As a lover of LEGO, there are two things that I’ve realized as I’ve gotten older. Number one, my parents buying my sets versus me buying my sets are two different things. Number two, there has been a giant price boom in terms of LEGO, which has deterred a lot of people from jumping into the hobby. Today, we will be discussing why LEGO has become so expensive in the last several years and what we as a community can do about it. And if you stay tuned to this video, I will be providing some resources on how you can better afford LEGO for as cheap as possible. For those who don’t know me, my name is Isaiah Barlow, and this is my LEGO room, my internet diary of all things LEGO, from opinions to LEGO reviews and sets. If you like this type of content, please like, comment, and subscribe, and hit the bell notification for all my new videos.

Reality of LEGO Prices

A comment I almost always get is: “How can I find a good LEGO set for cheap?” Right now, that has two parts: good and cheap. Good can be variable—I might think something is good, and you might not think it’s good, so it depends on your taste, and I always start there: What do you like in terms of your regular daily life? You like cars, Star Wars, etc. So “good” can be really interchangeable, but one thing we can all agree on is the word “cheap.” Now, cheap right now for LEGO can be really hard to find. A good set that I would consider is pretty much challenging, but if you enjoy it, it’s going to run you between $50 and $100, and that’s not that bad of pricing if you want one set a year. Most people who want to jump into this hobby want between one and three sets a month, and not all of those sets are going to be between $50 and $100. That’s just wishful thinking. Some might be $150 to $200, maybe $250. So at this point, that is not cheap at all, and that leads us into our topic of the day: Why are LEGO sets so expensive now?

The Problem of Resellers

I do want to leave a link to the Business Insider small resellers documentary on why LEGO sets are so expensive. It’s about 20-plus minutes long, a really good video that dives into a lot of reasons why LEGO is more expensive right now. But one issue that I don’t think it touched on deep enough was the issue of resellers. Now, if you don’t understand the concept of resellers, it’s just people who want to buy something at retail and then sell it for a higher price at a later date. If I’m being honest, I don’t have very many issues with resellers. I think it’s okay and pretty smart to maybe buy an extra set or two to hold on to for the future, to maybe make a profit, especially if you think that set is timeless. It might be an item that’s a luxury later on and maybe hard to find. I don’t think it’s a wrong thing to resell. I wanted to be very clear on that. However, not every reseller is the same and does not operate with a sense of integrity. Right now, we live in a social media era where hustler culture and side income are things to promote, and one of those main side incomes is reselling hobbies or knickknacks like LEGO itself.

Now, it’s one thing when there’s one person who’s a LEGO lover, maybe collecting a lot of sets, that ends up selling them off at a later date or holds them for themselves because they actually love the community. But some of these resellers are people who don’t love LEGO at all, don’t have a care for LEGO, and they just buy up a lot of the inventory to sell at a later date. This can be due to them having more capital in their pocket so they can buy a thousand-plus sets at one time and control the market of how many people can actually get a set for retail. Of course, one of the main problems is they don’t have an interest in LEGO. They’re not buying it because they love the craft or the community; they’re just buying it to make a quick buck off people like us. But now we have to pay about $50 to $100 over the retail price, and that’s just not fair. This, in turn, can discourage us as people from wanting to save for or buy a set when we can’t find it in store, can’t find it on LEGO.com, and the only place we can find it is maybe on StockX or another reselling site like eBay, where it’s super expensive for a set that should have been a different price because somebody bought it all up.

BrickLink and Verified LEGO Vendors

Now, this isn’t supposed to be a morbid video. There is a solution, and this is a free resource—you don’t have to pay anything to have this resource. It’s available to you today, and I personally use it to price out and find the right set price for myself when it comes to sets I can’t find on a regular LEGO site or maybe on Amazon, etc. I’m, of course, referring to BrickLink.com. BrickLink.com is a LEGO vendor online site that has a lot of retired sets or sets that you can’t find for great prices. If I’m not mistaken, don’t quote me if I’m wrong, I believe it is an official LEGO vendor. As I was writing this video out, it did sound like a sponsored ad, but I want to let you guys know I am not sponsored by BrickLink at all. I would love for them to sponsor me, but I’m not sponsored by them. This is something I regularly use, I love it, and I would love to share it with you guys. BrickLink has thousands of sellers on their website with different prices for each set you might be looking for. They pretty much have every LEGO set you can find, and if you’re looking for a set that you cannot find online right now and you see it on eBay for maybe a crazy price or StockX or wherever these reseller sites are, go to BrickLink first. You can check on the website the price and the average of how much it’s selling for and then make a smart business decision for yourself on how much money you want to spend.

