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I wouldn't say that any of the people who have been doing this for a while are stupid, they were way ahead of the curve on this, afterall. And I haven't seen one person who has been doing this for years ever say that they are surprised that this is happening. All any of them has represented is more of a disappointment in what it has become. Also, none of them have stated they're done. Of course they are adapting, but it doesn't mean they can't be disappointed in the new market. They already know how to do this. I think people forget that when people started doing this 10 years ago there was no site to ask every day "what should I buy?!" or "when will xxxx retire?!" or "when should I sell this?!" They did it all on their own and they are plenty savvy. Don't mistake disappointment for unpreparedness.

but what if tru only gets large sets modulars exclusives and such then short term flippers will benefit and long term large set investors will be in the toilet because then you will be saying i should have bought small sets and not all the large sets since they are available with tru in the long run and will be around for a lot longer and people that hold for the long term will have to hold longer and the short term flippers will be flipping and making money faster (edited for run on sentence to help long term investors that read emazers posts understand better)

reason for the second one is just cannot pass that price which is $600 on ebay. Just finished building. enjoy~ Sent from my iPhone using Brickpicker

I heard it moved two items to the left on S@H, so that means something.

Just in case he does and doesn't invite you, don't feel bad. I'll sum up the topics for you now: Current strategies - buy at least one SSD, DS, GE, PS per month until said sets are no longer available 2015 strategy - continue buying from the previous year's list plus add a few newer large sets like TB. 2016 strategy - more of the same. Maybe start mixing in EV. FOR ALL YEARS - never exceed 200 transactions. That's about it ?

I guess any discussion about Chinese knockoffs doesn't mix well with a discussion about LEGO's new hot Chinese market. Speaking from experience, many interviewers are ill-prepared when discussing LEGO, especially a topic like fake Chinese parts.

you live in Hawaii!?!?! Do not complain about anything again ever.

I am happy to announce that we were able to work out a deal with Raise.com (a discount gift card) website. We noticed some of you have been using another service, but they really didn't reply to our messages. Raise.com was happy to work with us and looks to have many of the retail shops that we talk about here covered. Some of the deals will be e-codes that only work online and will be given to you quickly. Others will be physical cards that are shipped out to you. Regardless, this is a great way to shave another 5% or more off purchases. Obviously we would like to keep this partnership and that only works if you guys use the links here to show them you want to use it. The more that comes from us, the more opportunity there may be for us to get you deeper discounts or special offers. $5 off $75- New Customers Only Code: RAISE75AF Expires: 4/30 Exclusions: New customers only, cannot be used with additional coupons. Walmart gift cards: up to 3% off $89.11 for $91.73 (With new customer promo code, price drops to $84.11 for $91.73) Target gift cards: up to 5% off $95.04 for $100 $55.74 for $58.72 (With new customer promo code, price drops to $90.04 for $100) Sears gift cards: up to 6% off $28.29 for $30 $84.87 for $90 (With new customer promo code, price drops to $79.87 for $90) Barnes & Noble gift cards: up to 14% off $43 for $50 $86 for $100 (With new customer promo code, price drops to $81 for $100) Toys R Us gift cards: up to 7% off $46.78 for $50 $126.27 for $134.99 (With new customer promo code, price drops to $121.27 for $134.99) There are more stores to pick from for sure. All I ask is that you come here and find the banners that I wiill be posting to show them we appreciate their service and hopefully it will benefit you even more in the future.

Funny, I thought the discussion about changes in TRU's exclusives policies have a direct effect on any LEGO EOL/retirement discussion.

Came across 9 John Hancocks (21001) at TRU today. $7.79 each. I was shocked and did a double take when I saw them on the shelf, considering these have been retired for what, over two years? Easily the best random find I've come across so far!

There are way too many punctuations in that paragraph for it to make sense

Not yet. Let me finish selling mine first.

My gosh! The market is getting more and more competitive! Making profit is becoming harder! What a blasphemy! Who expected this? Oh wait... As long as there is profit and entry is easy and not limited, the market will attract new players and develop new, increasingly complex practices to exploit the opportunity. Some people are panicking here like they did not know this and believed that LEGO investing would be a piece of cake forever. The LEGO investing scene has arrived to its mature phase and is showing its sign very well. Major players (TRU, emazers, etc.) are developing with a competitive fringe (small investors). Making profits requires more and more strategy and insight. Inefficient players will drop out (panickers are afraid of this?), it can not be avoided. The key to survival is adaptation. This is the essence of Ed's post. Investors have to select sets more carefully while profits will become potentially smaller with the introduction of extra uncertainty through not knowing which set TRU will not resell which results in more sets invested in bought around MSRP and with the increasing participation. So will it be harder to make profits? Certainly. What you have to do? Adapt and be efficient! Will it require more effort and time? Absolutely! In a contestable market this can be considered as a law. Who thought otherwise, believing that profits and required effort will stay the same in the long term is -sorry for the expression- plainly stupid.

