Soon, I will be tasked with liquidating a tremendous Hummel figurine collection. As far as I'm aware, it contains every figurine and plate put in to regular production, as well as some duplicates and special editions. Although I've been looking at these figurines for my entire life, I know relatively little about them.

My assumption is that nobody under the age of 60 collects these things anymore. More potential buyers die with each passing day, so I think it's best to act as quickly as possible. Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

There's a current seller on ebay trying to sell a 365 piece collection for $55,000. The collection I'm selling would be within the same scope. This seller has a figurine called Apple Tree Boy with a claimed "book value" of $15,000. If there is anyone reading this with Hummel experience, what is the book being referred to? The No.1 Price Guide appears to be the bible, but it doesn't look like it has been updated since 2000. I assume that the value of the figurines has dropped in 12 years. Probably by a lot.

The current top hit for Hummel collectors books on Amazon is this "official" guide. It says it lists values for your collection, but Hummel's own website states that they don't appraise or give values. I can't find that page right now, but I know I read it.

Is there any advice regarding the best plan of action? Say I get one of these books and catalog the whole collection. If the "book value" is $100,000, what fraction of that figure could I realistically receive? For the sake of simplicity, I would like to sell the collection as a lot. I assume it won't be very easy to find a buyer and it might be more profitable to sell it piecemeal. Any opinions on that matter?

Thanks.