My 'Hit By a Bus' cheatsheet

[brymolmom]

Just wanted to share with you all. There are frequently discussions of Wills, etc. on this board so thought this would be an ideal place. DH is executor of his sister's Will. She passed away last May. There are many reasons that make this more complicated than 'usual' (Lawyer handling was arrested halfway through for embezzelment, 2nd marriage for she and her husband, wanted her kids to get all $ but everything ended up with no names so defaults to her husband instead), but overall I have to say that being an executor is a pain in the behind!!! I don't wish it on anyone.

That said, dh and I had our Will drawn up when we were pregnant with ds (we need to review it and adjust it and will be doing so soon) and my sister is the kids' guardian and executor and gets all the $$ if dh and I go together. Now knowing first hand what a pain the whole 'red tape' thing of 'cleaning things up' when someone passes, I have decided to attempt to make it just a touch easier for her. So I created a printout of all our financial 'stuff' - social security #'s, bank account numbers, person who is the contact (like our financial advisor who monitors some of the accounts), 401K's, life insurance policies - numbers and company, Roth IRA's, stock, the kids' 529 accounts and where they are, mortgage account and where it's held, any other debt - car loan.

This will give her a huge jump start to start putting things together in the unfortunate event that I'm not here.

I have pondered the best place to keep it. I think it'll end up going on a piece of paper either in our security lock-box or 'hidden' in a book in the den or something similar. Then I will show my sister where to look to find it. I figure it this way - if I have a break-in in our house, most/all of this data will be compromised anyway and we'll be needing to close accounts, etc anyway - so having it here is just duplicating what's already here - just putting it all together in one spot for convenience.

I also put on there when and where our Will is on file.

 

[Coll0610]

Excellent idea, and something I've been meaning to do for a while. This would even help DH if I was gone, because I pay the bills online and he's not familiar with all the websites.

 

[karice2]

I have what is called my Dead Book. I don't have kids and stuff but am a bit of a control freak even in death. So the dead book is arranged in such a way to follow possible death or injury scenarios.

Starts with
1. Medical directives
2. Living Will
3. Power of attorney
4. Notifications in event of my death (work, life insurance, etc.)
5. Funeral plans including flower selection, clothing, song choices, invitation list and preliminary obit.
6.DD 214 (Veterans get free stuff for funeral)
7. Actual Will
8. Debt Payments
9. Electronic Passwords
10. Account information

The dead book is my chance to maintain some control over my life (and death ha ha). Also want to make a crappy situation for my parents as easy as possible.

 

[tlbwriter]

Why not just give her a copy of it? Or put it in a safe deposit box at a bank that is in her name as well as yours? (Make sure it's not in your/DH's names alone, since she wouldn't be able to access it if you died.)

 

[brymolmom]

Why not just give her a copy of it? Or put it in a safe deposit box at a bank that is in her name as well as yours? (Make sure it's not in your/DH's names alone, since she wouldn't be able to access it if you died.)

I thought of giving her a copy. However, then I have to redo everything (close accounts, watch my credit report more carefully, etc.) if I ever have a break-in at MY house or if there's one at HER house. Having it only at mine, I figure I'd have to do all those things anyway if there was a break-in here.

 

[tlbwriter]

I thought of giving her a copy. However, then I have to redo everything (close accounts, watch my credit report more carefully, etc.) if I ever have a break-in at MY house or if there's one at HER house. Having it only at mine, I figure I'd have to do all those things anyway if there was a break-in here.

Do you live in a high crime area? I can't think of a single person I know who's had a break-in, let alone had paperwork stolen.

 

[PHXscuba]

My parents had the ultra-serious "talk" with us about what to do if they (both) got hit by a bus ... they mentioned the briefcase in the attic with all of the info y'all are mentioning. My brother lightened the mood by nicknaming it the "Griefcase". Death may not be a joking matter, but we all had a more relaxed conversation. And I am grateful to my parents for keeping their affairs in order and giving us the basic details just in "case."

