In article <Xns9A832889D3F1avocatstuyahoofr[at]130.133.1.4> ,
Stuart Bronstein <spamtrap[at]lexregia.com> wrote:
- quote -

Can the expert in this case actually point to sales of that particular
item? We don't know; apparently, he didn't provide that information
to OP.

Seth

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In article <fb79b5b0-56c2-4348-9b4b-bb6f457cd38d[at]m71g2000hse.googlegroups.com> ,
kastnna <kastnna[at]auburnalum.org> wrote:
- quote -

You said that some items routinely sell for less than average on eBay,
to support your claim that eBay isn't representative. (Other items
routinely sell for more than average there; I've seen a book sell for
$80 while it was still in print from the publisher for $35.)

Half of all sales are at less than the median price for the item, by
definition.

- quote -

The definition of FMV is in terms of "a buyer" and "a seller", not
"the totality of the market". Yes, that means that one item will have
a lot of different prices, all of which are FMV.

- quote -

FMV is defined for an item, not a market.

- quote -

That was in response to your claim that eBay didn't matter because its
prices were often lower than "average". I pointed out that there are
lots of other places with the same property.

Seth

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On Thu, 17 Apr 2008 00:59:46 EDT, sethb[at]panix.com (Seth)
wrote:

- quote -

You have now introduced a fact that is not in existence. The
OP said he saw a listing, which is different than a sale.
Others have already explained why even one sale is not the
definition of FMV.

Just because you want something to be a certain way does not
make it so. Nor does repeating the same thing over and over
again make it true. A random listing on eBay will never
overcome an expert's opinion.

Drew Edmundson, CPA
Cary, NC

--
Drew Edmundson, CPA
Cary, NC

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On Apr 17, 12:39*pm, se...[at]panix.com (Seth) wrote:
- quote -

I never said that FMV should be the "publishers list", nor did I say
Amazon is "wrong". You're making inferences that aren't supported by
my statements.

Online retailers constitute a PORTION of the market only. FMV is
decided by the market, not a single or small number of transactions.
If online retailers provide the bulk of the product, then FMV may, in
fact, be very near online prices. If online retailers constitute only
a small percentage of a product offering then FMV for that market may
be no where near the online retailers price. As usual, it depends.

Originally this thread focused on the validity of ebay auctions being
representative of FMV. Apparently you have now expanded the debate to
include all online retailers. While ALL online retailers may
cumulatively come closer to reaching average FMV (depending on the
specifics) it doesn't change the original discussion.

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On Apr 16, 11:59*pm, se...[at]panix.com (Seth) wrote:

- quote -

You're limiting the definition to mean that a single transaction can
consititute FMV. The IRS describes "unusual market conditions",
"comparable sales", and even "expert opinion" all as factors that can
render a singular transaction (or even a minority of transactions) to
be an anomaly and thus not indicative of FMV.

Furthermore, immediately prior to your above definition, the IRS
states "FMV is the price that property would sell for on the open
market". A "market" is not defined by a single transaction but rather
ALL the transactions of that good, service, or idea.

Can ebay represent FMV? Possibly. Does ebay represent FMV in this
case? That depends on details not provided here. Does ebay generally
represent FMV? Not in my un-official experience for reason previously
stated.

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In article <5d285f99-b1f1-43f6-ae74-9a3786daa9c4[at]c65g2000hsa.googlegroups.com> ,
kastnna <kastnna[at]auburnalum.org> wrote:

- quote -

One can look for similar items (TVs, cameras, computers) at buy.com,
amazon.com, froogle.google.com, and even woot.com and see that they
routinely sell for "less than average prices". Does that mean that
FMV for a book is "publisher's list" and Amazon is "wrong"?

Seth

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sethb[at]panix.com (Seth) wrote:
- quote -

One sale is not sufficient to create evidence establishing value. The
expert presumably has experience with many sales and draws on them to
come up with his value. But a single sale can easily be a fluke, and
is unreliable for this purpose.

Stu

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In article <ftsc049d81tikrokaogsoodujov43mhv00[at]4ax.com> ,
Drew Edmundson <drewsbeagles[at]hotmail.com> wrote:
- quote -

I don't see two people saying. I see one person saying, and one
actual transaction (unless you consider eBay's reporting of prices to
be the word of an unreliable stranger).

Again, the regs _define_ Fair Market Value as the price a willing
buyer and seller would agree to. On the one hand, we have a willing
buyer and seller, and the price they actually agreed to. On the other
hand, we have an "expert" who claims they should have agreed to some
other price.

Seth

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On Thu, 10 Apr 2008 13:31:55 EDT, sethb[at]panix.com (Seth)
wrote:

- quote -

Lets be realistic. Because some stranger says the price is
one thing and an expert says something else, the stranger
somehow trumps the expert? Common sense says that the
expert wins and the courts support common sense. Find some
cases that support your point or some other reference.

Drew Edmundson, CPA
Cary, NC

--
Drew Edmundson, CPA
Cary, NC

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On Apr 12, 1:01*am, se...[at]panix.com (Seth) wrote:
- quote -

I buy a lot of stuff on ebay because it is cheaper than it costs me
locally. I don't resell it and "get rich" because there is an
opporunity costs associated.

- quote -

That statement would only be true if there were absolutely no other
variables to consider. There are numerous other costs and risks
associated with ebay that affect price. Shipping costs, selling fees,
the inability to "try" an item before purchasing, the lack of
dedicated customer service by individual sellers, and the risk of
getting "scammed" all result in ebay items generally selling for less
than comparable products in "brick and mortar" stores. To overcome
these additional factors, ebay sellers must demand a lower price.

