Cash in the attic

Posted on 17 Sep 2009 at 10:45

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Gallery

Toy story

Perhaps the most difficult items to send into exile inhabit toy cupboards. From the pastel coloured playthings of the nursery to the secret lives behind the box-room door, toys, dolls, teddies and boxed games were once central to the imaginations of their little owners and featured in the most formative and intense times of their lives. That's why some old farts are prepared to pay a lot of wonga to recapture their lost yesterdays. At the time of writing, a toy Batmobile has been snapped up for £240, someone has paid £299 for an Action Man Cowboy and a 1967 Avengers boxed set has gone for £483. That collection of Robertson's Golliwog badges or genital-free Barbies may be politically incorrect to you, but somewhere in nostalgia-land there's an obsessive possessive burning to own them. You can discover the history, indicative values and collector networks for such childhood treasures at World Collectors Net (www.worldcollectorsnet.com).

Meanwhile, there is a similarly barmy market for artifacts that have been confined to the potting shed or that lie smothered in weeds: we're talking about garden gnomes. Even if you don't have any gnomes to sell, do yourself a favour and pop along to Gnomeland (www.gnomeland.co.uk), click on the Auction Prices button and prepare to be amazed.

The finer things

Moving from the ridiculous to the sublime, let's consider what to do if you stumble across something that has the potential to be really valuable, such as a crate of vintage wine in the cellar, a Picasso nailed to the wall or a tiara in the toilet. First, you need to do some simple research and make sure that what you've got is likely to be the real thing.

For wines, use any search engine to check out the name on the label and the year in which it was bottled. If the wine turns out to be non-vintage or you can buy it for less than a tenner a bottle then you should drink it. However, if it seems a classic, you'll need to invest in a 30-day subscription to a website such as Wine Auction Prices (www.wineauctionprices.com), which costs $10 (around £6). Use its database to establish the exact commercial value of your wine, by searching the actual prices realised at every major wine auction in the UK, Europe and America for the past five years.

The value of art is a lot more subjective. If the painting or print you want to sell is unsigned, you can try to look for something similar online in terms of the artistic medium, type of subject matter, approximate age and definite size and condition of the piece. The easiest way to check out generic images is by using the advanced search features at Google Images (http://images.google.co.uk). If the artwork is signed, or you definitely know the identity of the artist, the best resource for an instant valuation is ArtFact (www.artfact.com), which provides just about every auction price achieved globally over the past 15 years. There is a minimum subscription fee of $20 (around £12), but the database is very impressive indeed.

If you're trying to find out what your jewellery is worth, be extremely careful when dealing with anyone online. In fact, if you know what you're selling involves genuine gemstones and precious metals, you're probably better off paying a visit to a local jeweller or specialist, making sure that the price they give you is the realistic selling price and not an insurance price.