Top Tips To Help You Decide Antique Furniture Values

Here is a guide to assist you when trying to decide antique furniture values. It often happens that you come across an item, and you are unsure what it is, whether it is a valuable antique or not. This would most likely occur in markets such as garage sales. How should you proceed?

Normally, an antique expert would scrutinise an object in four different areas, which are quality, condition, rarity, and demand. But first, you must try to identify it, and very often you start by making an assumption. Let us assume that you are looking at a dining table, and the seller informs you that it is a Victorian walnut dining table.

Or perhaps you make this assumption based on your own expertise. Well, the first thing to do is examine it with this in mind, and ask yourself if everything matches your assumption. Does the colour and wood-grain match expectations? Are the edges and the legs properly carved as they should be? Are there identifying marks underneath? All these are the type of questions that you need to find answers to. If you are unable to do this on your own, then take several detailed pictures, and get help from an expert.

When you are reasonable sure that you are indeed looking at a genuine antique, then you proceed with the four steps mentioned above. Quality refers to the level of workmanship that was used to make the item. For instance, in an antique dining table, there may be a removable central leaf, and a winding mechanism. If the quality is excellent, then this mechanism will still work properly even after hundreds of years.

The next step is to look at the condition of the item. What you look for here is the amount of wear and tear that the item has sustained over the years. This step also applies to any repairs that the item may have received. Examine every inch of the item during this step.

The quality is considered more important than the condition. For example, a high quality table in poor condition will normally be more valuable than a poor quality table in good condition. Ideally, we always want our antiques to be of excellent quality and in excellent condition.



Next step is to look at the rarity of the item. If is easy to assume that any antique is rare due to its age, but this is not always the case unfortunately. One example of this is the Hitchcock chair. This chair, even though it is a genuine antique dating back to 1826, was mass-produced at the time, and thousands of them still remain today. So, they are not considered rare.

The final item in the four-step evaluation procedure is demand. You may be looking at a great quality item in great condition, with no demand for it. This would mean that it is currently worth very little, so you are unlikely to make any money from it. This should not always deter you from buying, as demand can fluctuate over time.

Hopefully you will be able to make an informed decision. If the item is great quality, great condition, but not very rare and not in demand, you might still be interested in buying it. Maybe the appearance matches the décor of your home, or maybe you just like it very much for some reason. Whatever the reason, why not test your bargaining skills.

Remember that you are dealing directly with the seller, and not a cash register. Talk to the seller and inform him or her of your findings, and point out any flaws or damage that you discovered during your examination. You just might succeed in getting a bargain price.

About the Author:
Brian is an antiques publisher. For more great tips on antique furniture values, visit http://www.antiquinginformation.infosmrtovnice
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