i would, in fact this thread has been very useful based on the original premise. Now it has way too much chatter. So far Lego has not followed any type of manageable retirement strategy. They retired quite a few sets randomly and in waves since thanksgiving. This thread brought it to the surface for me. If it becomes random talk it should be locked. People seem to forget what a specific thread is for. Investors on this site are really beginning to look like retail investors in the stock market. Most loose money and get creamed because they are emotional and ill planned.

I feel as though City could be better if they continue to spread their choices in designs across various venues like they have been in recent years. The Police stuff has been rather repetitive anymore and there is only so much that can be done with the Firefighters but all the pedestrian and work related vehicles such as the Logging Truck, Camper Van, Flatbed Truck, Grand Prix Truck, etcetera, are what I would like to see more of personally. Now I don't mind a copper or fireman every once in a while but a true city is comprised of houses with people living in them, streets to drive on, and jobs to go to. I guess though Creator has become the 'go to' theme for building homes but even then I wouldn't mind seeing another set like this once more.

Yes keep buying the Exclusives, just because Toys R US put Exclusive on the GE everybody is going to panic, there is no way Toys R US will have all the Exclusives that retire on Lego as there Exclusive for a long time. When it says retired on Lego they are not being made anymore. So I am going to keep getting more SSD,GE,Camper,etc. Ed

It would be awesome if you listed the set name, for those of us who haven't memorized every set. That's a good price. The T-Rex's would probably sell for $100/pair pretty easily.

http://www.walmart.ca/en/ip/lego-star-wars-jabbas-sail-barge-75020/6000107232280

The mod team will not be watching over them unless you invite them. Only the Admins (Jeff and Ed) will be able to see into each group. If you make a group and no one shows up you should have perhaps made a more interesting group. The fact it costs a few points will stop people from randomly creating tons of groups that no one uses and hopefully steers them into making interesting, useful and fun groups. I'm not sure on the functionality of group owners being able to moderate their group, that's one for Jeff. I hope the members that cried out for this feature so vociferously in the past now use it.

I found this video of a Toys R Us rep showing off the Grand Emporium Special Edition:

Well the other day I had found Series 4 of the Friends Collectables at both Wal-Mart and Target getting myself a complete set. I like the look and what is offered with these ones the best so far and I couldn't be happier with the reduced $3.99 for each. Hopefully Lego will keep the lower price for later series'.

I think smart investors pay attention to the Winter Village sets, but there are so many sets in the $100 range that some get lost in the shuffle.

made more progress today after taking about a week off. (was building ninjago sets with my son) now on step 86.1 of 97. i prob have only 2-3lbs of elements left (set weighs about 22lbs) while impressive, it is just too big (measurements / weight) and delicate with all the greebling and plates. moving it is now nearly impossible. i did find another missing element, "Light Bluish Gray Hose, Rigid 3mm D. 12L / 9.6cm. since this color was released only in this set (2 come in this set), i'll buy the 20L version if really needed. both of these diff size hose elements are in the $6 range. my missing element count is now 5. not too bad considering the ones missing.

Dump all six sets into one pile and build them all at once

Let's cut to the chase...There is a whole group of members, both active posters and lurkers who do not want to share information with 20,000 members. We have been asked numerous times about a "private" forum. While Jeff and I do not want to segregate the forums, the people who will use this service are not sharing information now anyway, so there is no fear of losing valuable discussion to the private forums. Jeff and I feel this is a special option and that if members want special privileges, there has to be some cost...thus the BrickPoints fee. Otherwise, every Tom, Dick and Harry will want their own special forum. Remember one thing, this site is about LEGO and making money form LEGO bricks. The site and information has been free for everyone, but as the site matures and more features are developed, there might be some fees associated with those extra services. People make money from the information gathered on this site, so why can't the site prosper financially as well? That being said, this is not about Jeff and I making money off of private forums. For all we know, zero members will use this option and we really don't believe in the idea. I will not participate in them, nor will Jeff. But that doesn't mean that this feature is not valuable to someone else. This is about giving every member a reason to come to this site and to spend some time here. This is a feature that has been discussed many times and by charging a small fee, this gives some value to the feature in our opinion. 99% of the site's members might not want to get involved, but 1% might use it everyday. We will give it a try and make adjustments along the way...Thanks

If you reveal all this information in one place, you will drive away new members. Oh, you already did.

