Hey, all! I recently got into the idea of Lego investing and have been doing extensive amounts of research. Essentially, I've sold my soul to the US Marine Corps, and after my contract is up I plan on taking a year or so to do some traveling. I already have started putting money aside and plan to continue to do so for the remainder of my five year contract, and though this may leave me with a healthy sum to fall back on, I recently stumbled upon the idea of LEGO investing and thought that some long term investments may give me a substantial boost to my travel funds. 

My plan is this: I'm currently employed at  LEGO store, which offers me a small discount on lego sets. (won't disclose which one, hope you understand.) However, I will only be employed there for a month or two longer, as my report date is rapidly approaching. My thought is that I might be able to purchase some sets now while I can afford them, and store them away for five years while I complete my service. (A definite long term investment). In the Corps I doubt I'll have the time or diligence required for any form of short term investment, or even long term investments of two years or shorter (because of the likely travel while I'm in, it will be difficult to ship sets from my planned storage location). 

However, I am a novice at this entire thing. Should my plan be altered? Is a five year long term investment not viable, and if so, for what reasons? What sets being currently produced should I be interested in for a five year engagement, and why? These are the questions I seek to find answers to on these forums. I've been skulking around for a few days now trying to absorb as much knowledge as possible, hopefully some of you can provide me with even more. In a day or two I'll probably be posting more in depth lists and information as to what sets I'm keeping an eye on and what sets I currently own. Hopefully my current place of employment may help me to shed light on what rumors are floating around regarding currently produced sets, hopefully I can prove as helpful to you as I hope you will be to me. 

Cheers, 
  Tokyo.

Orthantic is an awesome set, I.think it will be a huge winner and maybe even a sleeper but it's still new so your return might range longer then say r2d2 who has almost made its 2.year mark

The Orthantic is probably a sleeper, Orthanc is not.

The Orthantic is probably a sleeper, Orthanc is not.

Op knew what I was talking about...and that set isn't talked about much from what i see

Well, based on all the research I've been doing (which is excessive, I assure you) plus I've gotten to talk to a lot of hardcore collectors in the course of my job as you might imagine, it seems like the sets I need to be focusing on should be exclusive (preferably), have a ton of display value, and a certain aspect of collectability if at all possible. Orthanc is on my maybe list because of the minifigs, and the definite display value of the tower - although it probably will be last on my list if I buy it all, it actually doesnt sell that well in my store and I'd hazard to assume that if a set isn't popular in life, it won't be in death. 

I already have acquired Tower Bridge for my investment plan, next up with be Sopwith and VW I think (my store's starting to run low on them, I'd hate to miss an opportunity because I couldn't make a decision) Then I think I'll do GE, Pet Shop, and R2D2 depending on how my funds look. I'm definitely looking at picking up Architecture Studio while it's back in stock, if it ends up being discontinued and multiplying in price as it was a few months ago, I think it may be worth a look. What do you guys think? I'm thinking Winter Village only if I decide to be diligent enough to continue collecting holiday sets in the future, so that one may end up getting pushed off the wagon if funds get low.

Forget about the disney princess line and focus on the exclusives. The only thing you did not mention is the Arkham Asylum.  Yes it will not retire as soon as the GE and VW T1 camper, but five years from now it may have the largest ROI. Superhero is the gold mine and AA is the best and largest set in the theme. There is no way this set won't at least triple its MSRP a few years after EOL. No way. You will regret if you don't have a couple of these 5 years later. 

Good luck. Im sure dallas will tell you lots. I left my SoCal home for USAF pilot training in TX and am still away 15yrs later.

1. Invest in TSP and 5k/yr in a Vanguard Roth IRA every paycheck before buying legos. While deployed etc you wont have to think about it. In fact set up a Vanguard targeted index fund 2060 retirement fund now so your first paycheck starts funding it. Then put at leadt %5 into TSP.

2.as for legos. I left a lot of my guns toys etc with my parents. PCSing loses stuff. My movers have trashed and stolen a lot of stuff over several moves. youll be away and out and about with little time or space to store or handle large boxes of stuff. Most young guys own what they can fit in the trunk of a car and for good reason.

if i want to buy anything long term only to sell later, i ship it to moms. And i sell it on ebay when i take leave and go home.

(Mom did put a $5k helmet collection in an outside storage that mice ate into. Lost it all. And since then my mom doesnt move my stuff and forget)

So use the parents house but make sure they know its not garage sale fodder. As for kits...

id buy 1million chima speedorz :-)