The Anti-BrickPicker Effect

Mos_Eisley · 2013-08-16T15:44:22.000Z

Let me first say that this is by no means a knock on this site. I enjoy this site and it provides a lot of great features you can't get anywhere else. The sad news for me though is that the way the site has been taking off over the past year has actually had a big impact on me buying less sets for investment purposes. There are so many posts from people who are amassing substantial quantities of sets I would have easily invested in in the past. Now I know some people are just talk and don't really have what they say, but there are plenty who really do have what they claim. Not only are the huge collections concerning, but the vast amount of sets spread 1-5 at a time across multiple investors adds up quickly to an alarming amount of sets that will have to be unloaded after retirement before really significant gains can be realized. I've said it before, but I think last year's retiring sets will be the last that see really big gains quickly. Yes, there will occasionally be a SE Crawler or The Zombies set that comes along, but those will generally be hard to predict (aside from Crawler situations). In the past, 2-3 years was a pretty standard time frame for a set to reach it's peak after retirement, but I foresee this becoming more like 5-7 with very gradual climbs after a possible initial small jump. With those kinds of holding periods, I just don't see it being as worthwhile anymore. Obviously, there are many ways to make money at this. I've tried all sorts of ways, and I don't think the method I've settled on is viable going forward. Doing small, quick flips just isn't worth the time and effort for me. All the hoarding that's going on combined with the significantly longer shelf lives of sets is creating an environment where sets will have to be held for far too long to make the returns that make it worthwhile for me. I think the risk vs. reward is skewing in the wrong direction. In the past, I have purchased at least 5-20 of every set I wanted for investment, and it was a lot of sets. When I see posts about buying dozens of this set and that, I cringe a little. Those posts actually make me buy less of a set than I normally would. In the past, I would have been all over something like The Orc Forge if I knew it was on its way out. I didn't buy a single additional set during all the hype for the set a month or two ago. Will I regret that? Possibly, but I doubt it. I'm not saying that I'm done buying, collecting, or investing. I will always be a collector. But my days of buying large quantities of everything I want are definitely gone. For investment purposes I'll only be buying quality sets that I can get for at least 30% off, things like BTTF and SE Crawler aside.