My in-laws operated from a paranoid state when Grandma was old and unwell and made some rather costly estate decisions that I wish we would have known about to try to talk them out of.

PHXscuba

 

[brymolmom]

Do you live in a high crime area? I can't think of a single person I know who's had a break-in, let alone had paperwork stolen.

No, not high crime at all. But that doesn't mean it couldn't happen. I know one person who had a break-in once years ago but in a different town than me. Likely not anything more than teenager types who wanted a quick take - but they recommend even in those cases changing just about everything (cc's, accounts, etc) or at the very least watching your credit report daily for awhile...

 

[hanutedmansionmomma]

really like the "hit by a bus" list...as much as "death book" has a nice ring too

this is a good idea whatever you call it. Need to get on it. Especially the will part - can you do your own or need to hire someone? If you just write things down and sign them is that legal enough?

THX

 

[DVCLiz]

OP, are you leaving all your assets to your sister, or are you putting them in a trust for your children with her as the administrator?

 

[brymolmom]

OP, are you leaving all your assets to your sister, or are you putting them in a trust for your children with her as the administrator?

As of right now, she just gets it. I have 100% trust in her - we have a very, VERY close relationship and see each other all the time and she loves my kids almost as much as I do. In fact, I've had serious conversations with her about spending MORE of my money if dh and I pass...she is very frugal, barely spends any money and I have fear that she will be afraid to spend any of my money on herself or her kids. We would be leaving them quite a bit...and aside from paying for my kids college and giving them a nice down payment on a house and/or wedding costs, I don't need my kids to have a huge lump of money...so I have encouraged her to use our money to pay off her house so that she can quit her job (with 5 kids 4 years apart, makes sense or she'd go nuts), to fund her own kids' college funds with it, and to take some vacations with it (she is not a WDW nut like me, so I've encouraged her to do some WDW trips in our memory).

My husband wants to make some changes and setup a trust. I am unsure exactly how that works and how easy/difficult it would be for my sis to get some of the money to spend on just 'everyday' things that cost more with 5 kids as opposed to 3...like vacations, bigger vehicles when it's time to buy a new car. I think how it'll end up is that SOME of it will go into a trust...and some of it will go directly to her. Like I said, I have no desire for either of my kids to get $250,000 handed over to them when they turn 21 or 25 or whatever...Especially since I won't be around to make sure they are responsible enough to handle it and not just piss it away.

Any advice on a trust??

 

[sookie]

I have what is called my Dead Book. I don't have kids and stuff but am a bit of a control freak even in death. So the dead book is arranged in such a way to follow possible death or injury scenarios.

Starts with
1. Medical directives
2. Living Will
3. Power of attorney
4. Notifications in event of my death (work, life insurance, etc.)
5. Funeral plans including flower selection, clothing, song choices, invitation list and preliminary obit.
6.DD 214 (Veterans get free stuff for funeral)
7. Actual Will
8. Debt Payments
9. Electronic Passwords
10. Account information

The dead book is my chance to maintain some control over my life (and death ha ha). Also want to make a crappy situation for my parents as easy as possible.

I LOVE THIS!!!! I am going to do this!

 

[bridget]

As of right now, she just gets it. I have 100% trust in her - we have a very, VERY close relationship and see each other all the time and she loves my kids almost as much as I do. In fact, I've had serious conversations with her about spending MORE of my money if dh and I pass...she is very frugal, barely spends any money and I have fear that she will be afraid to spend any of my money on herself or her kids. We would be leaving them quite a bit...and aside from paying for my kids college and giving them a nice down payment on a house and/or wedding costs, I don't need my kids to have a huge lump of money...so I have encouraged her to use our money to pay off her house so that she can quit her job (with 5 kids 4 years apart, makes sense or she'd go nuts), to fund her own kids' college funds with it, and to take some vacations with it (she is not a WDW nut like me, so I've encouraged her to do some WDW trips in our memory).

