Ask JKM a Question #26: Collecting or Hoarding?

 A reader named David asks:

“How do you find the space to maintain your incredible toy collection and do you ever start to worry about your collecting habit turning into a hoarding habit?”

All right, David, have you been secretly listening in on my conversations with my wife?

Just kidding. 

That’s a great question, and we haven’t had any questions here on the blog yet about my toys, so it’s a good change of pace.  

Frankly, my wife often takes a look at my office -- especially after Joel and I have been playing in it -- and voices concerns that I am teaching him hoarding.

But I have a few rules regarding my toy collection at this point:

1.) The toys don’t spill out beyond my home office.  My wife insists on this, and I see her point. For one thing, if you are constantly picking up and putting down a lot of these old items, they get destroyed.  It’s best to leave them in the office. If Joel wants to play with some of my toys, I have no problem with that, so long as we do so in the office and not carting them up and down the stairs.

2.) I only purchase “new” items on occasion since my home office is rapidly filling up. It has to be a great deal, or a rare item, or some combination thereof, for me to buy new toys at this point.  And if I can, I try to sell something for every new thing I add.  This is what my wife calls my “balance of terror,” although I prefer to see it, like Carousel, as “one for one.”

3.) My collecting days are coming to an end.  When I turn fifty (in seven years), I’m going to begin liquidating my collection, and keep only those items and objecti I really have a serious attachment to (like the stuff from Space: 1999 and Buck Rogers for example). 

In short, it’s pretty cool to have some Star Trek Voyager, Stargate and Alien Resurrection toys, but I don’t know that I’ll feel a deep loss if I no longer possess them. 

Why start liquidating at age fifty? 

Well, none of us knows how long we have left on this Earth, and right now I possess a legitimately gargantuan collection.  I don’t want my wife and son to have to contend with this albatross upon my passing.  They don’t know what any of the items are worth, and they have no attachment to most of the stuff.  My wife will be upset enough if something happens to me without having to learn about how to sell on E-Bay.  I don’t want her to be forced to deal with it.

I am leaving items in my collection to Joel, if he’s interested, but anything he’s not interested by the time I’m fifty (and he’s thirteen)…it’s gone with the wind.

Secondly, this toy collection is part of my retirement plan.  The way things are going Social Security and Medicare may not be around when I’m 67, so I’ll need another income stream if I hope to retire.  (But don’t worry: even at retirement I’m not going to stop blogging…).

Speaking of the blog, actually, I’ve learned that I enjoy my collection most when I write about it.  And I assume that -- writing about it once or twice a week until I’m fifty -- I’ll have gone through most of it.  That’s a lot of “collectibles of the week.” 

At that point, I’ll have photos of everything, have really thought a lot about everything -- thus enjoying it -- and the necessity to keep it around will be less.

So, to answer your question: I hope I’m not hoarding, and I have some rules to prevent hoarding, and I even have a built-in “sell by” date to avoid hoarding.

That said, on the days my office is messy, I do feel like I’m hoarding…

Don’t forget, send your questions to me at Muirbusiness@yahoo.com