Robert A. Ensminger Personal Property Appraiser UniformStandards of ProfessionalAppraisalPractice (USPAP) Compliant Appraisal Reports In the past 30 years I have conducted more than 1,000 personal property appraisals. Generally, anything that is not considered real estate is considered to be personal property. Personal property is further divided into tangible and intangible property. These items are then usually classified as business property or personal use property. Some definitions are posted below, but first let’s look at some of the reasons personal property appraisals are needed.
These are some, but not all the reasons personal property appraisals are performed. Now let’s look at the different classes of personal property.
There are several different types of value that can be reported for personal property. There are entire papers and dissertations relating to the various values, but several are encapsulated here.
What do we appraise? · Real Estate (please see the Real Estate section of our web site.) · Private estates, including divorce and bankruptcy appraisals – we have general knowledge of most items found in a typical estate – household furnishings, jewelry, coins, collectibles, tools, antiques, firearms, clocks, vehicles and most items imaginable. Our auction experience is the basis for our appraisals and backed up by a ton of reference books and the resources of the internet. · Commercial appraisals – again from our auction experience, we can value the physical assets of many business concerns including furniture, fixtures and equipment (FF&E), including computers, telephone equipment, warehouse stock, rolling stock, tools, general machinery and equipment found in many small and medium size business concerns. What do we not appraise? · We do not engage in appraisals for insurance valuations. · We do not perform damage assessment appraisals. · We do not engage in retail appraisals. · We do not appraise fine art and high-end antiques. · We do not conduct industrial appraisals consisting of large and specialized machinery and large construction equipment. Some definitions: Personal property: an estate or property consisting of movable articles both corporeal, as furniture or jewelry, or incorporeal, as stocks or bonds (distinguished from real porperty). Real property: an estate or property consisting of lands and of all appurtenances to lands, as buildings, crops, mineral or air rights (distinguished from personal property). Tangible asset: having actual physical existence, as real estate or chattels, and therefore capable of being assigned a value in monetary terms. Intangible asset: incapable of being perceived by the sense of touch, as incorporeal or immaterial things… existing only in connection with something else, as the goodwill of a business. Estate: The whole of one's possessions, especially all the property and debts left by one at death. Bankrupt: a person who upon his or her own petition or that of his or her creditors is adjudged insolvent by a court and whose property is administered for and divided among his or her creditors under a bankruptcy law. Chattel: any article of tangible property other than land, buildings, and other things annexed to land. |