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Looks like the box art was leaked too. 2464 pieces confirmed

I heard that TLC is now banning LEGO Shop at Home accounts based on how frequently users check the in stock status of PS and PC. More than once a week raises a red flag. Twice a day = ban, or so a little bird told me this morning...

Thirsty, I'm not trying to call you out but, this post is a perfect example of why anyone thinking about getting into this needs to sell a few items BEFORE they wind up with a portfolio worth $70k. Buying is easy, finding deals is a thrill. Selling, no matter what platform you're on is hard. Anyone doing this needs to know that. Good luck, I've sold on eBay for over a decade and am, for the most part, happy with it.

One other thought... to get that big, you will need employees. We've got about the equivalent of 3 full time employees right now (excluding me because I have a day job). We're heavy on parts sales and light on set sales, although I'm trying to shift that balance. To get to the point where you are clearing 60k, you might be working 100 hours a week. Believe me, parting a set or pulling a crappy 50-lot $20 parts order when you're 12 hours into the day is as much a grind as it is to work for someone else. Not saying this to discourage you -- just for you to consider it in your business plan that you might have expense for part time help when you get to a certain size.

OP - the goal of being in business for yourself isn't silly. Nor is the idea of using LEGO to do this. It's just going to be extremely difficult... no, make that impossible ... for anyone here, well-meaning or not so much, to give you the numbers that are going to work for you. Too many factors to consider, too many different ways and mixes of ways to make money selling LEGO. Under DR's plan (yes, I'm a fan too, we're 7 years debt free now) you can run the business in a small way now, but even at this stage the business needs to be making some kind of profit that is more than you could get taking a second job - otherwise you should be liquidating all the inventory, LEGO and otherwise, to get you through steps 2 and 3, and then returning to the goal of starting a small business at that point. DR's base 20% is a perfectly reasonable place to start - If you are aiming at $60K/year small business income and have a family's worth of deductions and tax credits, that 20% is likely going to be enough to cover your tax burden, and you will of course sit down with an accountant at some point and determine if your quarterly estimates need to go higher than that. Most folks here aren't trying to do LEGO as a real business. A few are, and some number more are using it as a long term investment vehicle, which doesn't put them in a useful place for offering info to a small business owner. Sitting down with a DR-approved accountant at this stage might be very beneficial -- they can give you some good starting advice, and you can determine whether you should be trying to do this at all in steps 2 or 3, or if it's best to wait until after. My humble opinion. I'm not among the nay-sayers who think selling toys for a living is ludicrous. I'm doing it now, and did it with books before that and training dogs before that, so being an entrepreneur doesn't seem to me to be a silly or dangerous goal.

​You need to be familiar with GDad's posts to understand his particular take at sarcasm.

​that number of capital is way over estimated for what is needed to hit 60k a year in profit. Our LEGO sales for last 90 days 2234 items $85,779 sales we run right about 20% clear after fees / shipping. LEGO is only a small portion of our overall business but we never run anywhere near 500k in inventory. Not even a 1/3 of that. just for that quarter the estimated profit would be $17,155. For ease of numbers if those numbers stayed the same for all 4 quarters you'd be at $68,620 in profit before taxes. Obviously 4th quarter will be much higher, usually double to triple the slower quarters. Biggest issue you will have is sourcing that many deals / sales to keep the inventory up for a solid year. This month we actually tried a more wholesale volume based experiment and hit 890 items with $51,643 in sales for the last 30 days. Personally being one person I could not keep that level of purchasing volume up with worthy deals being harder and harder to acquire to keep that pace going year round. The inventory is always flipping so your overall capital is not readily rising much. You're constantly buying as you are selling. You would need at least 100-150k though to have any legitimate shot of doing these numbers. You will need help of others to achieve that much volume of sets to reach those sets. Most people will not be able to come close to doing it out of one area. I have a few good friends on BPer and without them I would not achieve the volume of sales needed to make it worthwhile on a larger scale

​Apologies if my NOPE was offensive. This SW thread seems to just be very circular. Page after page of someone saying the set is retired, followed by someone saying that these holiday sets have a 2 year cycle, followed by noting that the other holiday sets came out of retirement in the UK, followed by the suggestion that it's a popular set why wouldn't lego bring it back for another year? It's like listening to my Grandfather tell a story. Anywho, sorry to be negative. It will be back for next Christmas, I'll unsubscribe from this thread. Good day to you sirs and ladies.

