What to do with a 25K pc collection?

Question

I know there are a lot of questions on how to sell your set, however, my situation is a bit different. I'm not sure whether I should sell my set at all vs. keep it.

I am currently spending a year in Israel and have started to recover my lego collection from my parents. Since I was a TeenageFOL/AFOL, as opposed to most people in their so-called "dark ages", I actually managed to keep hold of 99% of my former collection, which I'm guessing rivals some serious AFOLs' collections.

I estimate the collection approximately 25K pieces (not including approx. 3500 more that I currently have in the U.S., the bulk of the pieces are from the S.H.I.E.L.D. carrier). Here is a set list (last updated in 2001, hah):

http://guide.lugnet.com/set/mlist.cgi?m=88

I am now torn between the following options:

1. Bring the collection to the U.S. ...

a. ... for self-use, for me & my daughter as she grows up. This is possible, though it currently feels overwhelming due to the magnitude of the collection. Given its size, it feels like I would probably need to dedicate an entire room to it. Not exactly what I had in mind for my real estate needs, to be dictated by LEGO (though I'm 100% sure others in this community have done so!!!). I do not currently have a dedicated room in my house to do so. Also, I'm not really sure whether I would actually be drawn to building with it, as my hobbies have shifted over the years and are quite distinct from lego, though I will always love it. Also I know that it could be a huge gift to my daughter... but only if I can balance the desire to keep things meticulously sorted, and the tendency to jealously guard against messes and just general fun playing/building/destruction. I've seen that the ginormous amount of pieces is simply overwhelming for a child at her age (close to 4)... or almost any age.

b. ... and keep it in storage. This seems like a futile exercise, since it would probably cost me a fair amount in shipping costs. I do, however, have sufficient space for this without any additional changes to my current home. (Unfinished basement + outdoors shed if need be)

2. Sell the collection...

a. From Israel: that would allow me to save on two rounds of shipping

b. From the U.S.: I'm guessing that might give me much better options for buyers.

c. In bulk: would save a ton of time & energy. But clearly the collection will not be worth as much in bulk.

d. Sorted into sets and/or individual pieces: obviously should bring in more money but gosh, what a time sink. I'm a busy professional mom who hasn't spent any meaningful amount of time on Lego in years. Plus, I'm guessing there will be some or even many parts missing / discolored / damaged which will lower the value of the set-separated collection without further investment.

3. Leave the collection in Israel, i.e. at my parents' house, for the grandkids' enjoyment (but not my daughter). This risks further messiness / degradation of the collection by my nieces and nephews. Has the clear upside of avoiding headaches of all types, and the clear downside of letting go of huge amounts of money and love poured into the collection over my T/AFOL years.

I've read a lot of posts on this SE so far, which have been very helpful. Following that, I plan on using Peeron and/or Brickpicker to estimate the value of the sets I own, if sorted, to decide whether I'd like to sell it at all, and whether it's worth the time to sort (I'm guessing that aside from a few sets such as 10001, the answer is probably not). I really appreciate a few people mentioning the low reputation issue for selling on eBay, which I'll pay attention to should I decide to put up some of the rarer / more valuable sets for sale.

If you had to suggest a course of action from those I described above, which would you gravitate to?

Answer 1

Since no one answered here, I will post an update on what I have done so far. I will update it in the future if that makes sense.

At this point I've recovered the collection to my apartment in Israel. I've started sorting the collection, mostly because after reflection I decided to reframe it as something actually fun to do, as opposed to a chore or something in order to make money (it would probably not be worth the value of my time). After I sort the collection I am considering rebuilding some or perhaps all of my old sets, see what condition they're in and whether and how many pieces are missing.

If there are any rare or valuable sets I may consider selling a few them. That said I have already seen firsthand how much my daughter is enjoying the collection, and it seems I will hold on to most or maybe even all of it. But I won't make a decision for sure until I am done sorting.

I asked this collection on Facebook and received a number of alternative suggestions that were not among those I considered initially:

• Donating some or all of the collection to organizations that work with kids
• Creating art with it
• Opening a LEGO rental business :)
• Giving some or all of it away to friends with kids

I will consider some form of hybrid options between these.

I mention these here in case they will help someone else with similar challenges.