You can't take it with you

Written by Don Dedera in 2002 and expanded by David Barth in 2008.
Don Dedera was a columnist for the Arizona Republic and the managing editor of Arizona Highways. He has written dozens of books, many of which are out of print, but still available on such sites as Amazon. He was a war photographer in the jungles of Vietnam during the 1960's. He began collecting Nikon cameras in the 1970's, and before he disposed of his collection, it ranked as consisting of some of the finest and rarest items that Nikon produced including rangefinder cameras, Nikon F cameras and system components, and Nikon microscopes.

When somebody told the original American comedian/miser that he couldn't take it with him, Jack Benny thought for a long moment and declared, "I won't go!"

Well, yes he did go. And when he did . . . he didn't take anything with him.

And so it will be for you and me, and all other avid collectors. Oh, I suppose there may be a camera enthusiast so pathologically possessive that he or she will arrange for the grave to be filled with Nikon S-36 Motor Drives, Fish-Eye Nikkors, and Rangefinder Reflex Housings, in the manner of the Texas oil tycoon who was buried (smiling eternally) at the wheel of his Cadillac.

But most of us more standard personalities probably will go quietly, leaving it to somebody else as best they can to dispose of our cherished collections, regardless of whether they consist of cameras, furniture, watches, glassware, knives, guns, cars, or whatever.

This topic inspired several informal discussions among attendees at the Nikon Historical Society (NHS) Convention in Scottsdale, Arizona in February 2002.

Especially senior members, counting several founders of the NHS, expressed their concern in quotes such as:

• "When we started collecting 20 or 30 years ago, we were in our 40s and 50s at the peak of our earning power, and we thought we were immortal. Now we're in our 60s and 70s, and we don't dare buy green bananas. And I worry, what's going to happen to all my stuff?"
• "I started in the 1970s with two rangefinder bodies and five lenses, and the whole kit fit into a little corner of a shelf. Now my collection fills three rooms and takes two months to dust. And my poor wife doesn't know a Kogaku from a Kodak. My kids . . . they positively hate old cameras."
• "A few hundred bucks got me into it. Now it represents a major portion of my estate, and my lawyer and accountant tell me there is no way I can hide it from the tax man."

How serious are these issues for collectors? Who are we, and what do we have, anyway? When the time comes to pass down or break up our collections, what are the realistic options? Will we (as we hope) enrich a beloved beneficiary or (as we fear) impoverish an unaware victim?

To answer these questions to some degree, in 2002 I [Don] sent questionnaires to the NHS membership. Here are some preliminary thumbnails of feedback:

• One hundred percent of the responses were from males. All but a few of these men were 50 years old or older. The dominant geographical representation was North America.
• As to be expected, nearly all NHS members collect Nikons, and their interests divide about equally between Nikon rangefinder (RF) and F Reflex cameras. But Nikon guys also collect a wide spectrum of other makes, from Russian medium formats through Leica copies to American subminiatures. Most likely to be sharing space in Nikon collections are Canon, Rollei, Bronica, and Ziess. Other familiar types appealing to Nikon fans are Argus C-3, Ciro-Flex, Agfa, Olympus, Polaroid, Graflex, Diaz, Hasselblad, Minolta, and generic kinds of military, law enforcement, three-dimensional, and novelty cameras. However, a few NHS members profess to "collect everything."
• Impossible to infer precisely from such an informal, unscientific survey, but it would appear that substantial values are indeed tied up in collections. Eleven NHS members appraised their collections in the $10,000 to $99,000 range, and fourteen evaluated their hoards between $100,000 and $1 million (US dollars). Two collections were pegged at a half million dollars, and one at more than one million dollars!
• For a few mildly involved (or well-off) members, their collections comprise only 1-2 percent of the total value of their estates. Three members report that Nikons, (not stocks, bonds, beachfront properties, or pork bellies) amount to a whopping 60-70 percent of their total wealth. But more to the norm, about half of the returned questionnaires calculate collections to represent 5-25 percent of member's net worth.
• For a few, perhaps, our survey served as a wake-up call. Out in the thinly populated Nikonland called Arizona, USA, a pal of mine who has been an NHS member since the mid-1980s, penned an insightful note on his completed questionnaire, "Hope this helps us all to begin thinking of the future. It's amazing that my modest collection is worth so much. Never thought so 'till I started adding up all the accessories and small items. Our collections keep changing as we acquire new items, and sell/trade others."