Paid $500 for it all... the GC was opened, inventorying it now to check how complete it is. But looks like it is mostly there

The Bat-pod is a bit crude looking, but it's better than this:

Dude, you need to stop drinking so much early in the morning. ;)

By the way, it is in the site rules that if you win a Bat-Pod, they are automatically awarded to Ed and myself. It's just the way it is. I will say Thank you in advance!!

While I wait to apply elements to smooth out the dome (been sitting in a bag for 6 months), here's a "quick fix".

​Yes, finally I can finish my Chernobyl moc

Went out to a family who was selling some SpongeBob, and Ferrari sets. Once there they mentioned that they had a few more things they had found. Her mother was a collector, and just shoved stuff in random spots when she was done. Needless to say once I got it all home and went through it I was pleasantly surprised.

​You don't setup your buy-it-now auctions with instant payment required? For me, that's the biggest advantage of buy-it-now, weeds out all the Lookey-Loo's. Frankly, instant payment buy-it-now is the only reason I've stayed on eBay. Non-payment for auctions was reaching 50% for me, totally out of control.

Wait the full three days, c'mon, it'll be fun.

and 249.99 like I posted 3-4 months ago

Thank you sir for converting that to the one true measurement system. Just like we only speak one language we only measure one way ROFL

The one thing this theme has going for it is that it might be overlooked because anything STAR WARS will overshadow every other theme and set over the next couple of years, especially the next 6 months. I have a feeling LEGO is going to clean house of many of the older STAR WARS sets before the new movie and release the largest selection of new STAR WARS sets in their history. Sets like these will slip under the radar starting this Fall when people are freaking out buying new Falcons.

This is a good chunk of it. 10211's behind the T1 Van and the 9492. 8 10228's behind the Grand Emporiums. Viking Fortress (2) and Unimog behind the 10195. More shots to follow.

A freaking Grand Carousel? Give up the price already, we need to know how much to hate you

Jeff said they are waiting on the app developers to roll out the new version. It should only be a couple more weeks. I'm just as anxious as you are. ​

;-) Sounds like a dare...

The part I don't like is you need to buy first, and then email them about the discount.

​Awesome! You just made my day. Thanks for finding that.

​He did mention cost of goods sold in a subsequent post (or, replacement inventory as I think he put it). But I wasn't defending his calculations specifically, I was just trying to draw the attention of the mob to the fact that he's selling parts, which is a different business model, a different sell-through rate, etc. than flipping sets or holding sets.

Somewhere back in this thread, someone posted a closeup from the box art that pretty clearly shows gearing and power transfer axles. Sure looks like this set can be motorized. edit: this post.

​I'll pay to watch that

​Damn Canadians, spoiling everyone's fun

​Famous last words, you allow all of us on the one thread and you have no idea what you'll unleash

I don't think they are doing private groups anymore. But you can have an Irish thread if you want. I know there's an Australian one and a German one as well.

...as I was saying... I've been using the phone browser and it's ok if you are just posting a reply. If you are quoting (see above post), it's a disaster. Once you quote, your new text keeps appearing in amongst the quote, it's bloody ridiculous. Also, once you quote someone, there seems no way to get rid of it without posting it (again, as above). I like it how you can get to the brickfolio easily . That's about the only pro. I don't see how the upgrade benefited anyone really. Oh yea, and I had to resubscribe to all my followed threads again, as the upgrade somehow got rid of them.

​ ​I'm going to own up to my mess up, and go sulk in the corner over there...

The trains are both new, there is a third that's open but complete.

​I always thought we were seeing dwarfs at the amusement parks as a kid, but they were just hippies.

roller coaster to the back right as well

Wow that's quite a collection. Damn you're lucky to be collecting in Alberta. Dat sales tax. Good luck on your sales! I guess what we've learned here is the amount of posts or likes you have on X LEGO forum doesn't really matter and assuming he's lying or incorrect is irrelevant? Appreciating these replies guys, as they may come in handy for myself some day, biking_tiger, ltbuyer, Archilles, gregpj, Kenxxx!

