Some things yes....but "fine antiques" like silver and art glass fine art pottery and Colonial furniture, Oriental rugs has not.....and what I call "junk" advertising items, old toys from the 50S primitives seem to have gone through the roof!

Yes, I have noticed that too. Really good stuff keeps it's value but a lot of Victorian furniture is definitely down.

Many Arts and Crafts era, nice quality pieces have been shown on AR as devalued. This has happened many times in the last 100 years to A&C items, even the beautiful pieces. I guess it is currently "out of fashion." Still awesome to me.

Same can be said for Shaker and Art Deco. Both where very popular with high prices then over time fell out of favor dropping prices.

I recognize the market may change, but I do wonder if some of these changes (up or down) in the ARS prices indicate an original estimate that was off the mark back then, and the current expert is correcting it.

I think AR's estimates are routinely very high. They presume the item would be sold at an auction of like items and state the highest amount it might bring.

The arts and crafts furniture value was artificially inflated 25-30 years ago because celebrities like Barbra Streisand were interested in certain types of pieces, and they were competing for a relatively small number of pieces and they could pay wherever they felt like paying if they wanted it. That infiltrated down through the market.

Likewise 50 year old pieces by Paul Evans have captured the fancy of people wealthy enough to pay $400,000 retail for a studio piece or $100,000 for a piece made in a factory. To some extent its the Tulip craze: at some point a few people who could pay a half million for a piece of furniture will decide they don't want to and others will realize its not a sound investment and prices will fall.

Run of the mill first period and 19th century furniture has had fairly negligible auction value in my locale for over a decade. Only unusual or fine pieces garner much interest

I never go by what AR's gives as a value, I find that most of the stuff you can find cheaper in a shop. Antiques go up and down in value all the time.

I watch those shows too & always wonder about the time when it was appraised. Pre-recession collectables were going for 'stupid money' as Hubby calls it. If you listen to the appraisers, they will often say whether the market for certain items is hot or not.

I do notice that some items appreciate too; it's not all downhill.

FWIW, Hubby buys & sells guitars (& other musical instruments & equipment) & says the prices given for those are often overly high.

Prices have dropped.

I think 2 reasons.

The baby boomers (myself included) were the majority of people buying antiques in the 80s and 90s and into the 2000s. They are now nearing or are retired and are down sizing and no longer buying.

The 2nd reason is the recession. When you lose your house and/or job you do not buy antiques. Supply and demand, prices go down.

Not sure where you live, Zorro, but we are no longer in a recession...in my town the unemployment rate is under 4%

In most cases the value has dropped considerably

Don't agree with this assessment. I would say all the then-and-now episodes I've watched have had plenty of items with values that had climbed since the first airing (and appraisals).

And yes, they make it clear that auction estimates, when given are just that - what might be earned in an auction setting. I am much more concerned about all of the people that bring in previously locally appraised items that were offered prices sometimes many thousands of dollars below what the Roadshow experts think they are worth. I doubt the Roadshow people are too high most of the time.

I think it depends on what it is. 1950s-1980s vintage studio or low production factory pieces are commanding unheard of prices that many fine antiques never got, $8M Garvin Carver tables notwithstanding....the high rollers are interested in something different, that's all.

Limdac92

When I said the recession has caused it, I was referring to what happened while it was occurring. I think it gave people a sense of being more frugal with their money since then. BTW, I live in Illinois, unemployment rate here is 4.7, which is very good. So glad to see the economy is/has recovered.

I think it has to do with a large generation are downsizing so it is flooding the market and the younger generation not wanting those items so the items go down in value. Give it another 10 years and those things will be trending again when the generation coming up discovers them.

Was on TV few months ago that"nobody wants grandma's old stuff"! SIL said she had "junk" to get rid of or throw out that was her mom's. Like some beautiful silver & punchbowl & other lovely items like Roseville & Weller. People must have paid attention to that as several other people in a group I was in said same thing. Just throw it out , don't even bother to take to thrift shop. Wow, I didn't say anything, I still like that "old junk" !

My neighbors just moved out of their house, it belonged to their mother and still had many of her things. They tossed a lot when they moved in 8 years ago and when they moved this time they tossed out what was left. I went over a picked through the pile and got some real nice 1950’s pyrex. I could of snagged a lot more stuff but i am dealing with my moms stuff rght now and have no more room to store more stuff. But i like vintage pyrex and find it much more useful than the stuff you can buy today at the store so i took what i could use.