If you have any expectation/need (financial or otherwise) that will ever be resold, just don't buy it.  Buy the stuff only because you want to enjoy it now.  All my stuff?  I told my three sons they can do what they want with it: sell it, divide it up, bring a front-end loader an dump truck and take it to the land-fill.  I won't be in a position to argue - or care.  

There is an old axiom, TrainHead, "When in doubt, leave it out." Should that apply to such musings?

FrankM

I told my  2 boys the same as Lee did. I don't care what they do with my "toys"

 

Brent

That fantasy of buying three rail (or any) trains as a retirement investment has

been shot down.  Buy what you like and can afford, but consider it sunk costs, and

be surprised if it isn't.  Since you are, perhaps, younger than the average at York,

consider that youth as giving you more time to enjoy your money's worth.

Dear Trainhead,

 

Is this your first time? Slow down! You are probably overstimulating yourself! Stop and get your bearings, you probably need a breather. Worry about selling at another time, for now just enjoy yourself! You are in train buying heaven! It shows you that this hobby is alive and well!

 

Clue:Think about storage space and how many trains you are able to run at the same time, that should help some.

 

Most of all have fun!

 

Mike Maurice

 

Hint: I haven't been yet but I heard over the years since I've been on that it is an AWESOME Experience!

Buy whatever you like and can afford.  Don't worry about future disposition.  Look at it this way:  If you'd spent the same money on amusement parks, golf, drinking, or travel, it would be gone just as well.  At least with trains, you can go into your room, enjoy looking at them and running them, over and over.  My point is, you have something to show for your money.  (Didn't mean to offend anyone who goes to theme parks, drinks, plays golf or travels.  I do some of those myself). 

A friend told me that the last man standing would get stuck with all the trains.

 

Once upon a time, not so long ago, mothers took care of the excess train problem by throwing them out as soon as junior left to pursue girls, school, work, etc.  This made old trains scarce.  This made them collectible and expensive.

 

Then Lionel, MTH and others started making new trains.  The new trains are both expensive and numerous.  People stopped buying the old trains and started to buy the new trains.

 

The new trains get better every year.  Prices of relatively young new trains drop as people continue to upgrade from PS-1 to 2 to 3 or from TMCC to Legacy.  We live in a throw away society but trains don't get thrown away.

 

Now we have all sorts of new trains to choose from and many older trains sitting in boxes.  Someday most of them will be recycled as everyone switches to virtual model railroading.  Why carry a box load of trains when you can get the same experience watching a 3-D computer screen?  

 

Eventually, real railroads will disappear as goods and people are beamed anyplace in the world at the speed of light.  It will be hard to model a light train and the hobby will end.     

 

Enjoy what you have now and don't worry about the future.  It is certainly uncertain.  Joe   

They can bury the stuff with me for all I care. It is of value to me now and perhaps of much less to my wife later.

 

I buy it for immediate gratification and it works wells. For my future and the hereafter I store up more important treasures for where they are also my heart will be.

 

If you are crazy TrainHead then there is a train load of us. Might as well enjoy the ride.

Andre---great post! lol

quote:

We will  probably not be able to give this stuff away

 

That's probably a fair assessment.

When I buy trains, I consider the money to be spent. No different than playing a round of golf, seeing a show, or going out to dinner.

I have no expectation of reselling them later.

Atta boy, Joe! It all adds up to a famous Mad Magazine saying "What-me-worry!" Bah!

 

Play now, tomorrow can take care of itself later!

 

Mike Maurice

I told my grandson to sell the trains for whatever he can get for them. Whatever he makes on them will be total profit for him.

I have been in the business for many years and have seen Toy Train prices go up and down. We are now in an operators market. Toy Trains were once thought of as an investment and we all know where that portfolio went. I always tell my customers not to buy trains with the intent of selling them at a profit. Buy Toy Trains for enjoyment and relaxation. I have also instructed my wife to give all the trains to our children and let them worry about their disposal. I know this sounds stupid but why worry about the future when you have no control of its outcome.

Happy RailRoading

Pat

WWW.PATSTRAINS.COM

Perhaps you should consider taking up a hobby.

Buy for your enjoyment and you will not be concerned with what happens to them in the next 20 years or so.

I know there are many young people on this forum. Unfortunately, many of us find it hard to get to York (I know I can't take off during the week unless it's an emergency). I think there will be people interested in your collections once you pass.

 

Let's just hope that isn't for a long time yet.

Apparently you have not read the "Sanity Clause" disclaimer printed on the back of every train car box.

On the other hand many people believe there is no "Sanity Clause".

Mark

Buy what YOU want to and can afford.  Build whatever you can build for a layout, it doesn't matter whether it's 4' x 8' or 50' x 200', it's whatever you got for space and can afford. This hobby is about having fun and enjoying buying, collecting,  and running your trains on your layout or at a train club. We are one big family that enjoys the same hobby and enjoy helping each other here. Don't worry about the future because no one knows what the future holds for us. If you're still here tomorrow you'll have your trains to run. You take care of your trains and your layout and they will be there for you as long as you want them.  Don't buy them just to try to sell them to make money later, buy them to run and you will find what they are really worth.  PRICELESS! GO & ENJOY!

Are you having fun?  That's all that counts.

