Take a guess for me

[anonymuse]

I'm trying to figure value of things in the home. Most of my furniture is hand me downs--even my bed is the same one I used in high school that my parents gave back to me when I bought my house (over 22 years old--yes I have a newer mattress though).

The only "new" piece of furniture is a couch I purchased in 2001 for about $1000. It's got average wear (and it's share of dog hair from my beagle). I know it's just an opinion, but how much do you think that couch costs after 5 years?

[SinkingFast]

Old Law you could use "Fire Sale" pricing to set your values.

New Law, you must use replacement costs for similar items. But, where you find a 4 year old sofa??

Yard sales, garage sales, Goodwill, and other 2nd hand furniture outlets.

Look in the paper in the classifieds for the garage sale and yard sale ads. Sometimes, people will list furniture items that are similar to what you own. That's where I got a value for our bedroom suite. Someone selling a similar set.

Goodwill has an auction website. It's much like eBay. Goodwills from all over the country post all kinds of items there for sell. Another good thing about the Goodwill auction,............. Goodwill sets a minimum or opening bid on bigger items like computers, sofas, dining tables and chairs, and such. So even if no one bids on something, you've got a base price to list.

[anonymuse]

I've used eBay for other stuff and didn't know about the Goodwill site http://www.shopgoodwill.com/ . Found my camera on there -- worth $10.29 LOL . No couches on Goodwill, but I can't believe they are on eBay. Shipping would kill them!

[SinkingFast]

On average, when I was looking at Goodwill, GW was opening sofa's for $50. Unless it was an antique or leather or something. Those can go as high as $100 to open. When you use the GW site, sometimes you have to think of other names things are called. Couch, loveseat, sofa, divan, or however it's spelled. There's no common terminology for listing things at GW.

GW and eBay both, on large items, make them local pick-up. So very often, the only people bidding are people that live in the area to begin with. GW and eBay both say on most of their larger items ads, shipping is not an option. The item must be picked up.

Fully functional computers, tower only, sell at GW for around $50. A total computer, including monitor and speakers, will run up to $100. Laptops about the same. $50-$100.

[anonymuse]

Thanks for the sofa tip--kept on using couch, sectional, and "la-z-boy"/"lazy boy" on eBay. Found one almost identical (larger model of mine) for $250.

I have a computer (486) that I bought about 10 years ago for $49. LOL Guess it's worth about $5 now.

[SinkingFast]

The first time I talked to our attny's paralegal back in January, she said Old Law, the average household was valued at $2K to $2500. When we had our Consult, the paralegal said our household goods value would probably run up around $4K-$4500. Not to be surprised if that's the figure we saw. With the New Law, they wanted to be sure we and the attny were covered for not undervaluing our things.