Estates: Steps you can take now to help your heirs in the future

We were once hired by someone who didn’t have a very cluttered apartment but wanted us to “clear out all the cobwebs.” What he meant by this was that he didn’t want any unnecessary stuff tucked away in drawers or closets because he wanted to make the process of emptying his home easier for his kids after he died.

Another client once hired us to prepare an inventory of the contents of her home, not because she needed things appraised or needed an inventory for a property insurance policy, but because she wanted to give her three adult children a road map of what they would find when they needed to handle her estate.

These are rare calls, but we’ve had a number of them over the years, and I love them. I’m always impressed by people who are realistic about the future and want to make things easier for the people who love them.

Much more often, sadly, we get calls from heirs and executors who have been left with very complicated estates and have no idea how to proceed.

We worked for one estate that caused a tremendous amount of stress for the deceased’s close friend - who he had appointed as his executor. The deceased, Howard, had been a life-long collector and had convinced everyone in his life that his collections were quite valuable. He collected Asian porcelain figures, oil paintings, portraits, religious relics, books about the royal family, antiques, and elaborate wigs, just to name a few.

He loved to host dinner parties and show his guests these elaborate collections. He loved telling people that his collections would, someday, make his heirs rich. To hear him speak about it, his friends believed they would be accepting bids from multiple dealers and auction houses.

Sadly, this turned out not to be the case. Some of his collections did have some value, but it was a pittance compared to what Howard had suggested it would be. His executor made herself crazy trying to find buyers for it all. When she was unsuccessful, she hired us to take over. We suspected right away what she had learned the hard way: there was little-to-no financial value in Howard’s collections.

In addition to selling things, Howard also specified in his will that he wanted some of his art donated to his alma mater. But he had never contacted them to see if they wanted it. He just assumed that they would be thrilled to receive it. His executor spent months trying to reach them. Each time she got the name of a contact who seemed they might be helpful, they would hand her off to someone else. The truth was that they just didn’t have enough interest in the collection to make it worth accepting the donation.

Howard’s executor and other friends were all devastated by the reality of the situation. They even considered keeping his apartment until they achieved the goals Howard had hoped for. But this would require maintaining an empty apartment in Manhattan, and paying for insurance, taxes, and utilities. The estate did not include much cash, so this would be a difficult thing to do.

I never met Howard but I am sure he did not plan to leave his friends in such a difficult position. He believed that they would be making a ton of money and thanking him every day for his generosity and savvy collecting. But he was speaking from a place of optimism, not one of reality.

We did manage to sell a lot of Howard’s things through a reputable, small, auction house, but the sales were nominal and the estate spent a lot of money on our services and on the cost of removing everything that the auction house would not take. In the end, I am not sure the auction sales even covered these costs.

I wish I could have spoken to Howard before he died. My advice would have been for him to give his friends and heirs the tools they would need to handle his estate more easily. Here are some of the suggestions I would have made:

• If you suspect you have things with strong re-sale value, please do some research to back up your suspicions.

• You might want to hire an appraiser to assess your things, and then hire them to re-assess them every five or ten years, to reflect the changing market for used goods.

• If you aren’t inclined to pay for an appraiser, reach out to some auction houses and ask them if they would be potentially interested in, one day, auctioning your collections. Get their feedback in writing and include it with your will.

• If your things are valuable, you will want to leave your heirs enough money to take care of them properly. There are costs associated with auctioning or selling anything valuable.

As you look around your home, try to think about it from the perspective of your estate executor. Be realistic about what you own, or do some research to find out if things you always assumed have value actually do. Then make sure you leave your heirs the resources and tools they will need to empty your home.