Estate Planning · Valuation

Executor Valuation Instructions

An executor valuation instruction is the written brief that tells an appraiser what collectible property must be valued, why the valuation is required, the relevant date, the legally appropriate basis of value, who may rely on the report and what the final deliverables must contain.

The instruction does not tell the valuer what answer to reach. Its purpose is to define the assignment clearly enough that the resulting opinion is independent, evidence-based and usable for the estate task at hand. This distinction matters because a single collection can have materially different probate, insurance, retail, auction, liquidation, donation and beneficiary-allocation values.

Core rule

Instruct the assignment, not the outcome

The executor should define the estate question precisely and provide full access to the available evidence. The valuer must remain free to select the relevant market, comparables, methods, adjustments and final conclusion.

Requests such as “keep it below the tax threshold”, “match the figure already filed” or “use the insurance schedule because it is convenient” compromise the assignment. The executor is the client, but does not own the appraiser's professional conclusion.

The first decision

State the valuation purpose precisely

“Please value the collection” is too vague. A sound instruction identifies the exact estate decision or filing the report must support.

Estate reporting

Probate, inheritance tax or estate tax

The instruction should request the legally prescribed market-value opinion at the correct effective date. It is not automatically an auction reserve, dealer retail total, insurance replacement figure or net sale receipt.

Administration

Division among beneficiaries

A division exercise may use date-of-death values, current distribution-date values or both. The executor must say which question is being answered, especially when administration has lasted long enough for markets or condition to change.

Disposal

Proposed sale

A sale brief may ask about likely hammer price, net proceeds, reserves, selling period, venue and lotting. Those outputs are useful, but they should not silently replace a formal estate valuation.

Risk management

Insurance during administration

The collection may need revised cover after the executor takes control. Replacement or reinstatement values can be materially higher than estate-market values and should be commissioned as a separate purpose.

Transfer

Charitable donation

A proposed donation may require a fresh appraisal meeting the receiving jurisdiction's tax, evidential and institutional requirements. The estate report may not be sufficient on its own.

Dispute

Litigation or beneficiary conflict

Where authenticity, title, executor conduct or distribution is disputed, the valuer may need to work to expert-evidence standards and explain assumptions, alternative scenarios and limitations more formally.

Division of responsibility

What the executor decides and what the valuer decides

Clear boundaries protect both independence and accountability. The executor frames the assignment; the valuer performs the professional analysis.

The executor decides

Why the valuation is required and how it will be used.
Which estate assets and locations are within scope.
The relevant jurisdiction and effective valuation date.
Who may rely on the report and what format is needed.
What access, records, deadlines and practical constraints apply.
Whether separate tax, sale, insurance or distribution advice is also required.

The valuer decides

Whether they are competent for the relevant category.
The inspection, research and market analysis required.
Which market and comparable transactions are relevant.
How condition, completeness, provenance and restrictions affect value.
Whether items should be treated individually, in groups or as a collection.
The supportable adjustments, uncertainty and final independent opinion.

Collector scenario

The inherited role-playing game collection

An executor finds several thousand role-playing books, boxed sets, modules, miniatures and convention items across a house and two storage units. A local auctioneer offers a free estimate for the whole collection and proposes a single mixed lot. The deceased's insurance schedule shows a much higher figure, while a beneficiary believes one early boxed set may be exceptionally rare.

A weak instruction would ask the auctioneer to “value everything for probate”. A defensible instruction would identify the date of death, the statutory estate basis, all locations, ownership uncertainties and the need to separate high-value variants from repetitive lower-value material. It would also require the valuer to explain whether specialist lots, grouped holdings or collection-level treatment are appropriate.

The executor may later seek sale advice from the same or another firm, but the estate valuation should make its purpose, assumptions and any conflicts explicit.

Before appointment

Prepare the estate before instructing a valuer

A valuer cannot compensate for missing assets, broken evidence links or destructive pre-sorting. The first stage is control and identification, not pricing.