I agree. Why does the random chatter really matter? So many of the topics are just the same stuff over and over when they are strictly on topic. And threads about retirement and such are mostly speculation anyway so what's the big deal?!

Certainly not a bad idea. I don't know how much I will use it, but mostly I think that some of the people who waste posts complaining about other people wasting posts will enjoy that just a bit more. As really that is what is wearing on me more than the random chatter. And spending brickpoints is good - as it will encourage people to earn more of them. Ha!

I think you are missing the point. This is a "special" feature that only benefits those individuals that are involved. Ed and I are not huge fans of the private forum, but we think that there may be a place for it. If no one uses it, I won't lose any sleep honestly. It is there because members have brought it up to us. There are those who may want to post and talk with people but not on the main forum. You are paying for use of a special feature, one that only you and your group gain from. I guess we can charge a monthly cash fee instead?

I think this is a good option for some of members on here that like are worried about those spying eyes watching you. It's also good for the members that like to spew out a bunch of garbage and pollute the forum. I will be interested to find out later how many groups do get created over time. Maybe we will never find out.

have to figure out a way to start selling legos on alibaba... and shipping to china...

How about power plants ? They can be either nuclear (we already have Homer and Mr. Burns ), wind, hydro, or coal

Jeff and I both got it and it works great. The Fire is so small, its amazing. Simple to use and hook up. A real winner.

Speaking of something on fire: (the grammar nazis might not want to listen to this song though :D ) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YkyhvCdJ_vM

Well that answer sounds a bit different from your previous opinion. Did the online flash sale alter it or something else?

2x Pirate Ship Ambush - 50.99 2x Unexpected Gathering - 35.69 2x Lake Town Chase - 25.49 2x Counsel of Elrond - 14.95 Meijer clearance + mperks coupons + meijer credit 15% off deal Also ended up getting $15 in rewards for the transactions (had to add some groceries to get some of the points) Thanks for the tip Bold-Arrow!

Many who post regularly here that seem to be "Major players" are actually small fish in a very big pond. Many of the major players don't even give BrickPicker the time of day, or even know what it is. There are other major players who are members of this site, but they don't post anything.

Break break break.........why are we talking about this (again) in this thread? Numerous members have asked to keep this on topic. Now I'm asking to get on topic or else another useful thread will have to be locked.

Great... Another bubble thread !!

Currently, this is not our job. It is impossible for members to add new sets to the database - and for two good reasons. Most people that post in the Brickpicker forums are really nice people... but there is always someone that would take advantage of this. Let's say that there is a member on Brickpicker named Untrustworthy_Remnant that decided to go wild and add tons of fake sets to the database. Jeff would have to look over a lot of these entries just to disapprove them... something that is time consuming and pointless. Here's another reason. There is not a serious need to put new sets into the database that are not being sold on eBay yet. Brickpicker is here for LEGO investors that want to keep track of how much their sets are worth and how many are selling. All the new sets that cannot be found in the Brickpicker database are probably available on Brickset for people to see.

So once we liquidate the older stuff, what other sets will be reinvesting in?

Do you all know what Batman's full name is? Na na na na na na na na, na na na na na na na na - Batman!

THe whole point of the last few posts is that sets that were available at a lot of stores become toy r us exclusives. I know VC was available almost everywhere.

Other than the "Our Exclusive" tag, is there any evidence that they will be the sole retailer for the GE? This doesn't even show up under the Our Exclusives category while several items that aren't exclusive do, this could just be a mistake on the website. Speculation ahead---> Since they aren't the only retailer for Technic anymore, maybe they opted for this arrangement instead.

This whole thread is going to find itself being retired with the way how the conversation has gone.

They probably read it on here.

Oh yeah, my Dad can beat up your Dad. I know Lego is meant for Kids but seriously what does this banter have to do with a set retiring?

Certainly. I spend nearly all of my scholarship on these sets (yeah, I am a good student...). All the more it turned out my girlfriend likes LEGO more than partying or any other activity. She didn't use to, she got addicted because of me. It is like a disease. I swear I am going to marry her.

How's this for a t-shirt? Ha.

It takes time, sadly this forum and the LEGO investing community in general has been invaded investors seeking quick profits. They expect every set to perform like Zombie weeks after retirement, thats just not going to happen. Honestly im happy with 50-100% returns in a 1-2 year time period, thats MANY times better than any stock could do, and an insane amount compared to the 1% CDs banks are offering or the 4% i could save in interest by paying off my mortgage early.