Fellow Collectors Taking Advantage Of Deceased Members Families

[Victrola20]

Paul
i fully understand what you are saying and generally agree. You are known as a reputable honest dealer and from my experience and knowledge most all of the known phonograph dealers are also reputable, ethical and sensitive to family members, while being honest about being dealers and their intent to resell.
All of us have experienced a sold sign initiating the comment “i would have bought that for that price “. knowing that they would never have to put up as it was sold
Your description of how you approach the heirs of a collector being honest and fair are exactly how it should be done. First looking out for the family/heirs to make sure they are protected from persons just wanting to line their pockets , without consideration of the families needs or disclosing their intent. Giving the heirs the honest and straight skinny on value and explaining the difficulty and options in disposing of the collection , lets them make up their minds with understanding and knowledge , so they can decide as to how and what is important to them in disposing of the inherited collection While you have apprently experienced that more often than not, they just want it gone , that is great and everybody wins when the whole collection is bought
Apparently the collectors out this way are generally poorer as the families often need the funds from the collection to pay off bills and expenses so they are not very often wanting to just get rid of the collection at any price
I believe that this discussion was not intended to be about the honest and open phonograph dealer but about the dealer dressed In friendly collectors clothes who befriends the family and ends up cherry picking the collection at prices that are yes realistically half or a third or more of the current wholesale price Yes other collectors would have for sure paid those prices if given a chance. This is where the ethical question comes in.
Do we as experienced collectors have an ethical responsibility to inform the heirs of our fallen collector that we are buying the best machines at dirt cheap prices and leaving them with the low end unsaleable machines? While some pretend to be only collectors often they are really dealers in collectors clothes, do we then have the ethical responsibility to inform them of our intent to resell? We can of course just tell them if they want to see how much their machines are really worth, that they may want to keep checking the forum , craigs list , face book etc as soon as next week , as they might see them for sale at 2 , 3 or even 4 times what they were paid.
I have heard from quite a few collectors who believe that ethically and as real friends to the collector that has passed that we have an ethical responsibility to protect the family/heirs. By honestly helping and informing the family of their challenges and options they can decide what is important to them. The heirs can then make decisions that meet their emotional and financial needs and we can sleep well knowing we have done the right thing for the right reasons
If we are talking about dispersal of our own collections because of an untimrly death i would think we all would want the same thing for our heirs. Yes we will have enjoyed finding collecting and restoring them, but we will be gone and cant do anything about what happens to the collection . But I am sure that none of us will want our familys to be taken advantage of by friendly collectors (dealers in disguise ) who make the decisions for them with bad information and greedy actions of cherry picking at dirt cheap prices and leaving them with the low end unsaleable items
If my family has been given honest information and knows the collection is worth a minimum of say 100k and they decide to sell it for 10k or donate it to the club that is their decidion and i am ok and happy with that. They made the decision and not someone else taking advantage of their lack of knowledge to receive a profit
The issue at hand as i see it is whether we as experienced collects recognize an ethical obligation when helping heirs dispose of a friends collection or our friends helping our own families dispose of our collections ?
I hope for the sack of the hobbie that we all want and have a goal to be ethical and be able to sleep at night. It is my opinion that this hobbly should be about helping each other and not about , as some have moved to , how much we can make buying and selling
I know this issue may be complex to some and not simply black and white. But i think it is something we need to face.
I am off of my high horse now sorry