Authority and control

Confirm legal authority to act and identify any co-executors or administrators.
Secure residences, storage units, safes, dealer premises and off-site locations.
Stop unauthorised removal, gifting, sale or rearrangement of estate property.
Photograph rooms, cabinets and storage arrangements before major handling begins.

Inventory and evidence

Create a preliminary inventory with stable item or group references.
Preserve boxes, inserts, labels, certificates, receipts and collector notes.
Separate estate property from borrowed, consigned, jointly owned or trust-held items.
Locate prior appraisals, insurance schedules, catalogues and digital collection records.

Assignment planning

Ask legal or tax advisers to confirm the required statutory basis of value.
Identify filing deadlines and the intended users of the report.
Flag categories likely to require specialist rather than generalist expertise.
Check conflicts before appointing a dealer or auctioneer to value property they may later sell.

Evidence preservation

Do not pre-sort destructively

Well-intentioned tidying can reduce value or destroy the evidence needed to identify the collection correctly.

Do not separate matching boxes, contents, manuals or accessories.

Do not open sealed products merely to check what is inside.

Do not clean coins, polish metal, repaint models or repair bindings.

Do not discard empty boxes, correspondence, old labels or dealer paperwork.

Do not erase annotations, remove mounts or break apart framed material.

Do not combine incomplete sets or reorganise archival order without recording it.

The written brief

What a complete instruction should contain

The instruction should be detailed enough to remove ambiguity without dictating professional judgement.

Administrative essentials

Executor's name, legal capacity, estate reference and deceased's name.
Purpose, jurisdiction, intended use and intended users.
Effective valuation date, inspection date requirements and report deadline.
Applicable valuation standard and the full definition or legal basis of value.

Property and ownership

Assets, categories and locations included and excluded.
Treatment of jointly owned, borrowed, consigned, disputed, company-owned or trust-held property.
Whether the whole asset, a fractional interest or alternative ownership scenarios are required.
Treatment of packaging, accessories, documentation, research archives and digital access rights.

Inspection and analysis

Physical inspection expectations and any agreed reliance on photographs or sampling.
Authority to open cabinets, inspect sealed cartons, remove frames or commission testing.
Condition, completeness, edition, variant, grading, restoration and provenance requirements.
Market evidence, currency treatment, lotting analysis and treatment of uncertainty.

Outputs and governance

Signed report, itemised schedule, category subtotals and photographic record.
Comparable-sales appendix, assumptions, limiting conditions and specialist referrals.
Disclosure of current or prospective buying, selling, consignment or referral interests.
A documented correction and revision procedure for later discoveries or errors.

Effective date

Fix the exact valuation date

The effective date may be the date of death, a legally available alternate date, the date of a lifetime gift, distribution, loss, damage, proposed sale or a date directed by a court. A report prepared later can still be a date-of-death valuation, but it becomes a retrospective exercise that reconstructs the market at that earlier date.

Dates the executor should preserve

Date of death and the date each property was secured.
Dates on which items were moved, damaged, sold or discovered missing.
Dates when missing components or new provenance were found.
Relevant exchange-rate dates and significant market disruptions.

Retrospective discipline

Later information may help prove a fact that already existed at the valuation date, but it should not be treated as though it was necessarily known to market participants at that earlier time. The report should explain any use of post-date evidence.

Basis of value

Use the legal definition, not an informal label

Terms such as open-market value, fair market value, market value and value at death may sound interchangeable, but their statutory assumptions can differ by jurisdiction. The executor should ask the estate's lawyer, accountant or tax adviser to confirm the correct basis and provide it to the appraiser in writing.

UK-type open market

Usually asks what the property might reasonably have fetched in an appropriate open market at the relevant time, rather than in an immediate house-clearance or forced-sale process.

US-type fair market

Commonly concerns a hypothetical transaction between appropriately informed and unpressured market participants, subject to the precise federal or state rule.

Other jurisdictions

Local law may use different language, reporting dates, tax assumptions or probate rules. The instruction should identify the governing jurisdiction and avoid importing a familiar definition from elsewhere.

