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I've been a member here since November 1st (same day I started collecting) but figured now that I have 1 rack filled I'd introduce myself. This post could also go in the "how am I doing?" or the "stockroom pictures" thread. But I figure I would throw it here. I definitely consider myself small time and mainly use the profits from my sales to finance my own collection (keeping the wife off my back ). I have most of these sets on the rack built and in my personal collection as well. All of the ones on the rack are new in sealed box. I think I'm doing ok but open to criticism. Only bought 2 city sets, a high speed train for $100 and a coast guard plane for around 30% off retail. No Chima or any of the riskier stuff to sell. All of the Architecture sets were at 40% or more off. Got some CS as well not in the picture. I have 4 Sopwith Camels headed my way that I bought for $104.50 each. I also had pretty good success flipping 25 or so Minecraft sets during the holiday season. I'm trying to keep a decent mix of short, mid and long term holds. I've made 50 or so sales doing the QFLL thing and am averaging $29.82 profit per sale as of now. Although now that the Holidays are over I'll be holding a lot more. I'm a software developer/consultant by day and have used that to my advantage when buying sets after EOL. It's been hard not to read the daily deals thread and want to run all over town searching for those Walmart deals. It's exhilarating, but its not where my strengths are and I have to play to my strengths. So I've written some pretty advanced scripts that buy my LEGO during the F5 phase. As I'm not a big investor, I don't mind only having 3 or 4 of each set. Honing in on a few more Red5 now and will probably start picking off a few ToO over the next few weeks. I also need to order a new rack to store stuff in. Recently, a buddy at work also gave me around 35 pounds of LEGO to sort through, build, sell and split the profits. I love building so getting paid to build free LEGO is pretty awesome. So far I've found lots of old space sets and a market street (yea baby!) I'm 29, and originally from Atlanta. My wife is Romanian and we have lived all over the world but are currently in Jacksonville, Florida. We have an adorable 10 month old girl who goes nuts over Duplo. I'm also a sponsored (Starboard) stand up paddleboarder and enjoy surfing and racing in my free time. Thats pretty much it in a nutshell. Feel free to give advice on my buying or box stacking techniques as I'm open to suggestions.

This has been a great read today! You know, as a newer member to this forum I appreciate the advice of others and that is why these forums exist. I learn a ton going through threads but occasionally I may miss a nugget and ask an already asked question from time to time. When this happens, there is no harm in simply NOT RESPONDING if you are so irritated by it. By answering the question in a brash manner, it appears as if you would like to belittle the member publicly while seeking approval from others. It's otherwise known as bullying. But what do I know, my lego dude has a beanie on his head!

Here's another suggestion - don't base your investment strategy on when something is going EOL, and you won't care when it's gone.

Actually this argument makes sense and in economics it's called cannibalization. These cars are close substitutes in LEGO's palette, therefore it might be a reasonable assumption that the average consumer is almost indifferent between them. Imagine that T1 and F40 both sell very well, but most people only buy one of them. If the majority who face this choice would buy the F40 if there is no T1 (rather than not buying anything at all) then LEGO can do better with retiring the T1 so it could spare the production cost of multiple products (more parts). In this situation the T1 is devouring would-be sales of the F40, making it an in-house competitor. Cannibalization might also (partly) explain the retirement of TH and R2 as well. It is not in the interest of LEGO to fragment demand too much across its products since it inflates costs and the benefits of cancelling production can outweigh the loss of some marginal sales.

Actually nevermind I'd rather not derail this thread by arguing over business practices that neither one of us know about.

I firmly believe that Lego doesn't base retirements on sales of particular sets. I think there is a strict time line that they go by and when that date hits that's when they retire the set. I could be wrong but that's just my gut feeling

sorry im going to derail this thread... i had a weird dream last night where people were building massive human castles out of either kings castle or helms deep... then they added all these chima riders (spiders, eagles, wolves, what have you) and created a stupid huge battle scene... then everyone saw it and started buying up all the chima on the internet. wishful thinking huh? lol

The flipping method of reselling takes much more vigilance and effort but if done often and correctly it can be quite lucrative. If takes perfect timing for obtain maximum profit.

Interpretation: Employee: I am surprised you are not buying The Simpsons House. Me: Why Employee: We have a ton in the back and per my Manager who ever sells the most this month wins a Chima Polybag.

