Even if there were no IRS regulations or restrictions, museums providing or 
facilitating appraisals would be a terrible idea.  Quite simply, it's a 
conflict of interest, and perhaps this is a rationale which you can use to convince 
donors, particularly when values of less than $5000 are iinvolved.  It would be 
all too easy for an eager curator to inflate an evaluation in order to 
convince a potential donor to give an object to the museum.
 
The greatest difficulty I've had with donors over the question of appraisals 
concerns objects of low value.  The donor understandably doesn't want to pay 
for an appraisal and balks if the curator cannot give a ballpark figure or 
range.  The donor assumes that the curator is knowledgeable about the item, 
including its approximate value, and is being coy or difficult, withholding 
information.  The donor might understand the curator's refusal to put a value in 
writing, but just wants a verbal appraisal.  Sympathizing with such donors, I used 
to cite recent sale prices if I happened to have a convenient catalog at 
hand--until I was cautioned that even that was a bad idea, too easy for the donor 
to misinterpret the "citation" as my appraisal if he was ever audited by the 
IRS.  So I haven't even done that for a very long time, advising the donor that 
he has to do his own research.  Nowadays, however, we have a great tool--eBay! 
 I suggest that donors locate values for similar objects on eBay, and they 
can even print out the basis for their evaluations for their tax records.
 
David Haberstich 



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