Why your item’s value should be measured accurately for insurers
James from the global auctioneers Dreweatts & Bloomsbury, explains why it’s important to have your precious items value correctly measured – especially important when dealing with inheritance tax (IHT) & HMRC.
First of all it is important to have items valued for insurance purposes because you need an inventory in the case of a fire water damage or theft and we can offer a complete inventory with description, photograph and a figure based on replaced with a replacement level, which is calculated that roughly double mid auction estimate. Sometimes the case of jewellery will be slightly higher than that.
With a case of IHT if an item has a probate figure on it for example, say a piece of jewellery at £25,000 pounds that item then comes to auction and makes more than that, we can argue the case with HMRC on behalf of the client or the beneficiary of that estate, arguing in their favor that of the time evaluation, we felt that the figure was correct compared with other similar items at auction at that time.
