There are quite a few members here that own a fairly large number of yoyos. I’m wondering what you hope will happen to your collections after you die. This is something I occasionally think about. Do I want my two daughters to split them up and keep them? Should I sell most of them as I get older so they don’t have to deal with a selling bunch of yoyos they don’t want? Which yoyos are getting buried with me? Here’s a poll, and please leave some comments below.
What do you want to happen to your yoyos after you die?
I want my them in my casket.
I want them to be left to my heirs.
I want them to be given to my yoyo friend(S).
I want them to be donated to a yoyo club.
I want them to be donated to the yoyo museum.
I want to sell them prior to my death.
I don’t care, I’ll be dead.
0voters
P.S. - Here’s a second hand story from way back when I was in college: My advisor told me a story about a professor from our school who had retired a few years back. This professor had a famous library in an old house near campus. It had a spiral stair case, ladders on rails reaching up to the high shelves, rare editions, etc. His dream had been for his beloved library to stay intact in perpetuity, and he tried to arrange for this to happen, but not long after he died, his family sold the house and broke his library up as it was sold off by an auction house.
For me I would pass one meaningful yoyo down as an heirloom and then prepare a list of the collection and the values of each and where to sell them so they don’t get jipped and sent to a good home if the hobby itself isn’t passed down.
Make memories for those to cherish rather than leave shiny things. If they wanted it, they would have asked for it.
If you do leave things to others, label it all well … but offloading other peoples things is a burden that I’ve had to experience and distracted from dealing with the grief in perhaps not the best way.
Also be sure to plan and properly setup things in event of your unplanned demise while revisiting it every few years to ensure it’s up to date.
You know it’s weird I just thought of this given the topic of conversation.
But there was a big upset that when my Dad does in his will he didn’t leave anyone anything.
Everyone was really mad, except me.
I kept thinking what does any of it matter, all we have is the time we’re here for, and I’d rather have that time with you, or with my loved ones, than anything I could ever hope or want to get.
I thought about making a topic like this a few years ago but thought people would be mad because it would seem tasteless. It’s not though. My thought has always been for my family to box them all up and send them to Yoyo Expert because I believe they would get them into the hands of kids who could not afford them or whoever. I don’t have any yoyos that are very expensive or rare anyway.
This is hard for me, but without going into any detail, my advice is to anyone who thinks they may eventually die, is to gift your prized throws to folks that would appreciate them, especially if they have collectable or historic ( yo-yo history, not “real” history) value.
I am 52 so I hope to be around a bit more but I too have thought of this.
I have some specific throws for my kids in my collection.
So some to my 5 kids one of my older children is into throws as he goes through collage. The throws are something for him to do during down time, he is starting out slow like I did.
If I have time before the end. I would like to pass some throws on to people I have had interactions made trades deals with, sold to or bought from and in generally had great communications with, who are still around on the forum at that time. That has a lot of variables to it so.
If unexpected end my wife may get with my oldest and keep some and then they would sell others on the forum.
That will be a caged hunt for the people with knowledge because they will be slightly handicapped and emotionally distraught…
I mean I am dead. Good luck hunting if goes down that way.
This was a morbid exercise but enlightening.
Everyone have a great rest of the weekend.
PS. I will have someone post on the forum if I die unexpectedly.
I’ve always thought it would be cool to do some sort of charity. Where once a year everyone donates some throws and we give them to kids for Christmas or soemthing
My grandma passed recently and she had SOOO much stuff. Not hoarder level, but just… wayyy too much stuff. It was weird seeing most of it just… given away/donated. It very quickly makes you think about all the crap you have and how having so much of it is… what’s the word - not pointless? But kinda? It hit me hard with my yoyo collection specifically, funnily enough. Like… why do I need over 200 yoyos? That’s just extreme excess, no one needs all that lmao.
So I’ve actually been thinking about this a lot recently. Unless my kids are into throwing eventually, it’d be really pointless to hang onto any more than a select few yoyos. No one wants to be the one to deal with “dad’s crazy yoyo collection” one day. But I would like for them to save a few sentimental and/or GOATed pieces I’m super proud to own… AND some throws I’ve used a TON and would make a great start to a player’s collection if my kids DID want to get into it.
So here’s the plan (and I guess if I die, someone get in touch with my fiancee and show her this lmao):
Keep this case and the 8 yoyos in it. This is my “house is burning down and can only grab one case” case of some of my most prized throws for various reasons - whether they be historic, sentimental, or I just think it’s awesome.
Then there’s obviously 6 yoyos outside of the case in this pic. I’d like these to be held onto as well for various reasons: GTR-JS is my fav bimetal and just one of the greatest competitive yoyos ever made IMO, Free Solo is my most used yoyo ever, MMC is the greatest organic yoyo ever made IMO, this Chief is not only 28s but is one of my favorite monometals of all time and integral to the history of yoyo design, Panorama is one of my most used yoyos ever and one of the greatest examples of slimlines, and the Dark Magic is my first “real” yoyo.
So with the above being kept by my family, I’d like some of my yoyo friends (I’ve discussed this before with them actually lmao) to go through my collection and take/keep a few things they’d really like to have, for free. Then, I’d have someone trusted take what’s left of my collection to DXL and spread some love by having a “pay what you’d like” sale, with any proceeds going to my family. I do luckily have my entire collection properly cataloged on an Excel spreadsheet, with what I paid/ballpark value so that may be of use in a scenario like that. And I like @POspot’s idea of passing along throws to certain people I’ve bought/sold/traded with or had great interactions with online. I’ll probably notate a few yoyos on my spreadsheet that would be cool to send back to the person I got it from.
Interesting topic though, I loved reading all the responses!