One of the best things about BrickLink is that there are thousands of sellers selling new, used, unopened, sealed, like-it-was-factory-made-right-out-of-Target sets for a great price, and you don’t have to worry about the hustle and bustle of is it a good seller, is it bad, fake, whatever. All BrickLink does is authorize LEGO sellers. But I would also just use it to compare prices. If you see something on Amazon or eBay that somebody’s reselling for, you can really compare the price on BrickLink to what’s being sold on Amazon and then, like I said, make a smart business decision for yourself on how much money you’re actually spending on a set that might be retired or you can’t find right now. Most people are looking in the wrong places to find LEGO sets, and this is one of the most trusted sites and online vendors you can find for a LEGO set you’re trying to get for a great price.

How to Afford LEGO Sets

Now, let’s say that you found the set you want. You went on BrickLink, you compared the prices, but you still do not have the money for the set right now. You’re probably itching to buy that set but just don’t have it at the current moment. I get it. A lot of you guys might be a little bit younger. You might not have exactly the full job that you want right now, or maybe not all the income you want right now. With that being said, let me give you guys three little easy tips on how I used to save for something in high school called sneakers. Before I started this channel, I actually had a sneaker channel called Isaiah BTV, previously called Common Hype Beast, and I went to college, so I wasn’t able to really keep up with the YouTube scene when it came to my sneaker stuff. But when I was in high school starting the channel, I had to learn how to afford shoes better. I was working at Chick-fil-A, just a small little job. I was getting about $400 to $600 every two weeks, so I wasn’t really making the most money, but I was still able to buy as many shoes as I could, and these are three steps I did to do that, and you can do the same with your LEGO sets.

So the first thing you really want to do is scout out what set is coming out in the next month or two, or maybe three months, that you want to purchase. The reason you’re doing this is because you want to figure out how much that set actually is. Most LEGO sets take a minute to retire, so sometimes the LEGO set you’re looking for that’s on the market right now is not going to retire anytime soon, so you can start saving money. But if it’s a LEGO set that has not come out yet, you have a little bit of time to save your money, so that way on the day of release, you’re able to go purchase that set and not feel like you’re breaking the bank. What I would do is go online, check out the LEGO sets coming out in the next several months or maybe the next month to figure out what sets you’re looking for and what the retail price will be, and write that down and keep it in mind because you’re going to need to know that for the next step.

The next thing you want to do is save for that LEGO set. What I used to do for my sneakers is I would be on sneaker news, figuring out what date certain shoes were coming out, and from that point on, I would know exactly what I needed to save and how much I needed to save. This is very easy to do because I figured out how much the sneaker was when it was coming out, gave myself enough time so I could save up money for that set without breaking the bank. That way, I could keep more money in my checks, have a little bit saved for what I wanted, and buy the pair of sneakers I wanted. You can do the exact same thing with your LEGO sets. Figure out how much that retail price is going to be, give yourself some time to save for it. Don’t find a set that’s coming out in November when you might not have the money already for it right then, but find a set that’s coming out maybe in January or February that you’re going to be interested in buying. Then say, let me save a little money here and there for my LEGO budget, so that when the set comes out, I’m there and ready on the LEGO site to purchase it, and I’m not feeling like I’m breaking the bank because I already saved for it and was ready for it.

The third and final step I want to give you guys is if a set is just too expensive for you to buy right now, or the next two or six months, and it just doesn’t make any financial sense for you to buy that set, my last and final tip is to go find an alternative set. Right now, LEGO is doing something that I’ve really enjoyed, which is they’re making smaller-scale sets of bigger sets that are very iconic and coveted. An example of this is the Millennium Falcon. The Millennium Falcon sits at about $850—a very hefty price—and to be honest with you, after taxes, you’re almost looking at $1,000 for a LEGO set that you might not finish in a week or two, or maybe three. What LEGO has done now, which I really appreciate, is they’ve created smaller-scale sets that people can enjoy, put on their nightstand, and just have as a display piece for much cheaper. There are two smaller Millennium Falcon sets: one’s like 20 bucks, and the other one’s like $85. Both are great sets, both look amazing, and you don’t have to necessarily break the bank to buy those sets. There’s also an R2-D2 set that’s the anniversary edition that’s like $240, but they made another R2-D2 set that’s only $100. You’re saving $140, and that’s a big difference when it comes to saving your money. The point is, you don’t have to buy the full, big set for you to be satisfied. You can get a different set for much cheaper and actually enjoy it and display it. I’m not sure if you guys have seen how big the Millennium Falcon is, but it’s very big. You need like an area to display that, and most people might not have that area.

Conclusion

LEGO is one of the greatest hobbies and communities I’ve ever been in in my entire life. I always enjoy being part of the LEGO community, and that community should not be hindered by prices and resellers trying to make a quick buck who don’t enjoy the community themselves. Hopefully today, these resources and tips I’ve given you might help you budget your way into buying a set you want or finding it for a better price than the resellers online. I love this LEGO community and I would love for you guys to be in this community with me. Let me know in the comment section below what LEGO set you guys will be purchasing next.

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