The sad truth

There is an informal E Mail chain I belong to with just Jag V 12 racers. We share tips and tricks etc. it's Global  US, New Zealand, Australia, England,  France. 

Only 12 er 11 of us now. One of our members failed to wake up one morning. His widow came on today trying to find buyers of her husbands stuff.  
She's tried the local Jag club but they are polishers and collectors not racers.  Nothing has value to them.  
While I'd love to buy some of his bits shipping from England would make everything too expensive even if she could build crates for the stuff. Her only hope now is a scrap metal dealer will treat her fairly. 
 

My advice  to all racers is keep a contact list of buyers of stuff you've got if the unexpected happens. 

The Swedish do a thing called "döstädning," which translates as "death cleaning."  As you get too old to do stuff, make the hard choices and sell stuff before you go, so you can see the good in it rather than leaving it to a spouse to become one more burden.  You don't have to get top dollar, just better or more rewarding than a scrap dealer as your spouse's only option, since that leaves a feeling of failure when the world is hard enough.  Phone numbers just in case of a surprise, but don't leave your family with a pile of stuff that only you understand. Divide what would have been in your estate when you are alive, so that you can see the smile it brings and participate in the shared experiences. Don't wait to do good and helpful things until after you are dead. Some things can't be done ahead of time, no worries. So many things can be done, though, so do those.

frenchy, i'm sorry you lost a friend.

matthewmcl, i'm totally doing a death cleaning while i'm able.  E36 M3, i'm thinking about doing one next year and i'm only 53 with good numbers on everything.  for every hour in the garage, 5-10 minutes of that is spent puttering around looking for E36 M3, and another 5-10 is spent playing garage tetris so i can even get to the work i'm trying to do.  plus, i was purgemaster for my Mom after Dad died.  berkeley, what a PITA.  i'm not putting that burden on my wife and kids.

AngryCorvair (Forum Supporter) said:

frenchy, i'm sorry you lost a friend.

matthewmcl, i'm totally doing a death cleaning while i'm able.  E36 M3, i'm thinking about doing one next year and i'm only 53 with good numbers on everything.  for every hour in the garage, 5-10 minutes of that is spent puttering around looking for E36 M3, and another 5-10 is spent playing garage tetris so i can even get to the work i'm trying to do.  plus, i was purgemaster for my Mom after Dad died.  berkeley, what a PITA.  i'm not putting that burden on my wife and kids.

I truly fear the hoard I'll have when I get older. 

I'd think the Goodwood members association would have someone that'd find a place for that stuff... if it's in the UK somewhere?

Sorry to hear about your friend, frenchy.

I agree about the "death purging" thing.  I've been actually trying to work on that myself, since I have so. much. crap... Granted, I have no heirs and likely never will. 

Make sure titles for your vehicles are reasonably easy to find. 

I find that a clear understanding with the spouse can also make this very esy. We have had the talk and agreed that EVERYTHING in the garage is junk. Call the scrapper and tell them that it is all theirs; Tools cars and parts, on the condition that they leave bare walls and floors. While it might be of value to someone, this is the least painful way to move on for the survivor. I have participated in such port-mortem clean outs and the slow acceptance that your loved ones prized possessions are all junk and worthless is hard to watch unfold.

I will do the same with shoes and purses if need be.

Pete

I sometimes worry about what my wife would have to deal with if I passed and I'm 37.

There is just a lot of stuff that I have that is basically worthless that she will potentially think has value.  And she will have to deal with it all.  I've thought about writing a letter that says, "give this, this, and this to so and so, pay junk person to clean rest for scrap"

Sorry to hear about your Jag friend.

In reply to NOHOME :

if my buddy Homeboy Mark survives me, he gets any Corvair(s) that i might own, *if* he wants them.  otherwise, i shall follow your lead and explain very clearly to my wife that she has my permission to treat it all as scrap.

Pre-Post edit: Since we both work from home now, i just told her. she's fine with that, LOL.

nocones said:

I've thought about writing a letter that says, "give this, this, and this to so and so, pay junk person to clean rest for scrap"

i'm pretty sure that's called a "Will"

I think I read many years ago here about having spouse host a party for your closest racing friends to all come over, have some drinks, remember you with your spouse, and leave with whatever they want from the garage. 

Then call the scrapper. But you must be very specific "If you take anything you MUST take everything". 

