Handle Collectible

When a person dies how do you handle the estate?

Say a person dies and has lots of “stuff” in their estate. I’m talking about furniture and collectibles. Not cash or other bank accounts. Can the estate “stuff” be appraised so that the inheritance tax return can be filed? And then can the executor hold an auction at a later date to dispose of the “stuff” and then split the proceeds from the auction with the beneficiaries. Any drawbacks to doing it this way and does the person who appraises the estate have to give a detailed list of “stuff”? Or can they simply say it’s worth is “x” amount of dollars?

It depends on a variety of factors including: 1) the size of the estate and 2) the relationships of the various beneficiaries.

If you are substantially below the threshold for state and federal estate taxes, then you really only need to concern yourself with making sure that the various beneficiaries are satisfied that they receive their fair share of the net proceeds. If the personal items have any value and the beneficiaries are likely to have conflicted requests, my advice is to have an appraiser come in to put a value on each item (even if only a ball-park estimate). Then each beneficiary should be given an opportunity to claim individual items at their “value” established by the appraiser (or to bid on items that are requested by multiple beneficiaries). The items that aren’t claimed should then be sold (a tag sale or auction would work) with the proceeds divided. Beneficiaries that don’t claim items or don’t claim items with high values should be given a “credit” that will increase their share of the cash proceeds.

My brothers and I handled our Dad’s estate this way and it seems to work out fine.

Rough Rider Patrick Henry Bowie:Collectible Coolness

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