Your sage advice appreciated

[tbickle]

First, I apologize if this is in the wrong section.

And second I apologize if the picture sizes are annoying.

Ok, here goes: A beloved family member recently passed away unexpectedly. I've been tasked with going through his things and creating an inventory for estate valuation purposes. He was an avid sportsman and collector of all things related to that...to a fault (you can barely walk in his house). I was directed to this community for a rough estimate of what he has and how I should value it/other considerations. I wish I would have spent more time with him and learned about reloading, but, alas, life seems to work out that way. Any help is greatly appreciated.

[tbickle]

Continued:

Attachment 106295Attachment 106296Attachment 106297Attachment 106298Attachment 106299Attachment 106300

Again, thanks for any direction you may offer.

[Sweetpea]

Wow...

You've got your work cut out for you!

First, let's get a location, see if there is a member nearby that may be willing to help sort and price items.

Pretty much everything shown could be sold here pretty easily, if the price is reasonable. Powder and Primers will be much easier face to face only, and the powder may only be good for fertilizer.

To sell on this forum, you will need at least 30 days membership, and at least 25 relevant posts. (Me too) doesn't count.

The dies and other tools could be sold on Ebay, or maybe gunbroker or similar, as well as the components.

Feel free to ask any more questions.

Brandon

[tbickle]

Thanks, Brandon, that's the kind of info I'm after! That, and if anyone has a gut-feeling, rough ballpark (enough qualifiers?) estimate of what I should put on the inventory as a value for his reloading supplies.

Location is a couple hours east of Pittsburgh PA.

[Zymurgy50]

The best I could help you with would be;
$20 for steel die sets, $30 for carbide die sets
The bullets you are gonna have to inventory and maybe check an online retailer to get an idea.
I dont know of too many people who would buy opened cans of powder, but any sealed powder would sell fast at $20/lb. Just remember that shipping powder or primers is ONE BIG HASSLE!!!

Sorry but I can not see the pics in your second post, no idea what you have there.

[Sweetpea]

Gosh...

Putting a value on it, Lock, Stock, and Barrel, would need a detailed inventory list, as many of those component boxes are probably only partials, and the dies and other equipment may be superb, or partially rusty?

If you need to put a value on the whole thing for the family, that's quite a chore.

My advice would be the same as eating an elephant... One sandwich at a time.

Start with one end, and slowly list items, and as they sell, keep moving down the line.

Trying to make a complete inventory and sell it all at the same time can be done with a proper spreadsheet setup, but IMHO, you're probably going to want to pull your hair out just keeping track of it, not to mention sending out 5000 packages all at once.

Brandon

[tbickle]

The best I could help you with would be
$20 for steel die sets, $30 for carbide die sets
The bullets you are gonna have to inventory and maybe check an online retailer to get an idea.
I dont know of too many people who would buy opened cans of powder, but any sealed powder would sell fast at $20/lb. Just remember that shipping powder or primers is ONE BIG HASSLE!!!

Thanks. Yeah, from the few other people I've asked about it it seems that the open powder is probably not worth anything. I've heard some people collect the old empty cans, though. Are they worth keeping?

[Sweetpea]

Yes, the empty cans are probably worth a couple bucks each.

[starmac]

If you do not know what you are looking at, you really need to get someone that does to make sure die sets are comeplete and value them, all dies are not created equal as far as price goes. The powder, primers and loaded ammo, will likely sell quick and easy through what ever local classifieds you have available. The rest could be sold here with decent pictures, and you could even sell it auction style if you don't know what it is worth.

[tbickle]

Gosh...

Putting a value on it, Lock, Stock, and Barrel, would need a detailed inventory list, as many of those component boxes are probably only partials, and the dies and other equipment may be superb, or partially rusty?

If you need to put a value on the whole thing for the family, that's quite a chore.

My advice would be the same as eating an elephant... One sandwich at a time.

Start with one end, and slowly list items, and as they sell, keep moving down the line.

Trying to make a complete inventory and sell it all at the same time can be done with a proper spreadsheet setup, but IMHO, you're probably going to want to pull your hair out just keeping track of it, not to mention sending out 5000 packages all at once.

Brandon

Yeah, I apologize for my over-zealousness. I actually wish I was at the point where I could just inventory and sell things. All I'm doing now is trying to estimate rough values for estate tax purposes since there is a short window to file those. It would take years to go through everything sufficiently on my weekends off. And the reloading was only a small part of his "collecting" habit.

[Uncle Jimbo]

First, let's get a location, see if there is a member nearby that may be willing to help sort and price items.

I agree with sweetpea, there are a lot of members here that would probably help you out if we knew where you are located.

[David2011]

Estate taxes are immoral. Every item your friend had was paid for with money that had already been taxed. Now the government wants to tax it again. There's no reason to value things at top dollar for the tax man. I've bought plenty of dies sets at $10-$15 at gun shows. Opened powder would only have value to someone who knew your friend as a gift. Most people won't buy opened powder because they can't know 100% that the contents match the label. Sealed powder, I agree, would be worth about $20. Individuals cannot ship powder or primers so local face-to-face is the only outlet. Primers are usually found in cases of 5,000 which is 5 sleeves of 1,000 which is 10 individual packages of 100 each. Prices on primers have come back down to the new normal of about $3.00/hundred. I've bought primers as low as $2.00/hundred recently at a gun show. These aren't the average price; they're the low end price but at the same time the tax man would have trouble arguing about them. Anything that's incomplete should have a very low value or no value. Tools- $2-$3 as far as the tax man is concerned unless they're cheap tools that were only a dollar new. Those will garage sale for $0.25. You can look at www.midwayusa.com for the value of bullets, prorate to the actual eyeballed quantity in the box and then value them at 60% of that for less popular sizes and 80% for popular calibers like 9mm (.355), .40 (.401), .44 (.429), .45 (.451), .224 and .308. By no means is that list perfect but it's a start.

