I'd suggest getting in touch with the local ham radio club to see if someone there would be willing to help sell the equipment:
Lynchburg Amateur Radio Club
https://k4cq.com/
She could also donate equipment to the local makerspace:
https://vector-space.org/
I would hope some place could show up and make her a decent offer to take all of it.
Yes, even though it is common practice to sneer at hams on this forum, many of them work in the Electronics, Comms or Broadcast industries & have extensive contacts who may well take the lot.
Ebay is the way to get top dollar and sell the stuff quickly with a minimum of fuss.
Wow, so ebay reports your sales if it's over $600 for the year?
I would hope some place could show up and make her a decent offer to take all of it.
The sticking point will be what number comprises a 'decent offer'. Getting someone to show up with a truck and pack all of it may not yield any more than cherry-picking the lot and chucking the rest in a dumpster.
Here's a good list of people in the used equipment business. Alltest out of Farmingdale, NJ would be my first call. I don't know if any of them will come to you or what they'll want for information ahead of time.
https://www.testunlimited.com/Dealer_List_Used.aspx
Wow, so ebay reports your sales if it's over $600 for the year? They just keep turning the screws and getting less viable all the time.
It's an explicit IRS requirement, part of the 'American Rescue Plan'. Not eBay's choice, I'm sure, and they were given a 1-year reprieve for 2022.
I'd +1 the idea of getting someone at least somewhat local and affiliated with electronics to run an auction - they'd be able to run the logistics of it and likely attract the right kind of buyers, and I'd expect it to net more to her than a reseller buyout of the lot.
Wow, so eBay reports your sales if it's over $600 for the year?
Here in Australia, all eBay accounts that sell more than $5k/year are reported.
Wow, so eBay reports your sales if it's over $600 for the year?
Here in Australia, all eBay accounts that sell more than $5k/year are reported.
Not wishing to derail but I thought it was 10. Do you have a good up to date source?
Best I can find is this.
https://www.etax.com.au/ebay-income/
Getting top dollar and doing no work is a tough combination. The no work part is easy though. Most places here in the US have auction houses that specialize in buying estates, failed businesses and the like and selling them off. Just do a Google search for nearby auction houses. Expect something like 10 to 30 percent of what you might get selling them yourself via here, ham swaps and ebay. But you will be done in a few days, whereas selling them off for top dollar would take months or years. You could also sell them cheap on those venues and get faster returns, but still measured in weeks or months and would involve all the work of marketing and shipping and dealing with the occasional crook buyer.
Getting top dollar and doing no work is a tough combination. The no work part is easy though. Most places here in the US have auction houses that specialize in buying estates, failed businesses and the like and selling them off. Just do a Google search for nearby auction houses. Expect something like 10 to 30 percent of what you might get selling them yourself via here, ham swaps and ebay. But you will be done in a few days, whereas selling them off for top dollar would take months or years. You could also sell them cheap on those venues and get faster returns, but still measured in weeks or months and would involve all the work of marketing and shipping and dealing with the occasional crook buyer.
I think if you can somehow space out the work over a certain period of time that that negates the hard work aspect.
My sympathies to the OP. As somebody who has buried too many fellow soldiers, I can appreciate the predicament. Imagine being bound by Australian law and then being named in the Will as the executor. The Will stated that the beneficiaries of all proceeds are named as a couple of step children (girls) whose legal guardian (their mother, not named) has been estranged for some period along with said juvenile beneficiaries.
You, the executor have the legal responsibility to ensure that proceeds of any sale attracts the most amount possible. Yet the estranged guardian (not the not-of-age beneficiaries) insisted on a fire sale/garage sale approach.
As executor, offering to acquire all assets for a sum of cash is considered legally precarious. And any profit from those proceeds of that could be considered challenge-able by the benefactors at some later date.
Imagine being bound by Australian law and then being named in the Will as the executor. The Will stated that the beneficiaries of all proceeds are named as a couple of step children (girls) whose legal guardian (their mother, not named) has been estranged for some period along with said juvenile beneficiaries.
Getting top dollar and doing no work is a tough combination. The no work part is easy though. Most places here in the US have auction houses that specialize in buying estates, failed businesses and the like and selling them off. Just do a Google search for nearby auction houses. Expect something like 10 to 30 percent of what you might get selling them yourself via here, ham swaps and ebay. But you will be done in a few days, whereas selling them off for top dollar would take months or years. You could also sell them cheap on those venues and get faster returns, but still measured in weeks or months and would involve all the work of marketing and shipping and dealing with the occasional crook buyer.
In my experience and assuming that you're selling on Ebay, anything that turns on and the buttons do something and the display changes but is otherwise untested is worth about 20 to 50% of the market value. Things that won't even turn on or that the seller won't test the keys are worth about 10 to 15%. And if you don't have a few good photos, the value drops even further. AND if you won't ship; well, the value is near zero. Let me make this 100% clear, there is almost NO market on Ebay for specialized items such as expensive TE that can only be picked up in person. If you're selling anywhere other than E-bay, I wouldn't expect to get more than 50% of the value that you could get on E-bay under the same conditions. That is for individual items, if you're selling it all as a lot them you can expect to get for far less.