My dad is bad for over-valuing things. I think it becomes part of an elaborate excuse mechanism for not getting rid of stuff. Over the years, he's been convincing himself that his collecting/hoarding is an "investment" but is unable to comprehend when it becomes a toxic asset.
Last year, when we were going through his and mom's stuff as they were downsizing and moving into a retirement community, he kept putting highly unrealistic prices on things to sell. He was convinced that his 20-year-old Buick LeSabre was worth $5,000, but he would take no less than $4,750 for it because in his mind, taking anything less than that would be letting somebody 'steal' it. In reality, book value for the car was half his asking price on a good day. After storing the car for several months at $200 a month, he finally let a friend of his take the car and sell it for him His friend got a decent real-world price for the car, and took a cut of the proceeds for his troubles. I have no idea how much Dad netted out of that deal, but I'm sure it wasn't more than a few hundred dollars after factoring in the cost of the storage unit.
I also took a large portion of his antique toy collection and have been gradually selling it on eBay. He was giving me prices to start the bidding on items that were two and three times what they were selling for. In other words, he was giving me 'I don't want to sell it' prices but the reality is there's so much stuff to deal with that it's more realistic to start the bidding at 'move it the hell out of here' prices and see what happens. Some things have amazed me while others have been disappointments but I end up doing okay in the long run.
