[Arran]

I just got into tube radios, and bought my first Hippo this weekend.

Even as a newbie to the hobby, I recognized that as an iconic brand, and when I saw the urethaned one selling for over $400, I thought I hit paydirt!  I still think I got a good deal but I've seen wildly varying prices on completed listings on eBay, from too high for a broken set, to too little for a recapped and clean one!

Of course, a trip through antique stores tells you how out of touch sellers are with their tube radios.  People think that if it has tubes, it must be worth a fortune.  I mean 60's plastic (broken) 5 tubers with printed circuit boards and they're asking hundreds of dollars for 'em!

Anyway, my idea was to recap the Hippo and sell it on for a nice profit.  I'll still ask an ourageous price, but only because I really want to keep it, and that's what it'll take to pry it out of my hands.

Anyway, those are my thoughts.  I can't afford, nor do I have the space or skills to deal with the really cool wood consoles out there, so I'll just be over here with the small tabletops.

Hi;
  Just a note of warning, that gloss polyurethaned Hippo on fleabay belongs to one of the known sleazeball sellers notorious for shill bid auctions. So a sale is not really a sale with that guy, and at some point it will reappear listed either under the current name or under one of his other identities.
 Regarding antique stores and old radios, most of them are utterly clueless when it comes to vintage and antique items of any sort, otherwise they would not attempt to sell plastic radios with broken cabinets any more then they would attempt to sell broken cups and saucers. It's also been my experience that antique shops, those of which that are not run as store fronts for the purposes of laundering money, have a failure rate as high as restaurants.
  I can't really see the point in buying something that you want, and then to fix it up, and then to offer it for sale at an ourageous price just because you want to keep it. Why bother offering it for sale at all? All you are doing is wasting everyone's time. What's more when you do things like that it tends to poison the well when there is something else locally that you would like to buy.
  With regards to console radios, I don't know where you have been looking but those are among the most difficult radios to sell, and consequently some of the least expensive to buy if they are as is. This is not to say that there are not many desirable consoles out there, but they are usually more complex then a six tube AC/DC set, and they are not something that can be shipped cheaply, but if you want a high performance radio that's usually the best route to get one. As for space, well I can fit probably at least a dozen consoles into a 10'X12' bedroom, but you need workshop space to repair and refinish the cabinets, even so not everyone wants to make the space for them.
Regards
Arran