You might try posting the second set of pictures again since they don't open. If there are reloading presses they sell pretty easily if the prices are right. I don't mean giveaway but so much of what's in E-bay right now is just overpriced and therefore no bids are made. I regularly see RCBS "JR" series presses for $70 and up for a press that wasn't that much new. It's not "vintage;" it's an old used press. I have one and figure that it's worth $35-$40 if I decided to sell it.

My two cents worth. . .
David

[oldfart1956]

tbickle if you're a coupl'a hours from Pittsburg I should be able to see your house from here! HAW!HAW!HAW! I'm in Greencastle, Pa. by the way. Anyways, I read your post before going to work last night and pondered on it all night. As posted, the tax man already got his bite once and I wouldn't over-value the items because unless you want to make 50,000 trips to the post office and spend months packaging before that the actual value isn't that high. I'd love to see the other items(attachments won't open) just to peek in. But...it all comes down to how much time do you want to spend on it? Time (and aggravation) is money. What you need is someone who deals in bulk/estate purchases of this nature. And I know a guy! Ed Kennedy is the owner of Ed's Sport Shop Inc. up in Tamaqua Pa. His kids are running the shop now and Ed travels to gun shows selling (literally tons) of stuff he bought at estate sales. The shop by the way is just a bit north of the Cabela's store in Hamburg, Pa. if that helps. Give him a call. Phone number is (570) 668-1080 and their hours on his card read Mon.-Fri. 11 a.m. till 7 p.m. and Saturday 9 a.m. until 4 p.m. They have a website at www.edssportshop.com as well. Let whoever answers the phone know you need to talk to Ed, and why. Send them an e-mail with an attachment of the photos you posted. Be sure and note in the subject line...estate reloading items for sale. Ed and his family are great folks. Audie...the Oldfart.

[LeadRecycler]

Depending on which direction you are calling "east," I may be able to lend a hand as well. My mother lives in Altoona, and I will be in that area for a good bit to do some work on her house.

[brassrat]

tbickle lol

[tbickle]

Depending on which direction you are calling "east," I may be able to lend a hand as well. My mother lives in Altoona, and I will be in that area for a good bit to do some work on her house.

Northeast of Pittsburgh would have been a more accurate description on my part. About 30 miles north of Altoona.

Thanks again for the tips. You have a great community here. I'll be sure to keep posting and engage the locals when it comes time to sort things.

[Wayne Smith]

Oldfart has the right idea. Let a professional handle it. He will low ball you, but he handles all the work and has to make a profit, too. Just hauling all that stuff out of there will be a job! If there are some large items, like reloading presses, that you want to handle you may maximize the profit you get from those for the family. If you know nothing about them post pics of them here and a lot of us can give you some reality based value.

[DR Owl Creek]

You do have your work cut out for you. You've been given a lot of good advise so far too.

I would add that in order to make sure you (or your friends) don't take too big of a hit on the values, you need to have an accurate inventory of what you have. Microsoft Excel is your friend. If you haven't used it before, don't worry. Its easy to use. If you can type, you can use it. It would help if you had a lap-top you could take to where the stuff is located. If not, box the stuff up and take it where you have a computer.

Do a separate spread sheet for each category of items: one for dies, one for components, one for factory ammo, etc. Don't worry about alphabetizing the items. Excel will do that for you.

For example, with the dies, list the manufacturer in column one, list the calibers in column two, give a brief description in column three, list its condition in column four, leave column five blank for pricing. You can put anything else you want in there too. For factory ammo, etc, you should also have quantities. Once you have everything entered into Excel, sort column one (manufacturers) alphabetically, and column two (calibers) in ascending value. You can then use that spreadsheet to add pricing. As said above, go to Midway (www.midwayusa.com) or Mid South Shooters Supply (www.midsouthshooters.com) for current market values. You'll have to factor these prices later based on condition, etc.

This may sound like a lot of work, but it will have to be done. If you don't do it, the attorney for the executor of the estate or his paralegal will do it. They charge an hourly rate based upon the number of MINUTES they work on it, in most jurisdictions. You should also keep a written record of what you do, AND how much time you spend on it. When you're done, you can submit a bill to the estate, and be paid a reasonable rate for your time by the executor. In the long run, you'll save them a lot of money.

Dave

[shooter93]

I'm near State College Pa. probably the closest to you. Let me know if I can be of any help.

[dbosman]

If there are taxes due, remember everything steel and iron depreciates tremendously. Rust. It's just terrible how fast it can ruin things.
Some of those die sets might bring $1.
Bullets are bad news. Some of us will help you dispose of them and probably pay the postage just to help out.

If there are no taxes due, we'll help out with valuations.