Scope

Define the property and the ownership interest

Possession does not prove ownership. An object in the deceased's home may have been borrowed, held for repair, owned jointly, consigned, sold but not delivered, held as trustee or owned by a company. The valuation instruction should flag these cases and state what interest is to be valued.

Include explicitly

Property at residences, storage facilities, dealers, museums and repairers.
Duplicates, damaged items, incomplete groups and low-value bulk material.
Packaging, certificates, manuals, accessories and research archives.
Digital records, access credentials and associated rights where relevant.

Qualify explicitly

Joint, beneficial, fractional, trust or company ownership.
Borrowed, consigned, disputed or retention-of-title property.
Objects stored abroad or subject to restrictions on transfer or export.
Alternative valuation scenarios where legal ownership remains unresolved.

Inspection

Provide enough access for a defensible examination

The instruction should establish where inspection will occur, who may handle fragile objects, what may be opened or removed, whether testing is authorised and what security, health, contamination or hazardous-material constraints apply.

Inspection limitations must appear in the report

Examples include items behind glass, sealed cartons not opened, inaccessible storage, untested electronics, missing keys, poor lighting, unavailable provenance, reliance on executor-supplied measurements, sample-only review or valuation from photographs. A photographic triage is not equivalent to a full physical inspection where material, construction, condition or authenticity affects value.

Lotting judgement

Item, group or collection-level valuation

The correct unit of valuation depends on how the material normally trades, where value is concentrated and what the estate needs to do next.

Individual

Item-by-item

Appropriate where rare pieces dominate value, condition and provenance vary, beneficiaries receive specific objects, ownership differs or reporting thresholds require separate identification.

Grouped

Runs and accumulations

Appropriate for repetitive lower-value material when the market normally buys in lots and line-by-line identification would not alter the conclusion.

Coherent whole

Collection treatment

May be justified where completeness, provenance, scholarship, exhibition history or a marketable single-owner narrative creates value beyond isolated objects.

Premiums and discounts require analysis

A coherent collection can command a premium, while excessive volume, duplicated common material, slow absorption, authentication cost or limited buyer capital can create a blockage or bulk effect. The appraiser should explain the evidence and mechanism rather than apply an arbitrary percentage.

Market evidence

Require comparable evidence that is actually comparable

A credible report distinguishes completed transactions from asking prices, auction estimates, withdrawn listings, unsold lots and price-guide entries. Each comparable should be examined for edition, variant, condition, completeness, provenance, authenticity, venue, date, lot composition, currency and premium treatment.

Evidence	What it can show	Main caution
Completed specialist sale	Observed market transaction	Check premium, lot contents and sale conditions
Dealer asking price	Retail positioning and availability	Does not prove a buyer paid the amount
Auction estimate	Consignment expectation	May be strategic and is not a completed sale
Price guide	Broad category benchmark	May be stale or insensitive to variants and condition
Population report	Certified scarcity	Scarcity alone does not prove demand or price

Condition axis

Record what was observed, assumed and not inspectable

Observed

Condition, damage, restoration and completeness directly examined by the valuer.

Reported

Information supplied by the executor, family, prior owner or another specialist.

Assumed

Facts accepted for valuation purposes but not independently established.

Unknown

Features hidden, inaccessible, untested or unsupported by available evidence.

Generic labels such as “good condition” are rarely enough. Category-specific details may include structural integrity, fading, staining, mould, odour, trimming, writing, repainting, replacement parts, corrosion, mechanical operation, seal integrity, packaging wear and both professional and amateur restoration.

Authentication boundary

A valuation is not automatically an authentication

The instruction should say whether the assignment includes authenticity, attribution, edition identification, forensic testing, grading, certification review or provenance verification. Where these are outside scope, the report should state the assumption or qualification clearly.

“Assumed authentic for valuation purposes.”
“Value subject to confirmation by the named authentication body.”
“Third-party grading relied upon but not independently verified.”
“Alternative values provided for authentic and non-authentic outcomes.”

