Practical Prepping II - Death Files

"CarsofFortLangley - Oppo Forever" (carsoffortlangley)
03/14/2020 at 21:47 • Filed to: None

After my first !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! which was inspired by my observations as a field adjuster, investigator and risk manager, I thought I would ask my wife about her suggestions. My wife is a Victim Services worker with two municipal police departments and our provincial court syste m . She told me that she thought that most people (including us) should make a “death file” or a “when I die” file.

Everyone thinks that they will be the ones to survive an emergency, but the sad new is, life is totally random when it comes to this kind of thing.

Similar to my encrypted USB with key information on it ( !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! ) that I keep in my emergency bag, the death file contains critical information for post incident recovery. The only difference is, it isn’t a recovery you’re going to be a part of.

Items in the file could/should include:

An advance directive that’s signed (and notarized if necessary)

A will and living trust (with certificate of trust)

Marriage or divorce certificate(s)

Passwords for phone, computer, email, and social media accounts

Life/Property insurance documents

Home and vehicle titles

List of active subscriptions/memberships

Investments

Instructions for your funeral and final disposition

An ethical will

Letters to loved ones

I personally also use Google’s inactive account manager. This allows for my wife to have access to all of my Google account data (including Google Drive, where we keep all our documents) in the event I have not accessed my account for a set period of time.

Nothing really to add to this one, but since prepping...or at least buying all the soup and toilet paper, is on people’s minds, I thought I’d share my and my wife’s plans/experiences.

DISCUSSION (10)

Nom De Plume > CarsofFortLangley - Oppo Forever
03/14/2020 at 21:54

Yep, your life would pretty much be over if anyone got hold of all that information. Certainly nothing of a predatory nature follows disasters.

This sounds like a leave in a safe deposit box your lawyer has a key to locked in his safe, good idea. Not carry with you through the thick of it, good idea.

BrianGriffin thinks “reliable” is just a state of mind > CarsofFortLangley - Oppo Forever
03/14/2020 at 21:56

Wouldn’t keeping all those items in one location be fairly dangerous? Even on an encrypted flash drive (how do you notarize digital docs?), you’ve still got to either write down a password or entrust somebody with a passkey.

I often think about what would happen if I got hit by a bus - could my person find my stuff? Could my person find *her* stuff? Probably not. But keeping everything written down also seems unsafe.

CarsofFortLangley - Oppo Forever > Nom De Plume
03/14/2020 at 21:57

Yeah, don’t like, keep it in a backpack.

In a safe, in the cloud, in a safe deposit box or encrypted hard drive/flash drive.

CarsofFortLangley - Oppo Forever > BrianGriffin thinks “reliable” is just a state of mind
03/14/2020 at 22:00

Like I mentioned to Nom de Plume, obviously you have to manage your risks with that info. But I presume that, if I looked in your house long enough, all of that is written/kept somewhere. Cheque books, filing cabinets, whatever.

I would argue you have a greater chance of death (100%) vs. some sort of horrible personal security breach, but yes, you do have to be somewhat careful.

CarsofFortLangley - Oppo Forever > Nom De Plume
03/14/2020 at 22:02

Also, as I point out in my first post. Practical prepping, in my mind is not for disasters . You’re way more likely to suffer a personal tragedy than something large scale.

Nom De Plume > CarsofFortLangley - Oppo Forever
03/14/2020 at 22:04

So responsible adulting that just happens to occur during a worldwide panic. :P

Good you and your wife are having these conversations in good health and relative prosperity.

BrianGriffin thinks “reliable” is just a state of mind > CarsofFortLangley - Oppo Forever
03/14/2020 at 22:08

Well, that’s the thing though. It ISN’T.

None of my passwords are written anywhere, there’s no record of my financial accounts except for my tax return (and that doesn’t even categorize non-income bearing accounts)...I’m not even sure someone could figure out where all of my properties are unless they do an actual background check, hoping Lexis Nexis grabbed them all.

My fear isn’t a person security breach by some unknown foreign entity - that’s, well, life. But trusting a *person* with access to *my stuff*?!? Ugh. Terrifying.

WRXforScience > CarsofFortLangley - Oppo Forever
03/14/2020 at 22:15

I’m way ahead of you, no kids or wife so when I die I’m just inconvenient to my parents and/or siblings depending on when it happens (I also rent an apartment, so no house to worry about plus my car is paid off and the most likely cause and place of my death) . Being inconvenient to your parents is pretty much the job of all children, so no biggie there. My siblings have earned enough of my ire and benefited from enough of my benevolence over the years to owe me enough to deal with whatever I leave behind.

Plus, I’ll be dead, so what do I care?

I’m not sure that I’ll ever die though. I’ve never died before, not once in the entire history of humanity. So, I put the odds of my dying at 50/50 at best/worst.

jminer > CarsofFortLangley - Oppo Forever
03/14/2020 at 23:28

The living will is an especially important one in the terms of a healthcare crisis. My wife works in healthcare a good deal and she keeps telling me we need to this. I say - you know what I want and I know what you want, that’s fine.

The issue is that sometimes relatives don’t agree with what spouses have decided and involve themselves and the courts and things get nasty quickly. I can see my super religious mother doing this and keeping my brain dead ass on a ventilator way longer than I would want to be.

ST80MND > CarsofFortLangley - Oppo Forever
03/15/2020 at 08:00

Having just dealt with the mother in law’s death, you speak absolute gospel here. We were unfortunate to have NONE of these things. No will, no funeral wishes, no information at all, just death. Without the needed signatures on needed paperwork, her financials were one of the biggest roadblocks to the whole process. No signed will ended up being not quite as bad, but still caused fights that ripped one side of the family apart. All of this took almost a year to get figured out, and cost around 25k in lawyers.

It’s bad enough to have someone you love pass away, but if the ducks aren’t lined up, you can’t even mourn. ALL your time is consumed with the bureaucracy of dying, which is a hard thing to do when you are an emotional mess.