Pal, this sort of thing perplexes me, too. We had the younger (!) Mr. Freeman come out to my parents' home to see if selling at auction would be an option for some things. They were interested in only a few pieces and those were not things we wanted to sell. Some of ours had to do with style, I suspect-large pieces from the 19th century(late) that were lovely, but not particularly in demand now, I guess. Too big for most places today. I would not be surprised if my grandfather picked them up at Freeman's in the early days of the 20th century!

I should think your mid-century items would be quite desirable. The doors sound wonderful, too. I think it is the same as people buying lottery tickets hoping to hit the jackpot without any effort. We all love a good deal, but I wonder if "something for nothing" hasn't become the norm these days. Sad.

I hope this changes and you find homes for your wonderful things!

It's like the commercial here they say "everything can't be 25 cents". I see it in the pharmacy all the time. "What do you mean $30! Bill the insurance!". Um, you just picked up $800 of medication for $30, that's pretty good. But it's not on the free program so nobody is happy.

Just because it's not new doesn't mean a set of chairs should be $10. Are there forums somewhere for people that collect or appreciate this stuff you could post on? There's a place on the interwebz for just about any interest.

That's odd. I though MCM was really hot right now.

You could look around for places to advertise. Apartment Therapy has a classified ad section and I know there are people there who are mad for MCM. There have to be other places to post ads out there.

If you have the time and aren't moving right away, I'd keep posting on Craigslist. Sooner or later someone will realize exactly what it is that you are offering and be willing to pay for it.

But, yeah, there is a mentality that everything should be a "find" and a "steal." Ebay and Craigslist have contributed to that.

We cleaned out so many places, I can't begin to tell you...we had people walk through and point at things and say, wow that's really valuable! But would they buy it? No. The fact is, the value of something is only what someone is willing to pay for it. And when it's in your house, the expectation is, I'll get it for a song or not get it at all.

Only other thing I can suggest is to make sure you are talking to the right guys. Some furniture dealers are extremely fussy, others less so. If a dealer you're talking to isn't interested, they often know other folks in the business who might be....

silly question, but do you have them listed on CL or ebay? If you are trying to Craigslist, you might try listing on the NYC CL. Any time I've had something kind of unusual/valuable/collectible for sale on CL, it seems like I end up with a buyer who drives down from NYC. Folks up there seem to go for that stuff more than the Philly folks. (I'm in Philly too, and advertise on the Philly CL).

Also, if you don't have them listed on ebay but you see similar items there, why not list them yourself? If you don't want to deal with shipping, just make it a local pickup only listing or say that the buyer has to arrange for shipping. If someone wants it bad enough, they will arrange for a firm like craters and freighters to come to your house and take the item away for shipping. Ebay will get you a national exposure unlike any other internet service out there.

Good luck!

I think CL NYC is a very good idea.

I did eBay the last time I moved and even did some furniture that way, so I may try it again. At that time, though, I had an entire day off during the workweek and that entire day was usually devoted to eBay for several months. I don't have the same amount of daytime open right now.

Freeman's Auction? I bet you already thought of that.

I wonder if you could do a curated sale of your items for One King's Lane? I have no idea how that works, what your responsibilities as a seller would be or how much of the profit they take, but it might be worth an Email to them to find out.

Oh, honey...

I understand your frustration better than you know!
My aunt, the dowager queen of that side of our family, died leaving a cottage full of things she had kept for umpty-ump years, many of them her (and my mother's) parents' things.
It happened fairly suddenly, leaving me responsible for removing everything. I rented a storage unit in a well-run place. I distributed everything I could to other family members who wanted them, kept the silver and china and a few other things of value...and paid to store the rest for years.

I was determined that everything go to the right place, and for the right price.

$15,000 in storage fees later, I finally gave the rest of it away.
We still have things in storage, but had I been able to deal with it all at first, I'd feel a lot less foolish.

It's not pathology, darling...it's family conditioning, an old-fashioned sense of value and responsibility in a time where those values are more rare, and your knowledge that those things that are not treasured by the marketplace just now really should have recognized intrinsic worth.

But your time and your psychic health have more intrinsic worth.

Try to make a bargain with yourself.
Rent a van, rent a storage unit, pack away the things you KNOW are worth something, deliver the rest to the auctioneers and the charity shops you've ferreted out, and take yourself out to Buddakan or Davio's for a whacking good dinner.

It's like ripping off the band-aid. Hurts like the devil now, hurts less in the long run.

I wonder if a consignment store in the right area might be able to help? I suspect that while the things you are selling have definite style and value, perhaps the buyers that are seeing them now simply aren't savvy enough to know the value.