Martin

My belief is that Lego has a date for each set on which they retire it, but Lego checks the sales for the set before they make the decision. If the sales are exceeding the estimates, they keep the set in production. If not, it's retired. Just my theory.

I would take back all the wallmart discounted stuff and go for a red 5/ pet shop / palace cinema / ewok village / EEE. I see the porftolio as too narrowly based themewise and you definitely want some SW or modulars too.

i cant speak for anyone else, but i started in 2011 and i just now started selling. about half of my items its going to be hard to make retail back (bought for 50% to 70% off) and the rest im making a killing. my advice is if you cant afford to sit on sets for a long time you wont make good/great profits. this hobby or whatever you want to call it is absolutely NOT for the impatient.

I've been flirting with the idea of no longer buying new Lego stock, as I already have about $70k (at current eBay prices) to unload and I am deeply concerned about the Lego reseller-threatening illegal activity that must not be mentioned by name lest my post be deleted. So I stopped checking the daily deals thread. But I do follow the threads for sets I own, since I need to know when I should start selling them. I thought 10220 was set for retirement last fall when it was out of stock everywhere but LEGO Shop at Home and the MINI Cooper was coming out, so Lego would for the first time have two licensed automobile sets for sale at once, which had never happened before. I applied the same logic to AA (with the Tumbler coming out) and turned out to be right, but no such luck with the T1. So I check here every few days, hoping to read that it's sold out at LEGO Shop at Home or at least dropped to limit 2. If you're in the US, or even better live in Europe but have a PayPal account filled with US$ for some reason, you can get a pretty solid deal on this set from European BrickLink sellers. Even after shipping, it shouldn't be more than $100 from some of them. The strong dollar is your friend. Likewise if you invest in CMF cases. If you haven't searched BrickLink in awhile, it's worth doing. The euro has absolutely plunged over the past few months.

Fair enough.....I deal with scumbags on a daily basis and I do admit that at times my sarcasm and disdain for the human race that stems from my job probably shows here on the boards. Apologies if you were offended by shaking my head comment but it just grows old when members pander for info that usually be gathered by simply reading through the threads. Trust me I'm not the only one who feels this way but it appears that I'm the only one who wants to say it. Anyways I'm who I am and members just have to accept it and move on. Oh and unfortunately my undergraduate and graduate degrees are very real. I know this because of the 70,000 of student loans I'm stuck paying off and that's after over half has been forgiven because of the line of work I chose. Trust me I hear how over qualified I am for my job everyday considering only a GED is needed to pursue a career law enforcement. Also I wasn't broadcasting anything the other day, a member asked me to qualify one of my remarks and I stated my education as a reference, I'm hardly the one who boasts about my education since I'm not the only one here with a graduate degree.

Stephen, I don't hate you. I appreciate your opinion. Only if you could express it in a more civil way more often. That "masters degree in psychology" you were broadcasting the other day - is it real? was it a joke aka sarcasm aka your "style"? who knows? - should not only enable you to (quote) "[throw around] any big smart words" if you wanted to (which you of course do not), but they should also make you capable of anticipating that some of your comments put members of this forum in discomfort for no reason. Other comments meanwhile appear like you were talking to a dog or something, not to a human being. I mean, reactions consisting of one or two words that are not far from "Down!", "Give!" or "Sit!", that's just not a great way of communicating. The more I think about it that PsyM must indeed have been a hoax. Or it is some kind of weird study exploring "The effects of permanent grumpiness on members of an internet community". However, I don't think you are a POS - and honestly I don't quite get why I should send you a message to tell you about it if I did. I just think you are a POG (Piece Of Grumpiness), that's it. You know what: Had you answered with what you wrote above right here the first time (instead of your original answer, being "SMDH") I would have had close to no problem at all. Mainly because I would have known what you mean right away. Above you said "if you and some other members would make it a little less obvious when begging for EOL info that would be great." My question is: why? Everyone here is keen on EOL info and everyone knows it - in fact even the site's title reads "Lego price and investing GUIDE". Are you seriously po'ed of people taking that literally seeking plain GUIDANCE? Why should one sugarcoat asking for EOL info? What is your problem with people "begging" (as you expressed it) without putting lipstick on their questions? Is it because they, ok, say "we", don't "give anything back"? Being a regular user of this site clicking through all the info posted here fits the definition of giving something back quite well, don't you think? So, I don't really get what you mean - if it is a religious thing or so then please enlighten me. To me your argument of "It's OK to make money, but it's not OK to make easy money" sounds a bit contradictory or should I say pointless? Maybe it's even sarcastic. I don't know, you are the expert.

