My MIL passed away in November after a long battle with cancer, She has left my husband and brother quite a bit of money and left us the condo and the contents with the exception of her engagement ring, which she left to BIL, There is a lot of jewelry. A lot. We are not really jewelry people and I had hoped there might be a family stone–diamond-- to give to each grand child for the future. I would like to sell it all and perhaps a) buy a stone for each grandchild for when the time is right or b) sell it all and open a cd for each grandchild to give them when they get engaged. The grandchildren are 20, 19, 19 and 16 (three eldest are girls, my son is the only boy) Obviously sentimental pieces would not be sold.
Thoughts?
ETA DH doesn’t mind either way, he says it all “just stuff” and he’s trying to get rid of it so we can sell the condo before the taxed are due in April
I can’t help with selling the jewelry, but I wanted to tell you what we did. My parents are divorced and when my father passed away, my mom went through the jewelry that he gave her. There are 3 grand daughters in our family and 2 grandsons. My mom had the gold (white) melted down and took stones out of pieces and each grand daughter was able to design a new ring using the gold and the stones. My girls love their rings. (not certain what my mom did about the boys since they are my brother’s sons) Just a suggestion to think about using some of the jewelry, since you said there is quite a lot!
Your perspective on this seems similar to how I would feel. I’d probably give the grandchildren an opportunity to pick out a favorite or two, save anything with sentimental value, and then sell the rest.
I love the practicality of your idea…but I have a suggestion. Gather all the jewelry up and put it in a safety deposit box for now. Wait a year before you do anything with it. Get the real estate resolved and do the clean out and and let the family grieve for a year. Grief counselors say that whenever possible…putting sentimental decisions off for a year is usually for the best. I think this is particularly important because the three people who would likely be most interested in the original jewelry are the girls who I understand from your post are you nieces? My suggestion would be to have the girls over for Christmas, if possible, and let them each choose one item as a last gift from their Grandma. Beyond that, it sounds like she left plenty of funds for the parents to help their kids, if needed. I would strongly caution you against doing “engagement” CDs…since it’s sort of discriminatory against kids who might not want to get married. Young people are putting that decision off much longer these days, and very often kids in their 20’s could benefit more from financial help in the college years.
Also, when you’re ready to sell the bulk of the jewelry, don’t rush it…research what you have and find someone honest who can fairly market it for you. Grieving families are so often taken advantage of. A friend of ours was thrilled to be offered five thousand dollars for her husband’s taxidermy and gun collection…she had no knowledge of what it was worth, and no interest in it…in her grief she just wanted to be rid of it, as it wasn’t an interest she shared with her husband and she wanted the large room clear for another purpose. (she found his menagerie of dead animals very creepy, too…lol) Thank God my husband got there before she made the final deal with person who offered her the five thousand! Hubby helped her find a reputable dealer. The collection, sold by the piece… was sold for over two hundred thousand dollars at auction.
@MaryGJ one is my daughter the other 2 are my nieces. My MIL and the grandchildren were not close, despite the fact that we lived in the same town. . We asked BIL if he wanted pieces for his girls, he declined. Perhaps I could send BIL the money for each grandchild to do with as they please when he feels it is right. Thank you all.
You might want to get this all appraised before you make any further decisions. We know several families who had a lot of jewelry they thought was very valuable…and found it was actually only able to be sold for a fraction of the purchase and appraised prices.
I do like your idea of somehow dividing up,the proceeds amongst the grandchildren.
@thumper1 I do plan to have that done. Thank you
@kandcsmom
I think your plan to divide amongst the grandchildren is terrific.
Agree, get it appraised. Then, if someone wants one or two pieces, you’ll have a better idea of value. And, if you decide to keep anything, (on the off chance something is really valuable,) you’ll have an idea of what to insure for. Or not.
Most times, resale is far less than you think.
@lookingforward I’m sure. And that’s fine, I just want to be fair.
In experience…with my mother’s jewelry…diamond, gold and platinum were easily able to be sold if we wanted to. Other stones…not so much so. We had beautiful saphhires, emerald, rubies…some aquamarines…they would not have sold for 1/4 of what they were purchased for.
So…we kept it all…and actually divided up the jewelry between the grandchildren.
My in laws had jewelry they thought was VALUABLE, it was not
That being said, there are variables in the resale
You can remove stones and sell gold for it’s melt down value
You can trade the value and have a jeweler make a new item.
You can take out a large stone and put it in a pretty new setting.
You can find a jeweler and try to have them sell it.
We had one piece that he spent five figures on in the 80s, and he was certain it was going be worth a ton of money, but it will not even be sold for what he paid for it, and that’s if we are lucky to find a buyer
And the seller will take a percentage of the sales price.
We have talked to assorted jewelers to whom we were referred all up and down the west coast, have had it consigned in two places and are very happy with the service and communication, if you decide to sell it via consignment and want a referral, let me know
Mainly what I proved is that FIL wasted a ton of money on jewelry that he thought was some big valuable investment and, darn it, jewelry is not an investment, it’s a pretty thing to enjoy if it makes you happy and that’s it.
Oh, and appraisals, what I found was that a current appraisal value was about twice what I would pay for the item at a non-mall store and 4x what that same jeweler would be willing to pay me for the item, assuming they were even interested in buying it
No help, but just chiming in to commend your family on your willingness to sell things whose usefulness ended when the owner passed away. I hear often of family conflict because Joey’s new wife sold Aunt Tillie’s broach to make a necklace, instead of keeping the hideous thing forever and ever because Aunt Tillie! Or whatever the sentimental item is. Allowing the grandkids to choose a piece, if they want, or to choose to have a new piece made from the available material, or taking cash/CD payment if jewelry is not their thing makes the gift meaningful and memorable to them, in a good way.
Appraisal value for insurance has little to no relationship to the amount you can actually get at resale. That amount is only relevant if the piece is lost or stolen. To sell to a jeweler or on the second hand market you will generally only get a small fraction.
Dittoing the comments about selling to jewelers. They won’t pay anything close to appraised value for insurance. The one thing they will pay decent price for is large diamonds. My cousin sold her mom’s 10 carat for $40k and it had flaws.
Wow–can’t imagine a 10 carat diamond. It must have been enormous!
Will reiterate that if you decide to sell the jewelry you will be shocked at how little you will get for it. Exceptions are large diamonds and rare sapphires and little else. Good idea to hang onto it for a while and deal with the process when everything else from the estate is settled. Most times its very expensive to design/have something made from existing stones or gold and if you’re already not “jewelry people” it may not be worth it. For your family, may utimately make sense for family to keep one sentimental piece each, sell the remainder and go on a trip that you’ll all enjoy.
This is a good reminder for the rest of us that buying jewelry is not an investment. I mostly buy from one person at local jewelry shows. He often sells custom-made or designer brand estate pieces at about 80% discount compared to store prices. Recently, I got a beautiful custom ring with emeralds and a large blue topaz (that constantly changes color) for just $90.
I have to say…my mom doesn’t have a lot of “valuable” jewelry. She had a handful of pieces…diamonds can always be sold. That being said…dividing the jewelry between the grandchildren worked for our family. And it was a whole lot easier than trying to sell it.