 

My wife went into the halls for the first time & she commented about all the old folks and few kids then I reminded her it was Thursday after Spring Break and all the kids are back in school.  "Oh yeah, that's right." 

Me too, what Lee, Brent, and Alfred E. Neuman said:  What, me worry?

.....

Dennis

TrainHead, in the field of financial investing there is something called the "Greater Fool Theory."  Google it.  You may find it goes a long way toward answering your question.

 

 

Have fun and don't go into debt paying for your trains or for most other things as well. Unlike many other collectibles, our trains have intrinsic value, basically, they are small machines that actually do something really cool. We add to that value by building layouts and structures, etc. What I see on this forum looks to me like musuem quality.  I am not sure how you can place a value on years of enjoyment, and we may not get back the same amount of dollars we paid, but I truly believe model trains will be enjoyed for many many decades to come.

Same here, I'm a church musician, can't take much time at all and I work BOTH weekend days, I do attend the shows near me (either before or after church, I have taken one day off to go to the Springfield show), those shows tend to have a good number of young people, especially the Springfield show this year.

I think it's called "spending my children's inheritance" good for you

Your sanity is checked. Please keep your receipt.
Tips are appreciated. Items left overnight will be donated to charity.

There are plenty of young people in the hobby, but they are busy doing what young people do. When they get older, they will go to York and so forth. Let's face it, when you're 18 there are better things to chase than trains.

 

I've loved train since I was a kid, but between the ages of 16 and 30 if I had a choice between hanging out with girls or going to a train show you can guess which one I was going to pick. It wasn't until I settled down and got married and had a kid that trains came into focus again. I think that's a very common occurrence. 

 

So don't worry, when the young hobbyists get a little older they'll start showing up at York.

 

-Eric Siegel

Probably best to not ask the other patients on the psych ward about your sanity. 

 

Pete

Eric, that is so true.

 

My sons are all in their mid-late twenties and are so busy they cannot even think about looking at trains, let alone buying some. They have seen my initial attempts at a permanent layout and think that it is wonderful, but they have neither the time, space or money to fit O-gauge into their lives. However I have no doubt that my collection will be discussed and, hopefully, divided equitably between my three sons when I can't run them any more.

 

I use this as the reason to buy more trains, so that no one feels cheated out of their inheritance . I haven't yet resorted to buying three of each (hey, wait, that might be a pretty good idea )

 

Bruce

Resale value is not important to me. Would like to see my stuff live on in the layouts of others after I'm gone. A few of my items are inherited from others that have gone on.

 

Tx Pete may know the John Prine song:

"Please don't bury me down in that cold cold ground, rather have them cut me up and pass me all around . . .

Throw my brain in a hurricane, the blind can have my eyes, the deaf can have both my ears if they don't mind the size.

Send my stomach to Milwaukee if they run out of beer, put my socks in a cedar box just get em outta here,

Give my knees to the needy . . don't pull that stuff on me,

Send my mouth way down south and kiss my @ss goodbye!"

 

Enjoy them now in the present. Don't worry about them in the future.

Each of my kids will get 1/3rd of my trains, and a small 5X9 layout - for THEIR kids.   My kids are not really interested in trains, though they appreciate them, but other have remarked that sometimes it skips a generation.  

 

So I will have a small 5X9 layout, minimal scenery ready for each of my kids, to give to their children when they have them.   No rush, no grandkids yet, but I have set aside track and the trains.

 

 

 

 

Lionel Trains " An Investment in Happiness "

 

Art

As far as younger people in the hobby; I think a lot of people may fall into my category.  I was born in 1956.  I had no model railroaders in the family, so no one bought me a train for Christmas or any other time.  When I was about 12, I saved my quarters and bought what I saw in the magazines, HO.  I viewed them as scale models and O gauge as toy trains.  I stuck with that and some N scale since I never had much room for a layout.  

 

Now lets flash forward to when I had entered my 50's.  My eyes needed stronger glasses, my hands had developed carpal tunnel syndrome again after surgery in my late 30s, also I had arthritis.  All of those factors led me to look for larger models.  Couple that with the fact that O gauge manufacturers had started putting out some pretty impressive models.  Also, what had seemed like toy like operating accessories started to seem pretty cool.  Maybe I'm reentering childhood.  I dumped HO, and moved to O gauge, and am not looking back.  Maybe there are a lot of others who will go this route as they age.

 

As to getting money out of trains, I am working on a short list of other O gaugers my surviving wife and or daughters could contact to sell for whatever fair market value is at the time.  If the bottom falls out of the market, so be it.  Maybe I will give models to promising younger modelers.  I did that with some of my HO and N.  I will have enjoyed the hobby and helped others enjoy it too. 

In the final analysis, we are only the caretakers of our personal possessions.  When we go, they go; and we have no control on their ultimate disposition.

Please Check My Sanity

 

I checked, insane, no doubt about it!

 

Face it: You're as crazy as he is. 

 

Pete

       
       


Take one N Gauge twice a day  to get the healing under way…





Hope this helps..

K.C.

At least your not wearing a silly hat.

Scott Smith

Sanity? Here? Not so much.

Lots of fun though !!!

 

Really: Buy for fun, not for any other reason.

Don't buy so much you can't use it all at least periodically.

I'm getting there, I slowed way down when I decided What time and place I would make my layout model.

Rio Grande is not the most available road name and that helps a lot.