I have to like any reference to "The Jerk". Most of my life decisions are based on this movie.

...I know how to make money, and people keep bothering me! What's up wid tat?

Not only might Stephen not just have been referring to Ed's comments in the EEE thread - but who knows, since there is so much info to be interpreted into in his response consisting of an amazing four letters (wow!) - he also seems to have no hard time limiting his constant misanthropic undertone a bit. What is so hard in maintaining a minimum of respect even to people with questions he subjectively regards as stupid? I know he likes to refer to "sarcasm" in those cases. That's one way to see it and it wonderfully justifies rude behaviour all the time, how very comfortable. If he would just call it loudmouthed grumpiness I would have less of a problem with his way. In a nutshell: "Normal" members would long have been banned for manners like his, and of course I do not only mean this one comment to me but many of his comments to many users.

Found another 2 in a local toy store for around US$250, sometimes its good lo live in a pissant town.

You may as well open your PayPal case now.

Lego is not a normal, profit-seeking corporation, for better or for worse. It would be run very differently if it were publicly traded and vulnerable to the power plays of activist investors. If a set truly sells terribly, like 10227, Lego will end production early. I don't think that was the case with town hall or R2. The latter was essentially due for retirement, next in line after SSD. TH is an interesting case, and I have no idea what they were thinking. But if Lego bases lifespans on sales, then we are to believe that The Zombies was the worst selling Monster Fighters set, The Burrow was the worst selling Harry Potter set of the last run, and assorted other dubious ideas.

Nice stash, if you ever find yourself in Charleston let me know, I'll happily lose a paddle board race to you.

Worked for me too... It seems the only sets its not working for are the trains otherwise it seems to work for just about everything else city and Star Wars. I ran into a strange scenario where the code wasn't working and had to use a different browser (chrome) no matter what I did in Firefox. The latest update of FF is a piece of garbage though.

It definitely does - I've placed ten orders thus far, and once they ship will place quite a few more. It doesn't work on everything, but plenty of the sale sets worked with the coupon for me.

It depends of what you call "impatient". Yes, if you're patient enough to wait for 4 months, you can make some money easily (ok, you will miss lots of boats, but you'll be able to jump aboard some) You don't need to quick flip if you know the lego retirement dance a little. Example. The RRP of the Technic 42006 excavator is $80. You buy some on amazon with 20% off ($64) on October 2014. Now that Xmas 2014 sales have absorbed all the last sets (amazon, lego shop, toys'r us, etc.), and because it's typical for technic sets to be unavailable around Xmas, two years after their launch (this one is a 2013 set)... you can resell them for (about) 20% more than RRP on ebay (for example) on February 2015. Consider ebay and paypal fees, and you'll see it's easy to make $20, with a set bought $64. So a ROI of 30% (you invest $100 and earn $130, but in the case of the 42006 excavator, it's even more). Of course, if you wait for Xmas 2015 you'll be able to earn even more money, but what I mean that you don't have to wait for 2 years to make some profits. Little profits, ok, but still appreciable considering the few time you'll seat on your sets. edit: Oh and very small sets (minifigs series, mixels...) have a shorter lifespan so if you can get some with some discount you can make some really nice profits (for example, some mixel mini-series like "the 3 blue characters from serie 2", or "the 3 greens from serie 3", etc...)

I think this is the blue piece on the left.

I know... just my budget is tight these days. Have to make choices. And I choose to buy the EEE yesterday at RRP.

It could happen...Resellers are sometimes their own worst enemy.

Actually a pretty cool build. Especially because the temple transforms into the Phoenix Sent from my HTC6525LVW using Brickpicker mobile app

yeah that's what makes it a little less enjoyable is that it will always be that packed but the flow is not near what it was when it was all opened up. The parking garage is a nightmare compared to when you could park any of the open lots. I still park on the back lot but that's a haul with double bag exclusives and by the time you've walked that trek 50 people have run into your sets lol. I still liked the old Pleasure Island days. Some of the new stuff is nice but some just isn't the same. Eventually when its all done it should be nice but not the same with that big garage blocking the whole complex as you drive in. Yes Helicarrier is 2/17 VIP release.

