All across the country people are making off with thousands of dollars of extremely popular LEGO sets and then flipping them on the web. Police have estimated one Arizona racket to have stolen and resold $250,000 worth of LEGO, and one ambitious Florida man stole $2 million worth of plastic dad-landmines. A gang of crooks in Canada broke into a Toys “R” Us just to steal LEGO merchandise. That means they passed aisles and aisles of expensive video game systems to get their hands on a bunch of little plastic blocks.
But why is the LEGO brand such a hot ticket for thieves? Unless you’re a 7-year-old day trader, you might not know that the price of LEGO bricks have been going through the roof for years now. These Scandinavian gemstones have an unrivaled market growth rate, with mint condition LEGO sets steadily increasing in value by 12 percent per year. Even more amazingly, some sets that are less than a year old can easily go for 36 percent more than the original price on eBay. Thieves have been capitalizing on the toy’s popularity with collectors by selling their pilfered goods online, turning those LEGO bricks into bricks of pure gold – making Legoland the new El Dorado. It makes us wonder why gentlemen thieves even bother heisting priceless diamonds guarded by lasers when they can just clean out a Walmart and retire.
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