Your Card Collection Has No Plan. Here's What Happens Without One.

The 28% tax rate, the probate problem, and why your estate attorney has never heard of PSA.

A collector dies on a Tuesday in October.

His wife knows he had cards. She knew he had a lot of cards.

What she did not know was what any of them were worth, which ones mattered, where the receipts were, or that the two boxes in the hall closet were not the same as the seven storage bins in the garage.

She called an estate attorney. He was good at his job. He had handled hundreds of estates, knew probate law front to back, and treated her situation with care.

He had also never graded a card in his life, did not know what PSA meant, and had no frame of reference for why one cardboard rectangle was worth $12 and another was worth $4,000.

The collection went through probate. The process took eleven months. By the time it cleared, her brother-in-law had already sold three storage bins to the first dealer who knocked on the door.

He thought he got a fair price. He had no idea what fair looked like.

This version of this story happens in the hobby every year. It can happen to any of us if we don’t have a plan.

The Collection Nobody Can Find

Here is the first problem when a collector dies without a plan: nobody knows what exists.

Not your spouse. Not your kids. Not your estate attorney.

Your brain holds the inventory. Your account on eBay or PSA holds part of the picture.

Your receipts are in a folder on a shelf somewhere, or in your email, or you stopped saving them after 2021 because you knew what you paid.

If you have never written down what you own, what you paid, and what it is currently worth, your collection is invisible to the people who will inherit it.

An estate attorney cannot protect what they cannot identify. A trustee cannot distribute what they cannot value.

Your heirs cannot make good decisions about assets they do not understand.

The card you paid $3,400 for at a show in Las Vegas looks like a cardboard rectangle to someone who does not collect.

What Probate Does to a Collection

Most collectors assume their family will figure it out. The problem is probate does not wait for anyone to get up to speed.

In most states, collectibles that do not have a named beneficiary, are not held in a trust, and are not titled to a joint owner go through probate.

That process is public, slow, and expensive. Depending on the estate and the state, it takes anywhere from nine months to three years.

During that time, the collection is part of the estate. Your heirs may not be able to sell anything.

The card you have been holding because the comp sales are climbing does not care that your estate is in probate. The market moves without you.

Then there is the valuation problem. Probate courts require estates to be valued. For a house, that is a real estate appraisal.

For a stock portfolio, that is a brokerage statement. For a sports card collection, most appraisers have never been to a card show. If your heirs hire someone who does not understand the hobby, the valuation will be wrong.

Too low and assets sell for a fraction of market value. Too high and the estate will owe taxes on phantom value.

Neither outcome is what you spent decades building toward.

What Your Attorney Does Not Know

I paid $4,500 for a trust.

Good estate attorney. Well-regarded in the field. He had handled plenty of clients with complex portfolios, and he treated my situation with professionalism.

He had also never heard of a PSA population report, did not know what triggered the 28% collectibles capital gains rate, and had no idea how to structure a card held as a long-term investment differently from one being flipped for short-term income.

He drafted a trust that technically covered my collection. The strategy inside that trust was built for a stock portfolio. It was not built for what I actually own.

Being vulnerable, I felt ripped off. Not because the attorney was bad at his job. Because nobody who understood the hobby was in the room.

That frustration is the reason Revolutionary Wealth built Blueprint Business and Tax Advisors. Not to compete with what estate attorneys already do well. To fill the gap between standard estate planning and the specific reality of collector wealth.

Blueprint Business and Tax Advisors drafts trusts in all 50 states. Our clients get CPA services and estate planning attorney access.

More than that, they work with people who understand what they are planning around. We know what a BGS 9.5 means. We know what triggers the 28% rate.

We know how to structure a collection inside a trust so the document actually matches the asset.

That is the difference.

The Four Things Every Collector Needs

You do not need to overhaul your entire estate to protect your collection. You need four things.

An inventory. A written, accessible record of what you own, what you paid, and what it is currently worth. This does not need to be elaborate.

A spreadsheet with card name, purchase date, purchase price, current estimated value, and physical location is enough. Update it twice a year. Keep it somewhere your family can actually find it.

A trust or named beneficiary structure. A revocable living trust keeps your collection out of probate and lets you control who receives what, on what timeline, and under what conditions.

If a trust is not right for your situation, you at minimum need to understand how your state handles personal property without a named beneficiary. Most states have a default answer. It is rarely the one you would choose.

An executor or trustee who understands the hobby. This is the step most collectors skip. If the person settling your estate has never been to a card show, cannot read a BGS label, and cannot tell a 1/1 printer plate from a base parallel, they will make decisions on your behalf that you would not have made yourself.

Name someone who collects to help with decision-making.

Documentation of your strategy. If you are holding certain cards as long-term investments and others as trading inventory, that distinction matters for tax purposes.

The IRS treats them differently. Your estate will too.

Write it down. Not for you. For the people who come after you.

Your Collection is a 1/1. Your Plan Should Be Too.

I reference Shohei Ohtani’s 2018 Batting Chrome #1 in PSA 10 condition sometimes when clients ask about the cost of planning. Pop 5,181 and it’s going for $4,513.

A collector-specific estate plan through Revolutionary Wealth and Blueprint Business and Tax Advisors costs less than that card.

Hilariously enough, that framing lands every single time. Not because the math is complicated. Because collectors understand value instantly when you put it in card terms.

Your plan for your collection and your family is a 1/1. There are no comps. There is no reprint.

You build it once, you update it as the collection grows, and the people you love do not spend eleven months in probate trying to figure out what you were building all along.

Revolutionary Wealth works with collectors across the country who are building real wealth in and outside of the hobby.

Blueprint Business and Tax Advisors handles the trust drafting, CPA work, and estate planning so the collection you spent years assembling does not get sold for a fraction of its value by someone who never understood what it was.

If you want to know what a collector-specific tax and estate plan looks like for your situation, you can start a conversation with me below.

Have You Had the Talk?

Your ten-year-old self just got super anxious reading that. Get your mind out of the gutter, you sicko!!

When I mean the talk, I’m referring to calling up a buddy in the hobby and having a what-if conversation. This does not have to be super serious; it can be very lighthearted.

My good friend from college Josh and I text about cards, all the time. I’ve said to my wife, if something happens, to call Josh.

It’s because Josh and I have had this discussion around our wives interacting with the hobby from the outside looking in. Thinking we are absolutely out of our minds buying pieces of cardboard.

He is someone that I know will not take advantage of her and will immediately be able to point everything in the right direction beyond what’s on paper and written down.

Him and I don’t even collect the same things, so he definitely doesn’t want my cards ha-ha.

We all have that person in the hobby, have the conversation. It’s a free step forward towards protecting your collection and family.

See you next time, cheers!

---

Disclosures:

This blog contains general information that may not be suitable for everyone. The information contained herein should not be construed as personalized investment advice. There is no guarantee that the views and opinions expressed in this blog will come to pass. Investing in the stock market involves gains and losses and may not be suitable for all investors. Information presented herein is subject to change without notice and should not be considered as a solicitation to buy or sell any security. Revolutionary Wealth LLC does not offer legal or tax advice. Please consult the appropriate professional regarding your individual circumstance. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.

Asset protection plans should be developed and implemented well before problems arise. Due to the fraudulent transfer laws, asset transfers that occur close in proximity to the filing of a lawsuit or bankruptcy can be interpreted by the court as a fraudulent transfer. Proper structuring of these assets is imperative please seek proper legal and tax advice prior to engaging in re-titling/structuring of any assets. Please note that laws are subject to change and can have an impact on your asset protection strategy.