Picked up a 43R4 Seal from Lego at Downtown Disney. They had at least 6 that I saw

First of all, thanks for your detailed answer! Knowing that the law enforcement comment was no joke too, puts things a bit in perspective for me, as well as my opinion on you. I do in fact appreciate that you give those idiots (out there) the treatment they deserve in your job - praising your effort might not be an overly popular opinion (not only in the US but even more in my country), but in my case it is real, that you can be sure of. However, the people IN HERE don't deserve a similar treatment! As I said, personally I understand "your style" of grumpy (I stay with that) commenting here better with the background info you gave, but that doesn't really take away from it being rather inappropriate oftentimes inside a community. I just don't like seeing friendly, harmless, peaceful (whatever you wanna call it) people getting answers like those coming from you now and then. Someone being too clumsy to use the search function, being confused, or even being a bit dumb deserves nowhere near reponses synonymous to "Just go die, you ugly motherf***er!". The saying goes "To each his own", not "To each the nightstick". People here mean no harm to anyone, that's the big difference between them and your main customers. Maybe some of us are in fact greedy. I wouldn't exclude me from that. In my case it's also because I simply dislike reading and always search for the shortest way to the info I seek, but that is another story. At least I try to contribute to the forum by posting some things I consider noteworthy from time to time. But I cannot offer much more since I don't know anyone working for Lego. Anyway, that is another topic and I don't say you're completely wrong with what you said before regrding this. Someone else may open another thread for that, but the demand for it might be very limited... So, man, can't we all just get on well together? Be sarcastic, please. But can't you also please reduce giving literally innocent people a hard time out of nowhere? Keep it to those who really deserve it. Good Night.

I would say that a lot of people are given everything they need to succeed without any cost. That's a pretty good deal. But that doesn't seem to be enough for many. Clicking on links can be viewed as payment for the basic information that is provided. Beyond that, EOL info is pretty valuable. I wouldn't just give it away for free.

Fallingwater has just gone back to Call to Check at Lego. Maybe it will stay dead this time.

It's been out just over 2 years which is pretty typical. I wouldn't worry about the low buy-in prices because those are now done and eBay value will get better with time. This has just recently sold out and some are still in the wild so check back in 4Q to see how it's doing then. If this was available from Shop at Home at a discount for weeks and weeks then I would be a little worried but the remaining stock sold out quickly and LEGO didn't even have to tag it as "retiring soon".

come on man.... He is a ghost.... He disappears from time to time.

That LEGO version does seem a bit fat particularly around the torso. Perhaps the camera angle and lighting added a few pounds. Ha. Well I still could not find any other physical builds of the Battlemaster. However there are the two digital renditions over at Brick Commander's Battletech page of downloads with LDraw files for the original "unseen" followed by the Project Phoenix "reseen" edition. Also to add a drastically different but super impressive one from the more recent Age of Destruction. Battletech Project Phoenix Age of Destruction

We just went through a slew of effective (not yet official) retirements during the second half of 2014. Right now as far as exclusives are concerned I am willing to park some of my money in Red 5's because I think it will be gone before many of the other possibly better long-term investments retire. There is some decent money to be made during the Episode 7 hype if it's done soon enough.

I think we're overthinking this one. If it's a big, expensive Star Wars UCS Lego set, the price is only going in one direction. I concern myself much more with the potential ROI of a $200 Lego investment in other categories. That should be the debate. The Red 5 is going, and future fans of Lego will want it. You won't lose money.

I expect the Pet Shop to be this year's Grand Emporium. Available most of the year and drying up late summer with sporadic F5s through the end of 2015. Then it will be time to start all over again. You should be fulfilled by LEGO Shop at Home without issue.

I'm not trying to bust your you know what but your attitude is precisely why scammers are so successful. Your logic is if it's a scam oh well ebay or paypal has got my back. Meanwhile the scammer got away Scott free with your money. Who do think reimburses you? The thief? It comes from PayPal or ebay who have to foot the bill, and then people wonder why the fees they charge keep going up and up.

Lol @ "when they arrive".

They produce the set for an additional number of years equal to the quantity you order.

I feel this set is a ripoff at full price...the structure is so small that you can't even fit the Bith in their performing area. This is clearly just an overpriced maxifig/minifig sale with a small, lame structure thrown in.

The SIMPSONS HOUSE - LEGO Simpsons Set 71006 - T

Here is the straight scoop from Charlie at LEGO... Brick and Mortar store Must be a Toy Store with 2 other major toy brands(LEGO can only make up about 33% of total store inventory) $5000 initial buy in NO EXCLUSIVES They do not discuss discounts until you are approved.