyhow, the room in question is my old office. long story short - I had too many hobbies - one of which was a band. We parcticed here, so when I got into the games, I had to try and juggle the space. so I ended up moving my office to my "workshop", and taking my 10x10 room and making it feel more arcade like. so fitting 9 games in a 10x10 room can be fun as well - lol! hence why I call it the corner arcade because you have a corner walway to get from the main room to the new office through the "arcade".
So unfortunately making it a TV room really wont work - since the 65" Mitubishi is out in the main room. I was just wondering if anyone had stories of dealmakers or dealbreakers when it came to the dedicated arcades.
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Do you do telemarketing from your office? Looks like some phones in front of the two middle black flat panel monitors in the first picture. ;)
 
Do you do telemarketing from your office? Looks like some phones in front of the two middle black flat panel monitors in the first picture. ;)
No,
actually my kids have their own computers, and since they are next to me I got them headphones (thats what you see in the pics) so I dont have to listen to the you tube, or games they are constantly into. Plus I can monitor them easily as well. :)
No telemarketing, just good ol fashioned surfing!! The monitor on the end is a test monitor for pc repairs. I almost put the arcade in there, but the room is 13 x 10, so maybe 1 more game would fit (with the layout it has), so it really wouldnt have been worth it.
 
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I would think the consensus would be that it would make the house a harder sell but you never know. A friend of mine painted a full wall mural of the beastie boys license to ill album cover on his wall when he was in high school. years later when his parents decided to sell the house they showed it with the mural still there but basically told all potential buyers that it would be painted over for the new owner. The person who finally bought the house specifically requested that the mural not be painted over as they really liked it. So you never know.
 
its impossible to know. You would have to sell it twice to get an idea.

It probably will appeal to the male buyer, but it probably will turn off the female. Since its usually the female who will decides, I would say it would be a negative.

People stage homes for a reason. I would say past 1 pin and 1 vid, pool table, bar and juke it would be a negative.

Here is a thought... Someonle likes the house and he wants the tron, tapper and tempest.. Now your looking to sell your home for its asking price(or less) and your giving up your games...
 
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