Fun for under $50?

With the upcoming birth of my son, the already austere hobby budget I've had the past few years is about to get REALLY austere. Prices on new boxed action figures and new model kits have already exceeded a point that I feel comfortable paying, although there are still some good bargains if you shop around. With a typical modern military 1/6 scale action figure now retailing in the $120- $150 range and media property figures scraping the $200 mark, I've already resorted to bargain hunting and reusing existing pieces in my collection to keep things going. Now, priorities for both finances and physical space have changed, so I'm going to try to keep my hobby running with less money and tighter focus.

Towards that end, I've decided to start an "Under $50" project. Basically, I want to try and avoid paying more than $50 for a boxed figure or model kit whenever I can. I may have to stretch the definition if the item itself is close to $50 before taxes or shipping. However, when I say "under $50" I will as often as possible stick to well under that price. Will it work? Possibly so! One way to do this is to buy older but new to me items that aren't priced at "collector" levels. Some ideas that come to mind include Dragon's earlier 1/6 figures like their Hong Kong police and SDU line that often turn up for less than $25 at on-line vendors and on eBay.

Most importantly, I don't want to turn my house into a "look but don't touch" museum full of "Daddy's toys" which means that eventually, my son will have "dibs" on most of the sturdier, child appropriate stuff. I may have to stash fragile, adult collectible stuff away for a few years, so I want to keep what goes into storage to a minimum. There's also the possibility that some of it might need to be *GULP* sold or traded! 

Anyway, back to today's project which is clearing out the soon-to-not-be spare bedroom that was formerly my storage and hobby space. But when a bargain comes along, I'll be sure to post it here.