This may be a topic somewhere else, but I couldn't find it.
The other day, i sent my mother a link to the little Q&A I did to promoter the new poster book from Gemstone publishing. She knew I had been collecting posters since I was a kid, but she was floored. She had NO idea of the sheer number of posters I owned or of their possible value. Up until getting on APF, I never really talked about the hobby with anyone i knew because i didn't want to bore/alienate them. Sure, if they came to my house they saw the posters on my walls. But that's it. Unless they asked, i didn't go into detail. No one at work knows about my collection, my extended family and friends don;'t really know, people from previous jobs, nursing school, etc. have no clue about it really.
So my mother said that i should get some insurance on the posters. That is actually a good idea. I had thought about it, but until i became a nurse it wasn't financially feasible...and then I was digging myself out of debt, etc. Now is actually a good time to get insurance. I'm still living in the shack-o-rama (no heat in here...brr!), but this will be my last winter in this dump (one way or another). If there was a fire or flood or earthquake, etc. the ONLY thing i would really be upset about losing would be my posters.
So my mom was going to talk to her insurance guy and have him give me a call. He said I'd have to get them appraised--which is understandable, except where in the heck am i going to find someone locally to appraise all of my thousands of posters? There's NOBODY outside of the LA or possibly Bay Area that can do that...and to get all of my posters to one of those locations would be costly and time consuming. I don't want to sound like a know-it-all (because I am NOT!!) or like a poster guru, but i really do NOT think there is anyone in my area or the surrounding outlying area who has as many posters as i do (nearly 40 years of collecting. Hello!?) or who knows about posters (and my knowledge is very limited...but i've been involved in this for 4 decades) like I do. I've been in this hobby all alone for so long. i have looked and looked for others with poster interests locally for decades--there's no one else.
So while my local insurance guy is pondering how to get these things appraised (and, oh god, the idea of having to pull out all of the boxes and tubes, etc), does any one have any ideas on what to do? Does anyone not living in a major metropolis have poster insurance on their collection? I'm just wondering what this might entail...
Thanks!