For Estate Sale Shoppers

Before researching an artist or trying to understand what an artwork may be worth, it helps to answer a more basic question: What is the artwork actually made with? A work that appears to be a painting could be oil, acrylic, watercolor, gouache, pastel, ink, or mixed media. Sometimes what looks painted from across the room is actually a print or reproduction. Identifying the medium can help determine how the work should be researched, handled, photographed, and compared with

An unidentified painting can be one of the hardest items in an estate to evaluate. Sometimes the artist’s signature is easy to read. Often it is not. Some paintings are unsigned. Others have signatures that are faded, partially hidden, difficult to decipher, or added later. And sometimes the most useful information is not on the front of the artwork at all. Before selling an unknown painting, print, drawing, or other work of art, it is worth slowing down long enough to gather

At an estate sale, price matters. But timing can matter just as much. A shopper who understands how an estate sale changes throughout the day—and from one sale day to the next—may sometimes find better opportunities to negotiate without being aggressive or asking the seller to ignore the published discount structure. The key is understanding that an estate sale is not static. The seller’s position at 9:05 in the morning may be very different from the seller’s position at 4:45

Negotiating at an estate sale is not unusual. How you negotiate can make a considerable difference. A shopper may believe the conversation is simply about price. But on the other side of that conversation is usually an estate-sale operator who has spent days preparing the home, researching merchandise, organizing thousands of items, dealing with the family, setting prices, advertising the sale and managing a house full of shoppers. Walk up to that person and immediately begin

Estate-sale shoppers often begin making decisions long before they reach the front door. A recent St. Louis Magazine article interviewed an experienced vintage reseller who attends roughly 10 estate sales a month and described how she studies listings, photographs, line procedures, payment rules, discount schedules, and even the apparent contents of individual rooms before deciding how to approach a sale. For buyers, those are shopping strategies. For homeowners and estate-sa

Estate-sale articles often tell shoppers what to look for. Sometimes they tell buyers what to avoid. A recent Southern Living article, “6 Estate Sale Items That Aren’t Always the Bargain They Seem,” warns shoppers to be cautious with several categories, including upholstered furniture, baby items, electronics, incomplete games and puzzles, expensive items whose value claims are difficult to verify, and purchases made simply because something appears to be a bargain. The artic

A recent estate-sale listing described a “picker sale” where much of the property had not been fully priced or thoroughly sorted in advance, allowing buyers to search through the home and make discoveries as they shopped. Picker sales are not new, and they are not automatically a problem. In some situations, they can be a practical choice. A family may need to clear a property quickly. A house closing may be approaching. There may not be enough time for a traditional multi-da

Estate-sale articles often speak directly to shoppers. They tell buyers what to look for, what categories may be overlooked, and where hidden value might be sitting in plain sight. A recent Martha Stewart article does exactly that. The article, “8 Valuable Collectibles You Should Always Buy at Estate Sales, According to Experts,” highlights categories such as silver and silver-plated trophies, alabaster vessels, collectible glass, coffee-table books, midcentury furniture, Rus