What to do with mum's engagement ring

Clutterfree

Have you actually checked that none of your children would like it?

When my husbands grandfather died my FIL skipped all the house contents as there was nothing of financial value. All my husband wanted was an ornament that had been at his grandparents fireside for as long as he could remember. By the time he saw his dad it was broken at the bottom of the skip. His dad didn't think anyone would want anything that he classed as rubbish.

IMHO it was an ugly thing and definitely worthless in monetary terms but it would have been priceless to him.

couponqueen123

Clutterfree wrote: »

Have you actually checked that none of your children would like it?

When my husbands grandfather died my FIL skipped all the house contents as there was nothing of financial value. All my husband wanted was an ornament that had been at his grandparents fireside for as long as he could remember. By the time he saw his dad it was broken at the bottom of the skip. His dad didn't think anyone would want anything that he classed as rubbish.

IMHO it was an ugly thing and definitely worthless in monetary terms but it would have been priceless to him.[/QUOTE]

this is so true when my grandad died i got given a bird ornament(grandad used to tell me it came to watch me when i was home with mum n dad) and its been next to my mums gas fire since i was 6 but my grandad got given it as a child by his grandad so it donkeys years old no value but to me is worth more than anything , i have moved out of mums years ago but my mum grew attached to it to (it was her dads) so its there and every time i go there i get a warm feeling when it catches my eye, i have a dd who loves orniments so it would be broken at my house :eek:

imo its the "rubbish " most people want not the house money cars etc , memory's are more important to me

HurdyGurdy

Thank you all for your replies. All the original valuation says is "18ct gold and platinum set diamond cluster ring", so I've no idea of the size of the central stone.

My children definitely don't want it, but I do like the idea of having a "blended" piece of jewellery made.

I went to a shop yesterday (before posting here) that does a lot of second hand jewellery and have a notice in their window saying they buy any old, broken or unwanted jewellery, and even they wouldn't offer me anything for it!

There is a lovely independent jewellers in our town and I had a quick look at their website this morning and they do remodelling and design, so I will go in there and see what they can suggest.

On the blended front, I would love to maybe incorporate something of my mother-in-law's (when she goes - hopefully not for many years yet!) to bring both sides of the family together. I may even be able to cobble together enough bits to make three pieces to be able to pass one to each of the children. So thank you to LEJC for that suggestion .

Thank you again for your replies. I did wonder if it would be outrageously expensive to have the ring dismantled, but you have given me hope that it won't be.

NAR

Where are the Flog It (or such like) experts when you need them! Do you have any reputable auction houses near where you live, which might indicate what you might receive?

koneko

I inherited my great grandmothers engagement ring when I was 18, valued at around the same as yours and also with a band of extremely worn gold (plus she must have had massive fingers). My mum always kept the ring as she had a safe in the house, until my OH went to ask my parents for permission to marry me last year and he was given the ring as my mum suggested it would be nice to use the diamonds for my engagement ring.

OH went to a local independant jewellers and they designed the most beautiful engagement ring to reset the 3 diamonds into a white gold setting (I'm not a fan of yellow gold). It was such a shock when he proposed back in May with it.

Anyway, my point is:

- The gold is probably not what is worth the money, it will be the stones.
- A good local independant jeweller should be able to help you re-use the stones, and it could become an heirloom that you will be proud to pass down the family.

My ring may be essentially a new thing, but the diamonds are old and so it has a lot of sentimental value. I plan to hopefully pass it to my children/their children one day.

meritaten

How do you know that one day one of your 'kids' wouldn't like something that was 'grandmas?
and tbh an insurance valuation of £1500 - £2000 and a scrap value of £24 for the gold is a big discrepancy. it doesn't compute. no insurance value can be THAT inflated!
and yes the ring can be 'redesigned' using the gold and the stones.

jackyann

Although I can see that this is a huge discrepancy, I know from my stuff that there is an enormous difference between the insurance valuation and the "scrap".
I have some family silver that was insured for replacement value of thousands, because of the workmanship that would need to go into making replicas.
I agreed with the rest of the family that I would stop insuring it separately as we really wouldn't order replicas!

I think there are some nice ideas above, and it completely depends on how OP feels - always interesting to read different ways of tackling things.

hazyjo

JodyBPM wrote: »

I can't see how anything can have both an insurance valuation of £2.5K plus a scrap value of £24? You really need to ascertain before you go any further whether you have something worth a few quid or a few thousand.

meritaten wrote: »

...tbh an insurance valuation of £1500 - £2000 and a scrap value of £24 for the gold is a big discrepancy. it doesn't compute. no insurance value can be THAT inflated!

Just as a comparison, I have a very nice platinum and 3-diamond ring with an insurance valuation of £2,450 (5 years old). I got offers of between £100-350 when I looked at selling - and a few weren't interested in buying it at all! Just crazy!

Jx

tea_lover

I tried to sell my engagement ring last year and could barely give it away. I was given valuations for the gold of around £30. It's insured for £1500 and has a pretty decent (to me!) diamond in it. Such a shame but sadly that's how it is now, which is how we end up with such discrepancies between the valuations.