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We have a trust, will, living will, medical directives, etc prepared by an attorney who specializes in estates. However, in addition to that I have a document f
by mrandish 4y ago
We have a trust, will, living will, medical directives, etc prepared by an attorney who specializes in estates. However, in addition to that I have a document for my wife which lists the passwords, locations and any other details for all the things I primarily handle such as servers, routers, email/cloud accounts, home automation, security cams, etc. The document is on a USB drive in our shared safe as well as printed out.
My wife is extremely intelligent, capable and has an MBA so I have no doubt she could figure things out in my absence. The goal of the doc is just to make things easier for her if I unexpectedly get hit by a proverbial truck. It's now been a few years and I've been surprised how the document slowly creeps out of date over time one item at a time. So, now I've picked a once a year date when I update it.
I created this doc when a couple we know went through a sudden death. They had wisely prepared in all the legal paperwork and typical financial docs but after the initial shock, mourning and recovery, I saw how the more mundane stuff like household IT, backup servers, home automation, etc was still a pain for the surviving spouse.
I was able to help him figure things out because I had physical access and our departed friend had done things in logically organized ways but it was still yet another thing to deal with. What I didn't fully appreciate until I saw it up close is just much unavoidable stuff is thrown at someone going through this in the first couple months. It quickly becomes overwhelming because it's all at once and at a time when they are emotionally nuked and understandably functioning at reduced capacity.