[HAM] B3 Value

[John Freund]

I'll add my voice of experience here and go a little OT to say to everyone:
Get yourself (buy or borrow) a video camera and walk around your house
recording everthing that's in it...open drawers, cabinets, move stuff around
in your garage, open boxes in your attic, etc, ad nauseum, ad infinitum.
Get the model and serial tags on stuff that have them.

When my mom's house burned down (total loss) in Raleigh after a lightning
strike, the insurance company made us draw up an inventory for EVERYTHING we
wanted to claim.  And we needed to guess at what she paid for it, the
current value and the replacement value for each item.  My mother maintained
a household since 1963 and her house burned down in 2005 so needless to say
it was a HUGE inventory.

Do yourself a favor and document.  You never know.  And while I'm rolling,
make sure you link at least one smoke detector on every floor together.  If
you're asleep in your bedroom upstairs you're not going to hear the one
going off in your basement or garage unless it sets the one off in your
hallway.

Oh yeah, and after you make the recording, make a copy and give it to a
relative or put it in a safety deposit box at your bank.

Thank you for your indulgence.

/John

> That was actually my first thought, and I tried that.  My insurance guy, a
> good friend, who's been in the business for 25 some odd years and is very
> well respected simply said it wouldn't work.  In the event of a total loss
> (I lost 1 organ in a fire already), the insurance company would simply
> take the "depreciated" value of something that old if there was no proof
> that it had a higher value.  Which actually sound right to me too.  Let's
> face it,
> the price of B3s with a Leslie and tone cabinet is all over the board on
> the Internet.  Plus in order for "replacement cost" to kick in, you have
> to "schedule" collectible items including well B3s, paintings, jewelery,
> guns, etc..  The scheduled items all need an appraisal.  Fires are no fun,
> and I don't want to go through that again.  It's really something that
> everyone with any amount of equipment should talk to their insurance agent
> about.  And no, I don't sell insurance.  :)
>