As the chief instigator of the survey and principal compiler of the results, I must confess an early, and as it turns out, faulty, presumption. I thought that probably not many of my fellow NHS members kept very good records on their stuff. Yet fully three-fourths assert that they maintain an accurate and current inventory, either as a print of computer file. They may document description, serial number, condition, purchase price, provenance, special features, and current retail value. They mostly rely on their own knowledge in deriving the realistic retail value, but about 40 percent of the responders assert that they have enlisted the aid of a professional appraiser – maybe a local expert or camera show regular. More likely, says a member, "I look in the big ads in Shutterbug to see what price things are selling for." (At this moment I can almost hear some cynical readers hooting, "That's certain to tell you at what price things are not selling for)."

Then consider the poignant plight of one Nikon rangefinder collector who should be in an ideal position to appraise his own treasures. Yet, "As a camera store owner of 19 years, I have to keep up with the never-ending changes in the industry. Over the years, I have been collecting older cameras, lenses, and anything that I thought was unique. So my collection has become quite large and unruly re: inventory and value. I do maintain a complete list of the Nikon RF equipment, but not on anything else. When someone wants to buy anything from me, I cannot name a figure off the top of my head. Wherever I look to find a posted price on the same equipment, the price varies greatly from one seller to another. Nobody, but nobody, can really tell what a thing is worth until somebody actually buys it. And I worry, if I, who is supposed to be an expert, am so confused, what is my poor wife going to do if she has to figure it out all alone?"

While pleasantly surprised by the widespread inventorying efforts of NHS members, I was a bit shocked by another revelation: Fully two-thirds of responders state that they have made utterly no provision, by will or other testament, for the ultimate disposal of their collections. Half of NHS survey participants say that they and their prime heir(s) have not even discussed collection values and options for liquidation.

So to sum up survey results so far: as a Society, we indeed appear to be growing older. Many of us, by wise investment and good fortune, have amassed substantial wealth in Nikon and other collectibles, yet typically we have not adopted a semblance of strategy for conserving the character or protecting the value of our collections. What to do? Drawing upon interviews with photographic dealers (who are also NHS members), savvy collectors, and professional estate planners, below we will discuss the inevitable dilemma: if you can't take it with you, what can you do?

To illustrate the dramatic appreciation of values across four decades, one needs only to look at the official Nikon price list dated August 1, 1960, comparing them to 2002 prices:

• Product Code AC590, rangefinder body cap, listed for US $1.25. Boxed examples sold for $250.
• Product FLP360, the plastic offset flash bracket, listed for $3.95. New York mail order ads offered it for as much as $250.
• Product MR75, a plastic gadget called the Meter Retainer, was priced at 60 cents. Now very rare, this item sold auctions for $385.
• Product FEL20, the Field Illuminator designed to enhance the bright lines in the SP viewfinder, originally cost $18.75, including a leather case. Mint condition examples, in the case, sold for $1,500.
• And what about the flimsy price list sheet from which I have been quoting? When it was current, it was distributed for free. In 2002 auctions it sold for $75 or more.

Feedback from an NHS member and camera store owner regarding the questionnaire: "I think these are thoughts which are normally set aside by most collectors. I have several customers who often tell me that their relatives are not interested in their collection at all and, in most cases, even their wives hate them for their hobby. So they don't know what to do. They do not want their family to get it because they won't have any idea what to do with it. On the other hand, they can't get themselves to sell it (and then they ask small, poor dealers like me, for consignment prices nobody can ever pay – just to be sure that they can keep their collections!) One can understand this. Depending on their health, there are many things they cannot do anymore when getting older, but one hardly gets too old to collect and to enjoy collecting. So why sell one of the last things that brings joy to life? So they set these thoughts aside and time goes on. Then one day I get a call: 'My husband has passed away and there are all these camera and lenses and . . . please come around and tell me what to do with it! This happens often. I feel it is a good idea to start this discussion. Every collector is concerned. It will help to protect our old treasures from being ruined or lost."

Forget the Golden Rule. Suspend those Ten Commandments. Here is the premium Fundamental Human Constant the governs war, marriage, work, travel, investing . . . and collecting:

"Everything in this world is easier to get into than out of."

Preliminary results of the NHS membership survey suggested that despite the fate that awaits us all, we are not quite ready to go. The situation brings to mind the interview, conducted by the Los Angeles Times with the great Armenian-American author, William Saroyan a few days before his death, in which he was quoted, "Deep down I accept mankind's universal inevitable mortality, but in my case, I was hoping that Providence would make an exception."

