[VLM]

Short version is the market is not smooth and has very asymmetric knowledge and gaining the knowledge the hard way with measurement instruments is a time consuming specialized skill.

I know all about the condition of the bearings in the headstock of my lathe... you most certainly don't and if you're wise you'll hedge your bets.

Also the market is fragmented. I like screwing around in my shop and do not care about revenue per hour generated. A job shop only cares about revenue per hour generated. I don't think the markets are going to make sense to each other, but people insist that selling machine tools is selling machine tools and it doesn't matter if the buyer is a for profit shop or an amateur steam engine tinkerer, unfortunately it does matter, a lot.

And edited to add, skilled people can see hidden value. Sure the ways are worn out on that worthless lathe and that worthless lathe had a trashed QC gearbox but hoarder dude knows how to combine the parts from both and sell the one good one for $2000. True, individually each is worth $0, but combined, with a skilled repair man willing to put in maybe 100 hours of hard labor... And tragically I've seen some semi-hoarding situations where the guy just gets too old... he could make that $2K which would be really helpful for a retired guy's budget, but doc just said no lifting anything and no standing for long periods, so other than praying for an apprentice, it'll sit there till the estate sale.