Also, another easy rule for spouses is if the car has insurance on it, sell it for money. If it doesn't assume it's worthless. 

We are in the process of downsizing so its a good time to make some realistic choices.    My arthritis has gotten so bad that it hurts to work on cars and do handyman work around the house.  So I am figuring out how to dispose material and tools I will no longer be using.  Probably will have to sell my MSM.

I have about a 1000 books.  The aren't going to fit in the downsized house.   A good friend  has a contingency antique shop and has agreed I can put a small book case in her shop with books for sale.   It may take a while to sell them but at least I know the books are going to someone who cares about books and they  won't be thrown in the trash like Goodwill would do.  

sleepyhead the buffalo said:

I'd think the Goodwood members association would have someone that'd find a place for that stuff... if it's in the UK somewhere?

The XJS is too new for Goodwood.  There are active groups who race the XJS but the widow doesn't know who to contact. 

matthewmcl (Forum Supporter) said:

The Swedish do a thing called "döstädning," which translates as "death cleaning."  As you get too old to do stuff, make the hard choices and sell stuff before you go, so you can see the good in it rather than leaving it to a spouse to become one more burden. 

Huh, I döstädned when we downsized and moved to Ohio.  I sold some big stuff, donated some furniture to Salvation Army, but I gave a lot of Jeep and car audio parts to a lot of friends.  If you came to help us pack or load the U-haul, there's a good chance you left with a new-to-you transfer case, KC lights, brackets, subwoofers, amplifiers, random electric motors, etc.

Robbie (Forum Supporter) said:

I think I read many years ago here about having spouse host a party for your closest racing friends to all come over, have some drinks, remember you with your spouse, and leave with whatever they want from the garage. 

Then call the scrapper. But you must be very specific "If you take anything you MUST take everything". 

Also, another easy rule for spouses is if the car has insurance on it, sell it for money. If it doesn't assume it's worthless. 

That's kinda like Gee this old Can Am car or Indy car    doesn't have insurance  and I can't find a buyer so it's scrap. 

My father was a lifelong R/C airplane modeler and flyer.  He had a shop full of airplanes, tools, and equipment.

When he died a couple guys from the local club, who were social friends of both my parents, organized his stuff and held a gathering in his shop.  Most of the key airplanes were sold to friends or club members for good prices because my father had an excellent regional reputation as a strong, straight, lightweight builder.  Everything else of modest value went home with someone who would put it to good use, and the shop was left empty and clean.

In reply to Professor_Brap (Forum Supporter) :

My plan is to donate all my wood and wood tools to Habitat for Humanity 

My cars, Tools,  and car parts to my buddy Joe. 
 

About 20 years ago a racing buddy passed away and he had a magnificent collection of Engines. 
Including a D Type Jaguar, 250 Offy, Birdcage Maserati engine, Coventry Climax. Etc. nicely displayed on stands.  I waited what I felt was the proper time and called his widow about the collection. 

"Oh,  all that junk in the garage I had hauled off"

Today that collection would be very valuable. And to the right buyers near priceless. 

Helped Dad with two clean outs.  Even if you're not leading them it is exhausting.  I feel bad for the widow that she now has to go through that.

Been to a few not-really-an-estate-sale-but-it-is-kinda-an-estate-sale things with the old boat guys.  Seen it done well, and seen it done poorly.  When they're done well its more like a wake than anything else, when they're done poorly it just leaves me feeling bad for the loved ones left behind.  The ones that go poorly always seem to have an estate sale auctioneer with them.  Let those guys come in after the friends and family have left is my suggestion

Sorry for the loss - appreciate the help you are offering.  My Dad and I have been helping buddies and their widows with this cleaning for a few years.  He is a machine on craigslist.

PSA - Please for the love of god pay a lawyer $300 to make up a will, power of attorney, DNR's, last wishes.  It isn't fun but it isn't hard.  Then make sure someone other that you has a copy of it.  It sucks trying to help sort out dying without documents for those you love.

The idea of a list of folks to sell stuff to is also a brilliant ad that I need to put in place for cars and bang bangs.