Wow! You sir I salute you! I know the feeling, I'm like that with vintage batman memorabilia, from 1943 batman serials posters, lobby cards, 1966 batman toys, 1970s batman toys such as AHI, chemtoys, ideal, Marx....its endless. john

Beautiful collection! youll make money where ever you sell it how ever you sell it LOL Congrats!

To either side. Six blue bins with Super Heroes, LOTR, Mutant Turtles and Monster Fighters. Miscellaneous picked up on sale. 18 Orc Forges in there and other goodies.

​ Keep in mind, $60K after tax is about $100k pre-tax if self employed (at least in my state, 8% state tax). Your numbers show $343k in sales to generate $68k profit; this is wholly consistent with my estimate of $100k in profit needing about $500k in sales/capitol. $1M is conservative, and gives you the pricing flexibility to move product if the market turns south. I still think my $500k - $1M in capital to generate consistent $60k/year after-tax income is about right. What I didn't account for is what you did: rollover. If you can reinvest 3-4x times/year on your inventory, then you can reduce the capital outlay by that amount. So yes, in that sense, my estimates are too high. That's an error on my part, but it also counts on the fact that you can find QFLL opportunities that often that generate your consistent 20% after-fee return. OTOH, if you have to hold sets longer term to generate profit, my $500k estimate is too low. A 2-year hold to match EOL cycles will require you doubling your outlay to get that profit. None of this is easy, not by and stretch. This isn't a business for the faint hearted.

Honestly, the capital required to generate $60k yearly after tax income on full-time lego sales in much, much higher than what you're estimated (if you estimated it at all, I'm not sure I see what you're counting on for purchasing sets and flipping them). Bare minimum of $500k to start if you want assured income and sales right away. I don't think $1M is too much, actually, for this to work out after all your fees and with selling prices that will generate consistent sales. At those investment levels, there are so many other options, including the good-old stock market that can be structured to generate the 5-15% return you'll be looking for, and with considerably less work and hassle. There's some big-time sellers here, and very, very few that make it their only source of income. For most of us, this is part-time, hobby-class level of investment. I shudder to think if I had to turn this into the sole source of income for my family. I'd find a hundred other things to do before trying to eke a full time living out of Lego reselling.

Funny because I remember finding this earlier. BATPOD by kmfs_asa Anyway, I presume those tires are the same from the UCS Tumbler. Radical mini vehicle all the same.

Something to note, is that THIS time of year, in my experience (March-June) is where prices and demand are LOWEST. Things start to pick up again in mid to late summer. So if you don't NEED to sell a lot, keep that in mind. If you need the money, it's a different ballgame. If you can, try to hold off til the holiday season for optimal prices. Obviously, this isn't super practical for people who need to maintain cash flow. As I've said in the past, I primarily use Amazon because I like the convenience of being able to ship in many items at once and the more or less "set it and forget it" nature of selling with FBA. The fees are higher and of course suck, but I know what I am paying for. The recent change to 6-12 month aged inventory is also a hassle. But for me, it is still worth it due to my schedule. If I was doing this full time, or lower volume, I may consider other options more seriously. But for the volume I move, packing and shipping individual sets isn't an option for me at this time.

​Even taking fees into account, eBay may still be the better option (if you're not top rated, expect 13% fees from USA buyer, as opposed to Bricklink where you should expect 6% fees from USA buyer). It all depends on the set. Evaluate both and choose the best for you and your sets...I use whichever to my best financial advantage, which usually means Bricklink for me. But not always.

​Hah, yes i am Not sure why i'd be your role model though! Fairly small time seller compared to others.

​I moved your request to the site improvements thread... I do believe I've seen that request a few times. I know Jeff has been working on a brickfolio update (he's always working on something BP related) so we'll just stick this here and see what he says.

Wait no longer, i present to you... the 10247 - Ferris Wheel

This just made my day, $3600 worth of lego for $936. -there's also 10 medium building cases that aren't in the pic, 10 of each set.