Avoiding Inheritance Squabbles

Furniture, decorative items, jewelry, etc. still often get less than what people think they are worth. High end antiques dealers want a big chunk. And trends come and go. Stickley was hot at one point and some stuff we could have gotten much more for if we had sold at peak of interest is not worth all that much these days. But it still has sentimental value. Mid century modern prices will vary depending on what is fashionable or in demand at time of sale .

Prices on antique furniture have plummeted. Yankee magazine published an article last year on the lack of popularity of ā€œbrownā€ antiques. The younger generation just donā€™t want the old stuff anymore. This is evident on Antiques Roadshow ā€œvintageā€ episodes, where a show from ~15 yrs ago is rerun, but the items are re-appraised. Values on antique furniture consistently go down.

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Well, Iā€™ve claimed the ā€œnutā€ bowl and sis can take the rest!

Love me a nice nut bowl!

Ha! My brother and I split the nut bowls ; )

Itā€™s actually a painted bowl featuring nuts of all kinds given to my grandparents as a wedding present about 100 years ago. Itā€™s always been a favorite in the house.

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That bowl sounds AMAZING. And in my family, it would rotate annually depending on who was making Thanksgiving!

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@blossom, neither of my parents specified who should get Dadā€™s wedding ring, at the moment, we are rotating it between each sibling for several months. Once everyone has had an opportunity to enjoy, I think we will propose that we just keep doing that, itā€™s nice to wear it, itā€™s nice to know another is enjoying it. The ring does not have to go to just one person, at least not for a long long time.

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My dad died before my mom. When mom moved to a retirement place we had to clean out her house then. It was a huge job as they had lived in the same house for 50 years and were children of the Depression so kept a LOT of stuff. What my brother and sister and I did was do a round robin. Weā€™d go through a room or a pile of knick knacks and each take a turn to pick out one item or one set (of dishes, say, there were 4 sets). For the most part it worked pretty well. Then when mom moved from Independent Living to Assisted, we did the same thing again, and again from Assisted to Nursing, and then again when she died. I ended up taking too much stuff, really. I need to declutter and get rid of some of the knick-knacks. But we didnā€™t end up hating each other. It was more of a strain when my dad was in a nursing home for 7 yrs and my mom was in the retirement/assisted/nursing for three years. My brother thought it had to be ā€œfairā€ about how many hours we each spent with them. That soured our relationship more than any stuff. He had no kids and I had two toddlers at the time. My sister lived 5 hrs away. Weā€™ve mostly gotten past it, but our relationship is not what it once was. Heā€™s a hard person to deal with sometimes.

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Sweet gum, that is a universal problem. I lived close to my parents and became their caretakers for many years. My sister would visit once a year. She was my phone support when I was stressed out. For others, the resentment builds.

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Sweetgum- I hear you. Iā€™ve been at funerals where the child who swooped in at the end (sat by the bedside for two weeks, dealt with private nurses or an institution for a few months) gets thanked vociferously, and the siblings whoā€™ve basically been dealing with the declining health for a decade sit and stewā€¦Agree that eldercare and toddlers is the 7th circle of hell. Hugs to you!

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Huh, maybe my father was on to something. A couple of years ago, while over at my parentsā€™ house, I wanted to show my kids a particular photo from childhood so went to grab one of the photos albums that for 50+ years had been stored on the bookshelf in their living room. Except they were missing. I asked my mother where they were and she had not noticed they were gone.

It seems my father took it upon himself to scan all the photos and put them on thumb drives for me and my two siblings and then, threw the albums out! He never said a word to anyone, not even my mother. She, and we, were furious! He was surprised that we even cared. There is something special about having a yellowed and aged photo of me in elementary school with the Dorothy Hamil haircut that just isnā€™t the same viewed on a computer screen. Funny thing is that my siblings and I would not have fought over the albums, but my father for some reason thought it was time to get rid of them. He and my mom are rather anal about getting rid of things, keeping their house organized, etc, so in that sense, when it is time to move them out of our family home, we are lucky it wonā€™t be as much work as some adult children face.

Throwing things out without telling anyone: sounds like something my dad might do. That was the reason I took the three hundred year old family Bible which is all in German. He might very well have thrown it out, not being able to read a word of it, and it not being from his side of the family.

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My parents threw out my beloved Barbie game without asking me when they moved while I was away at college. Decades later, I can still remember how sad I felt when I found out. Ridiculous, I know!

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I happened to be there fortunately when my dad decided to throw out his college yearbooks which turned out to be a real treasure. Not only did I enjoy them but my kids did too. It was a different era and a piece of history. Now every time my dad mentions going through stuff to discard I tell him to wait and weā€™ll go through it together.

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@sevmom My mother gave away my Barbie to her hairdresserā€™s children without asking me. I was in college at the time and I was very sad too. So today, I donā€™t throw away or donate any of my kidsā€™ things without checking with them first.

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My mother surprised me one day by showing up for a visit with my barbie dolls (in the blue folding case). Only problem, it is my sisterā€™s not mine (so I guess my sister has mine). Since my sister and are are estranged I may never find out. I may have gotten lucky in this deal, my sister had one of the very first ones ever made (since she is older). So if any of them become worth something it would be that one.

Iā€™m loving this. Several years ago I opened Christmas presents from my momā€“some of my first toys that she had saved including my Barbie doll.

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I once asked my mother why she threw out her Shirley Temple doll long before I existed. She asked in return why I threw out my Barbie dolls.

To my credit i saved the pokemon cards

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