Boundary with another domain

Authentication, grading, conservation and legal title may require separate experts. The executor valuation instruction should identify those dependencies rather than allowing the valuation report to imply expertise it does not contain.

Independence

Recognise conflicts before they shape the assignment

A dealer or auctioneer may have genuine specialist expertise, but may also wish to purchase, consign or sell the property. The issue is not merely whether several roles are permitted; it is whether the roles, incentives and financial interests are fully disclosed and appropriately managed.

Conflict indicators

The valuer wants to buy the property being valued.
The fee is contingent on value, consignment or sale.
The firm owns directly competing inventory.
Referral commission or beneficiary alignment is undisclosed.
The appraisal doubles as a marketing document.

Proportionate control

Separate estate valuation, sale-method advice and seller appointment.
Record all roles and interests in the engagement letter and report.
Use a second specialist where one item is unusually material.
Require a signed report identifying the responsible appraiser.
Ask whether the conclusion can be defended before a tax authority or court.

Large holdings

Sampling is a method, not a shortcut

Full line-by-line appraisal may be disproportionate for very large accumulations, but sampling must be designed around the risk that rare pieces are hidden among common material. The instruction should state the population, strata, selection process, proportion inspected, outlier treatment, uncertainty and the triggers for expanding the sample.

A defensible mass-collection sequence

Conduct broad triage across all locations and categories.
Isolate likely high-value, unusual and specialist material.
Inspect significant items individually.
Group genuinely repetitive low-value material.
Test samples within each defined group.
Document the method, limitations and residual uncertainty.

Regulated property

Legal restrictions can change the relevant market

Export control, cultural-property rules, endangered-species law, firearms controls, sanctions, title defects, indigenous claims, human-remains rules, hazardous-material restrictions, privacy and intellectual-property rights may reduce the buyer pool, delay sale or make ordinary commercial disposal unlawful.

Assumptions the instruction may need to resolve

Legal domestic sale only or sale with export permission.
A restricted buyer pool or unavoidable licensing delay.
Uncertain title, potential return obligations or inability to sell.
Transport, import tax, currency and international-market assumptions.

Value versus cash

Gross market value is not net sale proceeds

Myth

The estate value is whatever beneficiaries will receive after commission, transport, storage and other sale costs.

Reality

The legal valuation basis may require a gross market figure before some or all post-death selling costs. Net proceeds should be calculated separately and clearly labelled.

Ask for separate outputs where needed

Legally required date-of-death market value.
Anticipated auction hammer or sale range.
Estimated net estate proceeds after identified costs.
Expected selling period and liquidity risk.
Major commissions, taxes, transport, storage or restoration costs.

Report quality

What the finished report should contain

Administrative details

Client, capacity, estate reference, deceased, valuation date, inspection date, report date, intended use, intended users, jurisdiction, standard and basis of value.

Scope and limitations

Included and excluded property, locations, inspection extent, information supplied, sampling, specialists, assumptions, extraordinary assumptions and limiting conditions.

Object identification

Inventory reference, description, maker or publisher, edition or variant, dimensions, quantity, condition, completeness, provenance, photographs and ownership qualifications.

Analysis

Relevant market, comparable evidence, source quality, adjustments, collection treatment, authenticity assumptions, currency conversion, methodology and uncertainty.

Conclusion

Individual or grouped values, category subtotals, total, currency, rounding, signature, qualifications and declarations concerning independence and conflicts.

Deliverables

Preserve more than the signed PDF

Core estate record

Signed report and itemised spreadsheet schedule.
Original-resolution image archive linked to inventory references.
Comparable-sales appendix and assumptions register.
Stable copy of the data used for the original filing.

Operational outputs

High-value and urgent-risk item lists.
Location, restricted-item and specialist-referral registers.
Interim insurance and beneficiary-allocation schedules.
Sale-priority or conservation recommendations where separately instructed.

