Preparing for an Estate Sale

A friend of a friend recently ask me for tips on pricing her mother’s quilts for an estate sale. My only experience is pricing donated quilts for our annual Quilts Etc Sale in October and that is a group project—I am not a professional appraiser, but I shared some guidelines we use.

What is the condition of the quilt? Are there stains, tears, worn edges? Some fabrics in a pieced quilt just wear out before the rest of the fabric. Don’t give up on stained or dirty quilts. A good soaking in the bath tub can do great things.

The gross photo is the quilt on the right being soaked in Soak overnight. There are several commercial soaps designed especially for vintage and antique linens. OxiClean can be used as well as recipes found on the internet. Rinse many times–a water soaked quilt is difficult to handle but patience is the key. Fill the tub with clean water, stir it around and let the water drain. Repeat!

At the very least, give the quilts a good airing over the deck rail to get rid of some that funky “old” smell.

2. How large is your quilt? That is not to say a pristine vintage baby quilt is not worth more than a shabby twin. A very large “cutter” quilt (more on that term later) is worth more than a small “cutter” because you can get more projects from it.

3. Is it machine or hand quilted? Usually, hand quilting bring more than a machine quilted project. If it is hand quilted, be honest about the quality of hand quilting. Just because it is an antique, it doesn’t necessarily mean the quilting was great.

This quilt was sold for $400 –nearly perfect condition and look at the hand quilting. The stitches are small and even and the design is complex rather than an all over design such as Baptist Fan or Cross Hatch.

4. Are the colors and patterns attractive today? I have several quilts from my grandmother made in the 1950-1960’s ; pieced and quilted on a machine using garment scraps from that period. Very utilitarian but unless you are into that particular time period, not very attractive. But…….your tastes are different than others!

This vintage quilt was the first thing sold at the sale last fall by someone buying it for their teen daughter –at her request. She arrived early to snatch it up! I was really, really surprised–not my cup of tea!!

This quilt made almost a century ago would fit into a very contemporary bedroom. So price it accordingly.

4. Do you have information about the quilt? Proof of the date it was made? Do you have the story behind the creation—a “Hope Chest” quilt, a wedding gift or the maker. This is helpful in “upping” the price.

5. Where is the sale? How is it being advertised? Probably advertising that quilts are available will bring in a “buying” group. Will other vintage and antique items be for sale, also? I have friends that will drive a hour to purchase their “collectible” because they read online that it was available. Don’t post your prices on line though.

6. Did you know folks look for raggedy/worn quilts to make other items? The quilts that are in sad shape but have enough useable inches are called “cutters”.

Shirley made pillow covers, pennants and Christmas trees from one very loved “cutter

Diane used scraps from a cutter quilt to create wall art. She also embellishes some bibs cutter quilt hearts.

7. How badly do you want to get rid of your quilts? If you just want them gone after you have selected what ones you will be keeping (which I certainly hope you keep at least one!) Then price them to sell. It is an estate/garage sale. The prices should be a great deal lower that at a vintage shop. I was at a garage sale in my neighborhood this morning where the marked prices were much too high….didn’t buy anything. Folks expect bargains at these sales.

If you have storage room and don’t mind keeping them a while longer, price them accordingly.

Most of the quilts we receive at FUMC are in good to great shape and we have no incentive to store them so we price the quilts to sell. Any $$ for our cause is better than no money. We sell our super star quilts from $200 to $500. The cutters we receive are in the price range of $10 to $50.

Lastly, show off the quilts…maybe in a different way than most folks think about quilts.