Originally Posted by Candace
One caveat about buying machines from the Vikings inside Joannes, is that many of them are closing!! Mine closed here a few months ago and many folks have posted about their's closing too. I'd stick with buying from a local dealer(I bet they have quality used machines there). Buying from Craigs List as a newbie would be very risky in that you simply won't know if it's a good machine or not. Your local dealer should be able to give you options as used machines with warranties and classes.
I've had good luck with used machines from other local dealers - just no where near such good deals on trade-ins. In fact, most of the other dealers seem to strongly discourage them. Our local Jo-Anns just remodeled, for the worse, and we still have our Viking Gallery. Of course, we don't have any other Viking dealers, which probably helps.