I wanted to ask more experienced scripters how they would go about changing an item's (monetary) value in a script.

In Oblivion it was a simple "SetItemValue 0" but I can find no such straightforward command for Skyrim.

Much appreciated, to anybody who has any input to share about this.

SKSE's http://www.creationkit.com/SetGoldValue_-_Form. The value edit won't be stored in the user's save, however, so you'll need to maintain the value http://www.creationkit.com/Complete_Example_Scripts#Maintenance.2Fupdate_code_which_runs_once_per_save_load_and_shows_a_message_when_a_mod_is_updated_or_first_loaded.