Man Made $500K From Investing In Legos As It's 'Better Than Stocks, Bonds And Gold'

Bitcoin? No thanks. The New York Stock Exchange? Not my thing. But Lego? Now that's a different story...

You might not think of colorful Lego bricks as a typical investment, like stocks or bonds, but Shane O’Farrell from New Jersey would beg to differ.

At 35 years old, O’Farrell has turned his childhood passion into a lucrative venture, raking in an impressive $500,000 over the past two years by investing in Lego sets.

It all started with a touch of nostalgia.

O'Farrell has enjoyed hundreds of thousands of dollars of Lego resales. Tamara Beckwith

O’Farrell, who now resides in the US, grew up in Ireland playing with sets like the Fort Legoredo Lego.

Little did young O'Farrell know, the price of that kit would skyrocket in the coming decades.

Spotting the potential, the adult O’Farrell seized the opportunity.

Originally sold for $85 back in 1996, the Fort Legoredo Lego set now fetches a staggering $2,405 in O’Farrell’s hands.

He got into the business of buying and reselling popular Lego sets online, and he explained to the New York Post why this was his chosen investment path.

O'Farrell has made thousands by selling Legos. Youtube

"I started trying to invest in stocks and realized the 8 percent a year that I’m making in the stock market is not really going to work," he said. 

"It’s not really going to get me where I want to go. It would take decades."

Considering that Lego’s resale value has been growing by 11 percent annually—outperforming stocks, bonds, and even gold according to a 2022 study—Lego seems to be the smarter investment.

To maximize his profits, O'Farrell keeps up with finance and trend reports released by Lego and stays alert for announcements about when the company plans to retire certain sets.

Take, for instance, the Lego Star Wars TIE Fighter Pilot helmet model, which was selling for $60 before it was retired in 2021.

Getty Images

O’Farrell bought several of these sets and, within just eighteen months of their retirement, he sold each one for $350.

"You’re talking about a 400 percent return on investment in a year and a half’s time," he explained.

Despite his success in the Lego resale market, O’Farrell continues to work a full-time job since flipping Lego kits takes very little of his time.

"I can do it on top of my full-time job and create a supplementary income," he shared.

O’Farrell even finds time to pass on his knowledge through his YouTube channel, Brick Bucks, offering tips to others who might want to venture into Lego investing.

The Lego resale business does require patience, as O'Farrell pointed out, but the strategy is quite straightforward:

"buy the stuff, put it away somewhere in storage and just wait for the price to go up."

Of course, the trick is knowing which sets to purchase, which is where his insights come into play.