Appraisal and donating a collection

[steve]

People have been know to place antiques up on ebay
with $1,000,000 reserves to determine market value of
the antiques, not recommending that, but its been
done.

You could grab past ebay auctions of similar equipment
in similar condition. Final prices vary widely on
similar items, true,  but if you are trying to
appraise 100 items it probably evens out. 

Taking good pictures of your donations and printing
out the ebay auctions prices (with pictures) would
provide a good source of material if your audited. If
the pictures are taken by someone other then you, even
better.

Also, using the prices from the book "collectible
microcomputers" is another option.

I think want you want for difficult to price items
like this is multiple sources of price information,
current ebay prices (best), books, and appraisers. Of
course a good appraiser takes all this into account to
begin with, but its nice to have back up info.  

--- Tony Eros <tony.eros at machm.org> wrote:

> I'm looking to donate my vintage computer collection
> to a museum in
> Delaware.  The museum is a 501(c)3 educational
> foundation, so theoretically
> my donation will be tax-deductible.
> 
> >From what I'm reading though, it looks like I will
> need to get the
> collection appraised in order to properly take
> advantage of the tax
> benefits.
> 
> Has anyone on the list had experience in this area? 
> How do I go about
> getting my collection valued?
> 
> Thanks!
> 
> -- Tony
> 
> 
> 
> 



		
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