Appraisals

We are a full service company offering everything from the sale to the cleanout even a certified Appraisal. There are many instances when you need to have your personal property or collections appraised, before a potential sale, for insurance purposes, divorce, settlement of an estate, or even to donate an item(s) to a museum or other organizations. Whether it is your grandmother’s antiques in the attic, your parent’s estate, or the autographed baseball from your childhood, a personal property appraiser can help you understand the value of these objects.

WHAT IS PERSONAL PROPERTY?

Personal Property is all the items in and around your home that are not a fixed, part of the home or land. If the item can be mobile and it can be on “your person” then it is considered personal property. As general personal property appraisers we have the knowledge, experience and resources to certify the value of virtually every personal property item you have in your life. NYTS has extensive experience in understanding, identifying, and certifying the value of a broad range of personal property items including:

Fine Art – Jewelry – Antiques – Collectibles – Memorabilia – General Furnishings - coin collection – stamp collections – sterling flatware and other pieces – men’s and ladies watches – cars – boats, etcetera

However, there are several important considerations to keep in mind when getting your personal property appraised. The below guidelines will help ensure that you fully understand the process and that you hire the most appropriate appraiser possible.

We don’t pull valuations out of a hat.
While it can be fun to imagine an appraiser staring into a crystal ball when performing a valuation; the reality is that we rely on a substantial amount of research, expertise, and experience to arrive at a credible opinion of value for an object. First and foremost, we rely upon the Uniform Standards of Professional Appraisal Practice (USPAP), the Congressionally authorized standards for real estate appraisers and the widely recognized standards for personal property appraisers.

We most commonly look to past sales of similar objects to determine the value of an item. In this approach, we will find similar objects to the one being valued, and then account for differences based on a number of factors, including each of the item’s importance, quality, condition, rarity, desirability, and provenance. Based on these differences, we can begin to place an object into a hierarchy of value and ultimately arrive at a final valuation.

Different circumstances call for different values.
Believe it or not, the value an appraiser places on an object partially depends on the purpose of the appraisal. For example, if someone is getting an appraisal for insurance purposes, an appraiser will value the object based on its replacement value, which is how much it may cost to replace the object within a reasonable time period. In contrast, a donated object valued for tax purposes will require a fair market approach, which looks at how much on average the object would sell for on the open market. Typically, a valuation for the purposes of insurance will be higher since the cost of replacing a specific object can be quite high and above the potential market value, especially when the item is unique.

The appraised value of an item does not mean it will sell for that value. The appraised value of an item is often different from the amount it sells for, whether on the open market, online, at an estate sale, in an auction, or elsewhere. This is because there are additional factors at play.

Appraisers charge for their services.
After watching Antiques Roadshow or similar shows, one might mistakenly believe that appraisers offer their services free of charge. However, appraising is like any profession and need to charge for our time and expertise.