Revision control

Handle later discoveries without erasing the original record

Omitted assets, double-counting, new ownership evidence, recovered components, disproved authenticity, misidentified editions or erroneous comparables may require a correction letter, addendum, replacement report or supplemental valuation.

Every amendment should preserve

The original report and conclusion.
The new evidence and reason for revision.
The revision date and revised value.
The person authorising any amended estate or tax filing.

Common defects

Myths that weaken executor instructions

Myth

Use the lowest defensible figure.

Reality

Request an independent opinion under the applicable legal basis, even when the answer is inconvenient.

Myth

Use what the deceased paid or the amount on the insurance schedule.

Reality

Historic cost and replacement value may be useful evidence, but they answer different questions from date-of-death market value.

Myth

Value the whole collection as one job lot.

Reality

The valuer should analyse whether individual treatment, specialist lots, grouped runs or collection-level treatment best reflects the relevant market.

Myth

A free auction estimate is enough for probate.

Reality

A consignment estimate may be preliminary, strategic and prepared for a different intended use. Confirm that the report meets estate requirements.

Myth

Ignore common items and mention only the valuable pieces.

Reality

Low-value material may be grouped proportionately, but it remains estate property and should not disappear from the schedule.

Specialist threshold

When the executor should pause general clearance

These warning signs justify specialist legal, valuation, conservation, authentication or security advice before sale or distribution continues.

A single item may dominate the collectible value of the estate.

The collection contains rare variants, sealed products or unusually high third-party grades.

There is celebrity, historical, museum, exhibition or major scholarly provenance.

Authenticity, attribution, signatures or restoration are disputed or highly value-sensitive.

The estate includes archives, archaeological material, culturally sensitive objects or possible national heritage importance.

Ivory, tortoiseshell, protected species, weapons, hazardous substances or human remains may be present.

Export, sanctions, title, stolen-property or illicit-trade restrictions may affect the legal market.

Beneficiaries disagree about ownership, selection, division or the appropriate basis of value.

Action hierarchy

The executor's valuation workflow

The sequence matters. Pricing before control, identification and scope creates avoidable errors that later reports may not be able to repair.

Protect

Secure the collection, preserve evidence, control access and prevent premature disposal or destructive handling.

Identify

Create the working inventory and establish locations, ownership, completeness and associated documentation.

Triage

Separate routine material from objects that may be high value, regulated, fragile, disputed or category-specialist.

Instruct

Define purpose, date, legal basis, intended users, scope, limitations and deliverables in writing.

Value

Allow the independent specialist to select evidence, markets, methods, adjustments and the final conclusion.

Review

Check that the report covers the scheduled property, discloses assumptions and answers the actual estate question.

Report

Use the correct concluded value in probate, tax and estate accounts with appropriate professional advice.

Manage

Maintain suitable security, storage, handling and insurance while administration continues.

Distribute or sell

Obtain fresh current-value or sale advice where the decision occurs materially later than the valuation date.

Retain evidence

Preserve the instruction, inventory, report, photographs, correspondence, comparables and all later amendments.

Model instruction

The question a strong brief should answer

Provide an independent retrospective valuation of the deceased's collectible property as at the specified valuation date, using the legally applicable open-market, fair-market or other statutory basis, for estate administration and reporting. Identify the assets, ownership qualifications, condition, completeness, provenance, relevant market evidence, lotting treatment, material assumptions and uncertainty, and disclose any conflict or limitation affecting the conclusion.

Key takeaways

Define the purpose, date, jurisdiction and legal basis before discussing price.
Preserve the collection, inventory and evidence before destructive sorting or disposal.
State ownership uncertainties and inspection limitations explicitly.
Separate estate value, insurance value, sale estimate and net proceeds.
Require evidence-based analysis of individual, grouped and collection-level treatment.
Use specialists where authenticity, regulation, rarity or concentration of value makes general appraisal unsafe.
Retain the original instruction and report, then document later amendments rather than overwriting history.

Continue learning

Valuation updates & market change

Understand when an older estate valuation should be reviewed and how later market changes should be recorded without overwriting the original valuation date.

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