[Snowflakian]

I tend to agree with your initial sentiments.

In this day and age money can be better spent on other things, or even saved.
The 'collector' in me though, or rather the inner child in me, won't give it up.

BUT

I'm a finicky collector. I'm mostly only Imports, and even then only particular ones like
the motion revive series kamen riders or the various sentai model kits, which is what led me to cobra collecting as I needed a 'terrorist' group to amalgamate shocker to for them. Snake eyes just followed cause of the movie hype, and then resolute. The accel suits cause I'm a powered armor fan ( hence my BGC collection though I hate the bikes and really just wanted the knight sabers), and the scarlet reactive suits just cried out for kit bashes to start building my own homebrewed hero armored team.

Generally I only stick to certain things.
MU team building. (Just the basics, Fan 4, Modern X-Force, a few X-Men, the avengers, suburbia heroes like darkhawk, Spidey, Black Cat, Daredevil, & nova, and 2 bad guy teams, revised masters of evil, & Dark Avengers, to pass on to my kids someday, whenever I finally have kids. xD)

Transformers Classics/Universe - Basicly only who was in seasons 1-3, with a special addition for drift if he gets made since I'm digging the IDW usage. But I also expanded this to animated, and Certain home planet alt mode figures and WWI.

Bayverse - rethinking this one, as much as I like the few I have, it just seems weird to have them and not a complete good guys side... But I've yet to make any choices on these, cept on that I'm not buying anymore except for the 3rd bike for my fembots, and Brawn for a place holder in classics... (And to give the pistols to animated Arcee)

DCIH - Mostly only the green lantern ones, though I have expanded for the basic teen titans, and flash family.

Ben 10 - 10 aliens and done, but I've only bought 6 so far that I liked, the other 4 of AF so far I may skip, and wait for evolutions, to get.

Sentai Model Kits - Only certain ones, which I almost have all of so I'm pretty much done here until they make a dragon caeser one.

Minimates - Only getting X-Force in minimates, Ironman, Nova, Armored DD, and Darkhawk if he's ever made.

Icons - Indy from Indiana Jones in joe scale, hellboy, Microman Movie style Casshern, Dead or Alive, BGC and that's about it really.

Megaman/Rockman and Darkstalkers - I grew up on these two franchises, so I have a soft spot for them. Thankfully I don't import rockman kits anymore, and no domestic maker has made decent ones that I'd buy in the right scale. But Megaman Zero and the ZX armors could easily drag me back to this. As would a darkstalkers joe scale line.

Overall, I keep my collecting so simplified and directed even if scattered that I can keep cost and space down without worries, it also helps maximize value when I do decide to sell them since usually my picks are the same as everyone else's high demanded figures.

On a side note: I'm trying to unload everything I had prior to this new distinction on careful collecting. From vintage MOTU, Transformers, joes and everything else (DAMN YOU TOY BIZ!) and even the oodles and oodles of comics I wasted money on over the years instead of getting the TPBS.

Condensing is always good though. Just stick to what you like, but don't go overboard.
Like IM2, I'm really only getting a Joe Scale movie IM, warmachine, and dynamo. Maybe others, but I'm debating on selling the armory I've built so what's the point in more IM armors without it?

Basicly, my collecting rule now is, only certain things, and if can be, stick to joe scale, cept for transformers cause there's no choice there. But that's just how I roll since I lean on wanting everything in scale to each other marginally, and try to avoid bigger unless it suits the character in question.

Thanks to this, I was able to keep my 2009 toy spending down to roughly around 500 total for the year. About 260 of that was MU, the rest was transformers animated except 90 of it was TF movie toys. Another new habit I've picked up, is self sustaining my toy habits with toy sales. The old toys I sell usually go towards new ones. This helps keep the toy habit from digging too deep into my wallet, while still keeping a nice influx or rotation on one shelf to keep things fresh besides the mainstay shelves like TF, MU, and Kamen Riders.