Services
Estate Advisory
Due Diligence + Strategic Guidance for Estates with Significant Art + Valuable Personal Property
Our estate advisory practice is built around one principle: families and fiduciaries deserve independent, specialized counsel for every decision involving significant art and valuable personal property. We serve as the art market expert within your advisory team — coordinating with attorneys, wealth advisors, and executors to bring clarity, strategy, and fiduciary discipline to a process that is often unfamiliar and high-stakes.
Our background as private art dealers in a family business established over half a century ago has given us firsthand expertise in both the complexities of the art market and the family dynamics that shape estate decisions. We founded Art+Estates to support heirs, beneficiaries, fiduciaries, executors, attorneys, and financial advisors in clarifying goals and executing a strategic plan. Whether the goal is legacy preservation, museum donation or loan, or liquidation of the assets, we provide confidential and comprehensive oversight — engaging vetted specialists across every category of valuable personal property to ensure nothing is overlooked.
Rebecca Michelman directs every estate engagement personally, drawing on over two decades as a principal dealmaker in the Impressionist and 20th-century art market. She brings the market intelligence, disciplined advocacy, and hands-on oversight needed to navigate auction negotiations, consignment terms, and complex dispositions — producing optimal results while mitigating risk at every stage.
Families and executors surround themselves with rigorous, independent professionals to manage their wealth, legal affairs, and financial planning. Rebecca ensures the art is managed with that same standard of care.
Estate Advisory Services
Estate Planning Consultations
Working in tandem with your legal and financial advisors to identify, evaluate, and prepare for the future management or transfer of art, jewelry, design, and other valuable personal property. Whether the goal is long-term stewardship or sale, we help establish a roadmap that aligns with your family's intentions and meets the standards your advisors require.
Executor Support
When an estate is in the process of administration, we offer hands-on assistance with the evaluation, organization, and care of inherited collections — from fine art and sculpture to jewelry, furniture, decorative arts, and other luxury assets. From identifying unknown works to ensuring appropriate handling and storage, our services ease the burden for executors managing complex and varied holdings.
Sales + Disposition Strategy
Designed to help clients achieve optimal outcomes across all categories of valuable personal property — through private sales, auction placements, or a combination of both. We assess market potential, timing, and positioning for each asset category, engaging the right specialists where needed and always acting independently to prioritize the estate's best interests.
Pre-Sale Due Diligence
Before any work or object enters the market, we conduct rigorous due diligence appropriate to its category: provenance review, title verification, authenticity confirmation, and condition analysis. Addressing these issues proactively prevents complications, protects value, and positions assets for successful outcomes.
Appraisals
The right appraisal starts with the right appraiser — someone with genuine expertise in the objects being valued and fluency in the reporting requirements that govern each type of engagement, from IRS-compliant estate and gift tax valuations to insurance replacement schedules and collateral assessments for lending institutions. We hand-pick USPAP-compliant specialists in every relevant category — fine art, jewelry, decorative arts, furniture, and collectibles — and oversee each engagement to ensure the work meets its intended regulatory, legal, or fiduciary objective with clarity and precision.
Collection Documentation
"Organizing existing records — and supplementing them with our own independent research and firsthand examination — to create comprehensive digital and physical inventories across all asset categories, simplifying estate management, division, and long-term planning."
Referral Network
We provide access to a trusted circle of specialists — including conservators, art handlers, framers, jewelry experts, insurance professionals, storage & shipping facilities — ensuring we hand-pick the right team at every stage for the unique needs of each estate.
Strategic Auction Advisory for Estates
Major auction houses are extraordinary venues — global platforms that concentrate attention, generate competitive energy, and create compelling opportunities for sellers. But behind the spectacle is a complex commercial process with financial terms, contractual structures, and strategic variables that significantly impact outcomes.
For fiduciaries — including estate attorneys, trustees, and wealth advisors — participation in this market carries heightened responsibilities of diligence, transparency, and defensible decision-making.
For families, the process can be equally demanding — balancing personal attachments, differing priorities among heirs, and the pressure of making consequential decisions during an already difficult time. Understanding the mechanics — and having independent counsel to clarify, negotiate, and advocate — helps maximize net proceeds and mitigate risk.
We provide objective valuation analysis, pre-sale strategy, and disciplined negotiation support. By combining deep market intelligence with rigorous transactional oversight, we help fiduciaries and families substantiate pricing decisions, demonstrate prudent stewardship, and ensure every auction engagement is aligned with the estate's best interests and fiduciary obligations.
Get in Touch
Interested in discussing a fine art acquisition, valuation, or estate strategy? Art+Estates provides independent advisory services for collectors, fiduciaries, attorneys, and professional advisors navigating significant art assets. Call +1 646-535-9542 to schedule a confidential consultation.