Several months ago, while looking/buying a house here, getting the house there ready to sell, tying up loose ends in my career/cases, a friend reached out to me from a hospital, said he found out the night before that he was dying (stage 4, 9/11 pancreatic cancer) and asked me to sell his guns so his wife could use the money. What I didn't know was that there was almost 100 firearms altogether. Wife in her 70's never handled a gun, daughter had zero interest. This was a massive undertaking but I considered it a mission for a dying hero. Another problem was that he didn't want a rich guy buying up his whole collection - he loved each firearm, could talk 30 minutes about each one, and wanted each to go to an individual who would appreciate that particular gun........whoa. They also offered me 20% of all sales - which, of course, I denied. I told him I'd put a few 'select' guns from his collection aside for them to sell to me for 'a good price'.
He literally had no where else to turn except local gun shops that would have given his wife pennies on the dollar. When it was all said and done, I sold everything, piecemeal. Before he died, he told me and his wife that he was hoping to get $25K for the collection. Several days before he passed, I told him we were at $38K and he was so happy. He told me to take the rest to NC, but obviously I couldn't do that. The final count after ammo sales was just over $55,000. A local gun forum owner allowed me to use his platform to sell most - and was well-compensated against his arguments that he didn't need to be. I also ran a very large indoor/outdoor range so that helped sell many guns too. The guns I put aside for me were given to me by the widow for free - I protested, but have you ever tried to argue with a 73 year old Jewish lady???
Moral of the story - HAVE A PLAN. HAVE A PLAN. HAVE A PLAN. Put it on paper. Make it legal. Make it easy for your survivors and let them get the most out of the hobby you loved so much.
Here's one of my friend's rifles that is now mine. Henry .357 16". He had more than 40 leverguns.
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