So my first reaction to döstädning was maybe a little selfish, I just thought about us moving to Ohio, 700+ miles away from home, to a smaller house, strange place, and how much stuff we just gave away.  While moving to Ohio and dying aren't (technically) the same, reading my post again, I thought that my attempt at levity might not be appropriate, it wasn't meant to be disrespectful.  Unless you're a Buckeye, then yes you can consider it disrespectful.

frenchyd said:

Robbie (Forum Supporter) said:

I think I read many years ago here about having spouse host a party for your closest racing friends to all come over, have some drinks, remember you with your spouse, and leave with whatever they want from the garage. 

Then call the scrapper. But you must be very specific "If you take anything you MUST take everything". 

Also, another easy rule for spouses is if the car has insurance on it, sell it for money. If it doesn't assume it's worthless. 

That's kinda like Gee this old Can Am car or Indy car    doesn't have insurance  and I can't find a buyer so it's scrap. 

If you have something valuable like that in your shop, you'd probably have some type of insurance. Not like street driving liability, but fire, flood, theft, type insurance. No, it probably would not be a policy from Gieco, but again my guess is you would likely have insurance. 

Sad to hear about your friend Frenchy. I was left a hoarder level of literal junk when my uncle passed. Most of it was absolutely worthless. It's tough to deal with even when it really has no value. 

Another tip that I saw from a family at our church. Make an "in-case" notebook. One of our older members made copies of every important document - from wills and insurance policies to lists of possible outlets of value for salable stuff and requests for what songs and passages he wanted used in his service - and put it in a binder. He sat down with his three adult sons and went through the entire notebook. He kept it updated every 6 months or so. When the time came it made the process much easier for his sons and his widow.

We did the estate sale thing with Jewel's grandparent's place.  While her grandmother's death was sudden, and unexpected, she had been moved into an assisted living facility, and her house and belongings had been through a few purges in preparation for selling.  Thankfully her grandparents did some estate planning, and most of the valuable (monetary or sentimental) stuff was allocated to a child or grand kid.  The family is mostly rationale, reasonable, and gets along well, so stuff that wasn't already in the will, was fairly distributed to those who wanted it.  Everything else was sold through an estate sale auction company.  It was a surreal, but eye-opening, and educational experience.

On the other hand, my grandpa died of a sudden and unexpected heart attack.  He was a semi-retired, machine shop owner.  His New Britain screw machines are still set up for the last job he was running.  The shop is fairly well outfitted, but everything is out dated to near obsolescence.  His screw machines, and many other tools are WWII era leftovers.  Not a lot of folks who would want to use them for production in today's CNC world, and they're way too massive for hobby machines.  So they've sat mostly unused for 11 years now, as the pole barn shop, slowly deteriorates around them.

In reply to Robbie (Forum Supporter) :

He got some of the engines when he swapped in Chevy's. Back in the 50's & 60's .   The rest he acquired basically as junk paying little or nothing for. 
Following him I've started my own collection Jaguar's MG's  etc. again nothing of real value today.  But in a couple of decades?  
 

I do have a Million dollar overrider policy but I don't think it would cover the theft or loss of anything until my homeowners policy limits are exceeded. 

bigdaddylee82 said:

We did the estate sale thing with Jewel's grandparent's place.  While her grandmother's death was sudden, and unexpected, she had been moved into an assisted living facility, and her house and belongings had been through a few purges in preparation for selling.  Thankfully her grandparents did some estate planning, and most of the valuable (monetary or sentimental) stuff was allocated to a child or grand kid.  The family is mostly rationale, reasonable, and gets along well, so stuff that wasn't already in the will, was fairly distributed to those who wanted it.  Everything else was sold through an estate sale auction company.  It was a surreal, but eye-opening, and educational experience.

 

On the other hand, my grandpa died of a sudden and unexpected heart attack.  He was a sem-retired, machine shop owner.  His New Britain screw machines are still set up for the last job he was running.  The shop is fairly well outfitted, but everything is out dated to near obsolescence.  His screw machines, and many other tools are WWII era leftovers.  Not a lot of folks who would want to use them for production in today's CNC world, and their way too massive for hobby machines.  So they've sat mostly unused for 11 years now, as the pole barn shop, slowly deteriorates around them.

Yes!  That's exactly the sort of things that happen. Buyers will pick that stuff over at scrap metal prices, Something that provided him with a living and raised his children. 
Is the equipment obsolete?  Probably but likely there is a niche market for someone. The difficulty is finding that niche.