Help-Appraisal needed

Hi All-let me start by saying this is a great forum, I am so happy I found it. Having said that I have recently been appointed a trustee to my great uncles estate. He had a huge coin collection (mostly gold & silver coins) all in their original boxes all stashed away in his home. It took months but my brothers and I opened all the boxes, took pictures of the coins as well as the packing lists, resealed the boxes and brought all the boxes to Brinks security. Brinks opened all the boxes and put an inventory together. It must be millions of dollars in coins based on the prices I saw he paid on the packing lists. And most were purchased in the 90's and early 2000's. He is leaving it all to charity (I wish charity started at home but it does not) so we need to appraise the coins so we can sell them. I need an old fashioned reputable appraisal company-can anybody please help/recommend?

Looking forward to your responses, you would really be helping.

Thanks,

Alan

 

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Hard to give you great advice without more information. Did you view all the coins? Do you wish you could keep any of them?

Where did most of the coins come from? US Mint? Are the majority of them still "raw"? Are any of them graded? So many more questions, but a little additional information would be helpful so the members here could give you good advice.

If the coins are pre-1964, I think the large auction houses would be your best bet. Heritage Auctions or Stack's Bowers would be two that I recommend. Of course, they'd likely want the coins sent to either PCGS or NGC before they would put them in an auction.

 

Welcome to CT.

 

Maybe try posting a couple of pics here so we can get a sense of what you're dealing with.

How many coins are in the collection? Do any of them stand out in particular?

 

Yes, where he bought them does matter. If they're mostly from Home Shopping Network or the like, I'm afraid there may be bad news for his charities. If he bought them from the Mint, especially during that time period, the news may be much better.

I'm sorry for your loss, and hope we can help get you the information you need. Welcome to CoinTalk!

 

What he paid and what they are worth can be totally different things, espectially if he was buying from companies like Littleton.

Are there any coin shops in your area? Appraisals tend to cost $50-200 per hour, depending on the dealer. If you are on Facebook, there is a group called “The Virtual Coin Show” in which many dealers are connected. They can definitely lead you in the right direction. Some dealers, when the monetary amount is high enough, will fly out and do the appraisal for you if they are given a shot to buy the collection.

 

if he left it to charity why do you need a appraisal? Ahre you getting the tax deduction for charity?

 

I have a 2013 penny woth silver front and copper arou d front edge with some small spots of copper. The back and edge are all copper. Is it worth anything?

 

Post 1982 Lincoln pennies are copper plated zinc, i’m almost certain your coins just been damaged.

 

I would hand them over to his chosen charity and let them spend their time and money liquidating them. They should be able to eventually give you a market value for tax purposes.

A few pics would be nice for us though


As someone said, if your uncle was buying coins from home shopping network, he was unfortunately scammed and throwing money away. Hopefully that’s not the case.

 

I agree with the concept of giving the coins themselves to a charity and let them do the work. One problem is if the uncle willed the coins on a value basis, rather than specific coins, to multiple charities, then a valuation would have to be made. Is any tax likely to be due on the estate? If so, the Brinks inventory and pictures may be good enough. Show them to a dealer or two for an opinion. I've been involved in a couple of estates where there were coins involved, and a generalized evaluation based on Redbook values was good enough.

Another advantage of turning the coins themselves over to the charity or charities is there is less chance of them complaining that the executor(s) did a poor job of marketing the coins and asking the executors to make-up the difference. If there are multiple charities involved, see if you can't get their reps together for an amicable division of the loot as per terms of the will. Getting them to sign-off on their share can eliminate future disputes. If the estate is sizeable, a lawyer should be involved.

Cal

 

Wow thanks for all the great responses-here are some more facts. The coins were all bought from the mint and all in their original boxes. They were opened only so we can take a picture of the packing list and a picture of the coins inside. Then when we brought them to Brinks they also opened them so they could do an inventory for them. They were all purchased in the 1990's and early 2000's mostly gold, some silver. Based on what he paid we estimate the collection to be worth around 2 million dollars. We cannot give it to the charities to do the work because in his will he allocates 50% of his assets to one charity and 50% to the other so if we give too much to one charity as trustees we can get into trouble. I would love to have a dealer come and just buy the whole thing instead of us selling it off piecemeal, there are thousands of coins.

 

That's a tough position for you to be put into. Honestly, I would turn it over to his lawyer to sort out and he can take his fee out of the contribution. It's not really fair to place the burden on the family, especially if there is no provision to compensate for time and expenses.

Also, if this is bullion, it may be worth only melt anyway. It may be fairly easy to come up with the current value, which may end up being much lower than what your uncle paid for it. Gold and silver is down a fair amount from it's highs 10 years ago.

 

10 years ago was 2009. (Feel old yet?)

Gold's spot price in the 1990s and early 2000s was mostly well under $400/oz. Even with the Mint's premium, those gold coins are almost certainly worth a lot more than he paid for them.

The OP mentioned acting as a "trustee" in this process. In the past when I was asked to serve as executor for a friend's will (which fortunately hasn't been exercised yet), he explained that the executor is able to draw funds from the estate for expenses related to administration. I don't know whether the OP is able to do this.

If the dollar cost of the lot is that high, there must be thousands of individual items, and it's likely that most aren't rare or otherwise special. I don't know if Heritage or Stacks is the place to go with such a collection -- I wonder if you might end up getting more money from a big bullion dealer like APMEX or Provident?

@Alandhorowitz, would you consider posting an excerpt or two from the inventory list here, to give us a better idea of the sorts of things in the collection?

 

There are thousands of coins, most of which are not rare-I will try and upload the inventory list. Since he is not leaving any money to the family he did say he would consider gifting the collection to a relative who can then donate it and use the charitable deduction if thats even legal. Anyway I am going to try and upload the inventory list

 

Also he has hundreds of thousands of dollars in his checking/investment accounts so running out of money or paying fees is not an issue

 

I cant upload the file its too huge a collection

 

Ok, will chime in. If he is saying one charity gets half his 'coins' and the other 'half', then you probably have no need to appraise the coins to sell. You might be able to divide the coins by what they are... i.e., one years mint set for another mint set in a year, figure out a value for each and go from there If he has specified they must be sold and the proceeds divided, then it also may just behoove you to consign them to someone to sell, either on ebay or at a shop or something. Get with a probate lawyer to determine the requirements and go with the method that puts the estate to have the least cost. Unless he has specified that you must try to get the most $$$ out of it.

Much should depend on the laws governing how to donate or sell to disperse funds. Your Great Uncle's heart may have been in the right place, but he did not make it easy for you to do. Follow the laws, and get a good lawyer who can advise the best course of action.

 

You should delete that invoice with the personal info on it.

My advice would be to take it to a reputable local coin dealer. Ask the dealer to make an offer. If it seems reasonable, take the offer and give each charity 50% and be done with it.