Beneath a sea of debris and cockroaches lies a massive collection of valuable classic video games, many still left unopened.
Two YouTuber game hunters went inside an extremely messy room that had been locked for nearly 20 years. What truly surprised them amid the filth was there was actually a treasure trove full of factory-sealed video games, including cult classics like Drakengard for PS2 and mainstream hits like The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Walker.
Full-time reselling duo, Aimee and Korbin, are the owners of the YouTube channel Cheap Finds Gold Mines and they post videos of their finds from yard sales and Goodwills.
Recently, a viewer informed them about a house that was “kind of nasty” and soon the pair found themselves scouring a very gross area and unearthing all sorts of collectibles, Blockbuster-branded VHS tapes and vintage video games. They have made a three-part video series detailing their experience so far:
The most valuable hoarder home in America
This room has been locked for almost 20 years
We pulled all of this from a hoarder house!
If someone says a house was owned by a hoarder, then expect the rooms inside to be full of chaos, stuff and dirt. True enough, when the YouTuber duo walked in to the house, it had no walkable space as there were ceiling debris strewn all over and cardboard boxes were badly warped and thoroughly infested with cockroaches. As they weren’t really pickers by trade, the two admit they were not well prepared for their hunt when they arrived at the abandoned house wearing gloves, shorts and casual shoes.
Korbin said, “Once we got there and we saw the quality of stuff, I was not gonna go home and change.”
There were a boat-load of other games scattered throughout the house but the pair were mostly only interested in factory-sealed items, so they ignored probably hundreds of already-opened games. They made exceptions for gems such as PS1 game Tomba and weirdly, the bad PS3 port of Bayonetta. Aimee noted she can handle “a little bit of mouse poo” to obtain some good games.
During their hoarder home digging, Aimee got bitten by a spider and Korbin said he was pretty sure he got scabies on his leg. But the pair’s trouble was worth it in the end as they managed to unearth tons of Nintendo GameCube, PlayStation 2, and Xbox 360 games as well as stacks of Game Informer magazines.
The total value of the gaming collection from the hoarder’s home was around $100,000, and after splitting the finds with eight other resellers, Cheap Finds Gold Mines took home $20,000.
At the end of the second video, a woman named Stephanie explained the house’s history and why it had so many video games in it. The property belonged to her uncle and it was considered the family house since 1965. When her uncle got sick in 2019, she helped him move out.
She said, “We’ve been clearing out my uncle’s house for the past few days. We’re just trying to get all of his goodies out there…Hopefully (we) got some good people some good stuff.”
The house and everything in it were going to be demolished anyway, with all of its content going to the dump.
In the third video, Aimee said that the former homeowner was traumatized after losing someone dear to him, and to cope, ended up collecting anything that was of value to his heart, which turned out to be video games.