Norsemanjack: Sounds like we have a lawyer in the mix of us here on TB. Addendum might work here but my previous will was never filed and has little or no value, at this time. A new one is in order. Thanks for your suggestions and input.
George, and of course everyone tuned in here. You might want to send, as in PM me an address and phone #. It was in my previous computer and it flailed the flying finger of flatulent and died. And, it might help. If you send me a Christmas Wish List of what you might you be looking for?
Not a tax expert, but... Seems to me if you sell all your stuff you are going to make money on a few items and lose money on the rest. Maybe some people are extremely savvy about what they buy, but I expect to take more losses than gains, especially since I expect to get $0 for things like flex track, wiring, plywood, roadbed, and most of the scenery. Since you can offset capital gains with capital losses I won't bother trying to keep track.
I'm not an expert, either, but my understanding is that, if you sell a group of items that are a "collection" and get less than you paid for the collection, thre is no tax due. That is different from trying to say you sold a painting at a profit but sold your car at a loss and deduct the loss on the car from the profit on the painting. But, you should probably consult an expert, particularly one that knows your state tax laws as well as the IRS stuff.
I believe that you are correct. I misunderstood your original post as suggesting a number of independent transactions (due to your use of the word "offset"). My mistake.
For what it's worth, I'd like to add my 2c. I, Like many of you purchased a lot more rolling stock than I needed, even being in an Ntrak club and being able to run long trains, I still had more than I needed and soon it was clear I had more than I actually wanted. I was never going to build that big perfect layout so there was no need for all this stuff. I started to think about the value when two things happened. 1) Several local N-Scalers went to the Big Roundhouse, leaving friends to sell off their collections to recoup some cash. First things to go were all the cool stuff, like passenger sets, good locos,etc. Next were the more interesting cars. TOFC, Container wells, Tankers, covered hoppers,etc. What was left in each case were hundreds of plain old boxcars, nothing special, 40 and 50 footers, mostly boxcar red. The people selling this stuff were desperate, and MT cars were going for 4 bucks or less if you bought a bunch. Now these were not really any of the RARE HIGH DOLLAR cars, but just the same stuff I assume most of us have lots of. Pennies on the dollar, but the families were happy to get something. 2) A wise fellow N-Scaler, after discussing the above topic told me that he looks at model trains as CONSUMABLES. This caused me to look at the stuff with a whole new pair of glasses. He explained it this way; You pay $15 for a car that you like, you wanted it, you enjoyed finding it and you enjoyed putting it on your layout or on the display shelf, and you might even get enjoyment looking at it from time to time. How much is that enjoyment worth? You are consuming some of the value of the car by enjoying having it. As long as we don't attach EMOTIONAL value to the car (like a gift or a special trip souvenir) then the value is being used up. Kinda like a building kit, or a layout. You paid for it and you spent hours of enjoyment, putting it together. You will never recoup your time, so what is it worth? SO.......... I gathered up all my trains, spread them out on some tables and went through them. I picked out a few sentimental favorites, picked out several complete trains for my N-Trak running, Kept my collection of favorite engines and put the rest on Fee Pay. No reserve, 99c or $9.99 opening bid and Cleared out a whole bunch of consumed trains. I didn't think about the money that I lost, I thought about the money I have gained. Several thousand bucks, just sitting in boxes, not doing any one any good. I consumed the whole value with a nice vacation, paid for by emptying a cabinet. I have a few unique pieces, but mostly just average stuff. My wife knows what they are and someone may get to enjoy the cool stuff someday, if not, I had fun with them. Oh and my Phoebe Snow is going in the box with me! Greg O.
