"...we traditionally achieve double
the price
of most estate services..."
Settling an Estate or a Trust can be a difficult process for an Executor, Trust Officer, or Personal Counsel. There are a myriad of steps and tasks in the settlement process, with which we can be of great help. 
Our Appraisal firm specializes in making this a step-by-step process of correct and proper settlement decisions, making it all worry-free.
We give you all the information needed to deal with the personal property of an estate. Most Trusts and Estates contain various assets including:
- Real Estate
- Stocks and Bonds
- Investments & PERSONAL PROPERTY
We are the personal property experts and can appraise anything in this broad category including:
-Art
-Antiques
-Household Possessions
-Furniture
-Automobiles
-Business and Industrial contents
-Collectibles
-Electronics
-Coins
-Stamps
-Silver
-and Much More
Our appraisals are prepared to the highest market standards of Report Writing & USPAP Report Writing. The information provided in our reports is what is needed and required for various aspects of settling an estate as well as being most informative.
We are experts at appraising, having handled millions of objects and hundreds of Trusts and Estates.
What We Can Provide:
Our reports are informative numbered appraisal inventories. These inventories have an easy to follow text with correlating Photographic Sections showing the objects in detailed imagery (heirs may live hundreds of miles away from the estate). Each item of value will be provided with an exact identification, detailed description (often interesting information of rare objects), dimensions, age, condition and fair market value.
We also provide a Comparable Values Report detailing the sources of our pricing. (Reports may be requested for each principal of the estate as well as counsel, accountants, or IRS).
Consultation:
- We can provide guidance as to what is or is not worth appraising.
- Set the level for the report at a certain monetary amount and our report will reflect, for example, everything over $50 per item.
- With great knowledge and experience in appraisal and liquidation, we will fully inventory the Trust or Estate and provide a report as to what it contains.
We go on site and confidentially search and identify items of value in a careful, noninvasive manner.
We Travel Nationwide It is not uncommon for the Executor, Attorney or a Trust Officer to mail us a key with an address, and we fly to the location city and thoroughly evaluate a home's contents, and then provide a prompt report to the Estate or Trust.
Purposes Of Estate Appraisals Include:
- Equitable Division amongst the heirs (equalize the possessions to dollar values, rather than apples and oranges). Dividing Grandmother’s treasured possessions can get ugly. Families can break up over simple possessions. We assign an equalizing dollar value, and this provides the heirs with a fair manner in which to choose possessions without strife.
- Tax Purpose. We assign fair market values on personal property for tax purposes. New IRS legislation requires that appraisals submitted for various purposes must be performed by a professional appraiser, not just your local “antique dealer,” jeweler, or auctioneer.
- Non-cash Charitable Donations. In many cases, personal property can be donated to suitable non-profit organizations for significant and helpful tax offset benefits. Our reports provide valid proof of values for the IRS, which has a stringent process of reviewing sizable charitable donations.
We Provide Expert Estate and Trust Sales:
If the Estate is to be liquidated, our service is the most profitable and efficient. Rather than sending items to a non-expert local auction which will bring pennies on the dollar, we have sophisticated and rapid sales methods.
The most that a local auction can provide is a crowd of approximately 200 buyers. They often lump valuables in box lots, not recognizing a rare and valuable object.
Instead, we provide a fast and efficient method in which we evaluate and market these items to large and varied audiences.
- Household items with a level under $200 per piece or large objects too big to ship. For these items we might place a fixed price on each of the items in a home and conduct an ‘estate sale’ of the goods to the local marketplace. As we have been conducting sales for over fifteen years, our customer invitation list is quite extensive. We conduct a dignified and elegant event, rather than a simple garage or tag sale, raising price expectations of buyers.
- We know the best venues to sell valuables.
Our expert knowledge of the marketplace enables us to maximize returns for valuable items. High value items are generally best sold through major auction houses or to wealthy private collectors. We are major auction house consultants and know which specialty auction house will maximize return on a significantly valuable or rare object.
More modest items are often best sold via Internet auction at which we are among the most experienced sellers in America. The Internet auction marketplace reaches an audience in the tens of millions of bidders/buyers and we have completed over 200,000 auctions online since 1996. This resource is also excellent for art, automobiles, jewelry, coins, stamps, electronics, and antiques.
- We are expert appraisers with vast, up-to-date referencing resources covering an extraordinary range of specialty markets: Americana, Fine Art, Antiques, Fine Jewelry, Stamps & Coins, Furniture, Guns, Vehicles, and most kinds of Collections (even coins, silver, maps, toys, militaria and books!)
- We have a history of profitable sales and have established trade relationships with the top national and international boutique and general auction houses. And we know their strengths and weakness, so we can correctly place the more valuable assets to maximize client profits.
- We provide complete House Clearance if desired. We can organize and supervise on-premises estate sales and auctions.
- We can arrange immediate purchase of entire estates.
Added benefits of using our service are that we also clear houses for sale. During our sales, many home shoppers attend to attempt to purchase the home. Last year we passed their names on to several Executors, who were able to sell the homes without paying Realtors' fees. This is done as a courtesy without charge.
Our sales fees are based on a percentage of sales and are on a sliding scale. We are more than competitive with others, but as stated previously, we traditionally achieve double the price of most estate services.
References are available upon request from many respected professional Estate Attorneys, Trust Officers and Banking Professionals.
Timothy Gordon, I.S.A.A.