One can simply look for big ticket items on ebay (BMWs, plasma TVs,
etc) and see that these items routinely sell for less than average
prices.

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In article <yNCdnUPP6NMzHmPanZ2dnUVZWhednZ2d[at]earthlink.com> ,
anne watson <anneb3[at]mindspring.com> wrote:

- quote -

Except there's no evidence of actual sales. All we see are the ask
side.

A dealer has had several of my books listed for a year, without
sales. Does that make his asking price FMV?

Seth

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In article <357f9970-f7fc-4ec0-96fe-801874272305[at]s50g2000hsb.googlegroups.com> ,
kastnna <kastnna[at]auburnalum.org> wrote:

- quote -

Then buy the stuff on eBay and get rich.

The fact that so few people are doing that implies that eBay prices
aren't necessarily that low.

Seth

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On Apr 10, 11:29*pm, Stuart Bronstein <spamt...[at]lexregia.com> wrote:
- quote -

Perhaps ALL of ebay is an aberation. I think it is a shopping place
for tech-savvy consumers looking for a deal, not a source for fair
market value. Suppose one were to find 5 or 10 similar sales on ebay.
What if 1000s of other sales occurred offline at prices markedly
higher?

Ex: Because I am in the market, I recently checked ebay for a 2006 3-
series BMW. Total for sale=90. I then checked autotrader for the same
criteria. Total for sale=3158. Even if autotrader constituted the
ENTIRE market (which I don't believe it does), ebay is offering less
than 3% of all potential candidates. The vast majority of the ebay
offerings were also cheaper that the autotrader offerings (with some
overlap for double listed items).

That may not be the case here. Ebay may, in fact, be the primary
resale source for the items in question. However, if it is not, it
shouldn't be relied upon as indicitive of fair market value.

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"anne watson" <anneb3[at]mindspring.com> wrote:

- quote -

The Abe book site is a great one for buying books. But they list many
copies of the same book, often at a wide range of prices. I'm not aware
that you can look at what the actual sales are for those books.

On eBay, however, you can apparently see the actual results of past
sales.

Stu

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sethb[at]panix.com (Seth) wrote:
- quote -

A single eBay sale is meaningless because it could be an aberration.
If you find five or ten eBay sales of the same item, that will give you
a better idea of what it is actually worth.

Stu

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"> > > > One sale is not fair market value. How do you know the eBay
- quote -

Just had to jump in. EBAY ss not the place to look for Fair Market Value in
books. d a Google for ABE books, you might be surprised. Our Friends
of the Library uses it to sell hundreds of books per month.

No auction just buying and selling at what ever the market will bear,
Anne

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Seth wrote:
....

- quote -

Just having sold it doesn't remove the possibility of a compulsory sale
by the buyer -- he _could_ be willing to accept anything if in a pinch.

The expert appraiser trumps the regulation in the eyes of probate court
in some states apparently from earlier posts.

I agree it would need a fairly sizable sample population of completed
auctions to have any chance of setting a FMV at significant variance to
an expert appraiser's estimate if it came to that in the process of
probate -- but that doesn't say it isn't possible still the appraiser is
over-estimating for a multitude of reasons.

Where I see the practical difficulty in stuff like this is that ime
appraisers tend to have experience in what I'll term "high end" markets
whereas an "every day" estate auction is likely to only bring in small
fractions of what some items might bring if there were the time and
inclination to market them to precisely the right outlet or in a
location (particularly larger population centers) where there could be
more demand.

imo, $0.02, etc., ...

--

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In article <ebpLj.34310$rC6.32266[at]bignews4.bellsouth.net> ,
Drew <drewsbeagles[at]hotmail.com> wrote:

- quote -

What about an eBay _sale_? The eBay sale meets the definition in the
regulations, and I don't see anything in the quoted regulations about
a qualified appraiser trumping the definition.

I agree that the listing is irrelevant; I know lots of cases where
someone listed an item for a low price in order to attract interest,
and expected it to sell for much more (and did get an order of
magnitude more than the mininum).

Seth

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<removeps-groups[at]yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:520277db-1a7c-40e3-9deb-95693c8621cd[at]s37g2000prg.googlegroups.com...
- quote -

No it isn't.

- quote -

the property would change hands between a willing buyer and
a willing seller, neither being under any compulsion to buy
or sell and both having reasonable knowledge of relevant
facts." Note "no compulsion" in the regulation. So motive
is a key element. The law is the law and telling me how the
law should be doesn't help. But you have gone off on a
tangent. Appraisal from a qualified appraiser trumps an
eBay listing. That is just the way it is. If you don't
like the appraisal then get another expert to tell you the
first appraiser is wrong or gather a whole lot of other
evidence than just a random eBay listing (no insult intended
to the OP).

Drew Edmundson, CPA
Cary, NC

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On Apr 7, 4:01 pm, "Drew" <drewsbeag...[at]hotmail.com> wrote:

- quote -

Maybe the eBay seller was desperate for cash, but that's part of FMV.
The market of sellers includes people who want to make a profit and
put their money into new investments, people who want to sell stuff to
pay for college, people who want to sell stuff because they need to
pay for heat, etc. Whatever the underlying motive, that's irrelevant;
the bottom line is that the price they sell for is FMV. Simarly, when
I sell stock I own because I need to pay for something (whether it's
for a wedding, to pay a tax bill, whatever), the only thing that
matters for tax purposes is the price I sold it at.

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