The survey found that nearly all respondents admit to a woeful lack of physical and electronic security against crime and calamity. It is true that a few shelters are equipped with expensive, state-of-the-art electronic safeguards in domicile and locker. Others rely on home alarm systems that, often as not, are routinely disabled (by the resident, not the burglar). My sense is that at least half of member collections enjoy zero protection beyond standard locks on windows and doors. The insurance pictured is just as bleak. Most members hope they can count on some coverage under their homeowner's policy. If indeed some day they suffer a loss to fire or theft, they will discover that the agent who sold the contract will be replaced by a third party adjuster dedicated to discounting and disqualifying claims. For starters, old cameras are assumed to be worthless. Establishing the true global value of a mint, unsynched Nikon M might prove to be a daunting, even, impossible task when the camera lies a melted glob in a nest of ashes remaining from the original inspection tags, manual, and appraisal notes. Moral: store collectibles and papers including price documentation in separate places.

When any thought at all was given to disposal after death, sentiments seemed to divide about equally into 3 choices:

1. The collection will go intact to heirs.
2. It will be broken up and sold in pieces by family and friends.
3. It will be liquidated by a dealer.

In the latter instance, camera collectors emphatically voted for a dealer commission limited to 10 to 20 percent of the retail value. Of questionnaires completed, only 4 pegged a proper dealer discount to be higher than 20 percent. And what did our dealers say? Actually, about the same.

Some ideas that came out of interviews with international, fulltime dealers as well as others who sold and traded. Their responses were so similar that I chose to combine their advice into a thumbnail strategy.

In a card file, account book, or computer, keep an inventory with solid data to support realistic values. If anything, be conservative. Inflating expected sales prices may make a collector feel good today, but it will cause heirs headaches tomorrow.

Every receipt and proof of purchase retained will become pure gold if and when the liquidation of a collection attracts the attention of the tax collector.

Lucky is the collector who can bequeath, in toto, his collection to heirs who are camera buffs. This neatly passes the problem off to somebody else.

Relying upon relatives and/or friends to profitably dispose of a complex, extensive collection piece by piece, is potentially, a blueprint for disaster. Typically, nobody else knows a collection so intimately as the collector. Advertising, auctioning, and peddling rare photographica is not without costs. These projects take time, lots of time, and probably travel. How is the Good Samaritan to be compensated for labors and expenses, if at all?

Which leaves a third choice – call upon the services of a reputable dealer. Here is what a collector may expect, as summed up in the words of a career dealer and co-owner of one of America's larger photographic mail order firms: "Sure, there are a few bad apples, but we're not all crooks. Finding and acquiring quality collectibles is a major aspect of our business. We can't just fill out a wholesale order from and have a central warehouse next week send us a batch of Nikon Ones. Our reputation of fair dealing is about all we have going for us, and we won't last long by ripping people off.

"Conversely, we can't operate on a 10 or 20 percent commission, not when the appraised value of a collection is exaggerated to begin with. Thirty percent and maybe more allows for errors, market fluctuations, and hidden equipment damage that has to be fixed. Maybe you have a special camera, and you know one like it sold for $5,000. that does not mean you can assume that yours is worth as much. In such a specialized market, everything depends on the time and circumstance. For that moment, maybe there was only one customer willing to buy at that price, and another one won't appear for a year.

"As a rule, regional and national dealers will travel any time, any place, to assess and bid on an important collection. It doesn't bother me that a client may be calling in several prospective buyers, but I'd like the courtesy of knowing the rules of the game. Frankly, I welcome a report of an independent, professional appraiser with some knowledge of cameras.

"A neophyte liquidating an estate probably shouldn't consider placing things on consignment. Those deals can drag on, and often turn messy and rancorous. A serious dealer should be ready to write a check for the whole collection. Then all parties can get on with their lives.

"If I had to boil down my best advice into a few sentences, I'd say, 'Assess the value of your collection the way a farmer looks at a field of hay. No blue sky. Then sit down with your loved ones and honestly discuss the true value and best final plan. Cultivate the friendship of an honest, reliable dealer, and establish a working relationship. A written contract is neither necessary nor desirable. There are still some of us who operate by old fashioned standards of honesty and fairness."

So, you can't take it with you. But you can leave it in good hands.

Don Dedera, Scottsdale, Arizona, 2002

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