My husband wants to make some changes and setup a trust. I am unsure exactly how that works and how easy/difficult it would be for my sis to get some of the money to spend on just 'everyday' things that cost more with 5 kids as opposed to 3...like vacations, bigger vehicles when it's time to buy a new car. I think how it'll end up is that SOME of it will go into a trust...and some of it will go directly to her. Like I said, I have no desire for either of my kids to get $250,000 handed over to them when they turn 21 or 25 or whatever...Especially since I won't be around to make sure they are responsible enough to handle it and not just piss it away.

Any advice on a trust??

Have you met with an attorney? Ours gave us very good advice and explained things I never thought of before. Plus there are tax implications, etc. depending on your net worth and they can help with that.

 

[Cruise]

Why not just give her a copy of it? Or put it in a safe deposit box at a bank that is in her name as well as yours? (Make sure it's not in your/DH's names alone, since she wouldn't be able to access it if you died.)

I second this. If you both go together, she'll need to get into your safe deposit box anyway to access its contents. Also no worries about the information being compromised or discovered in either of your houses. If you don't have one, does she? She could just keep a copy of the information there without worry.

My name is on the safe deposit box my parents have for this very reason. There are huge amounts of red tape involved to access a box that your name (in this case, your sister's) isn't on.

 

[MrsPete]

We have a list similar to what you're describing: It contains all our account numbers, insurance details, contact names, passwords, etc. It isn't JUST in case we both fall off the edge of the earth at the same time -- if one of us were gone, the other probably wouldn't be thinking too clearly and would greatly appreciate having all this information in one place.

We update this every year around New Year's -- which is also the time we sit down for a serious how's-our-retirement-and-so-forth coming along now? talk.

We keep this information in our safe, along with passports and other things that we wouldn't want anyone else to find in case of a break-in. I do know multiple people who've had home-break-ins, and none of them were in bad neighborhoods.


And now a funny-sad story:

About six months ago my 16-year old came to me and said she wanted to talk to me about something serious that'd been bothering her. She'd been making plans for IF both her Dad and I died. She'd figured up how much money she could make working part-time. She'd figured that she'd have a car at her disposal (thinking that we wouldn't likely run head-on into one another, taking out both cars as well as ourselves). Her specific requests:

- She wanted to know how much was in her college account, and would that be enough for her to still go to community college while supporting her younger sister and herself?
- How much would taxes remove from her paycheck?
- Would we teach her to drive a manual transmission in case she was left alone with only that car?

It was very touching that she would think about all of this, and that she'd take all the responsbility upon herself. But she was also EXTREMELY relieved to hear that IF we were both to die, her aunt and uncle would swoop in immediately and take care of everything, and that although they don't have our financial details in their hands, they know exactly where to get them in case of an emergency. She was also BESIDE HERSELF to learn that we have significant life insurance and money other than her college account -- that working to buy groceries while going to high school would not be her lot, that she and her sister could still go to college, and that her aunt and uncle would sell the house and they'd have that money too. And she hadn't even considered that our land would belong to her and her sister, and she was glad to hear that if we died early that her other uncle would hold the land in trust for her 'til she's older.

That kid's mature beyond her years even to think of such a thing in this type of detail.


Here's another story, somewhat related:

Putting things away in our closet, I found two copies of the Dr. Seuss book Oh, the places you'll go. My husband was right there, and I asked him why he had them -- he was a little embarassed, but he told me to look inside. The books each contained a card addressed to each of our daughters, instructing them to open them upon their high school graduation day. And there was a $100 bill between each page of the book. He explained that two years ago, when he'd been very sick, he'd worried that he might not live to see them graduate . . . yet he wanted them each to have something from their daddy on that special day. He said that if he'd died, he knew I'd have found them and would've figured out that they were graduation gifts. I'm crying a little telling that. How can you not love a man like that?

 

[ShelsGoingToDisney]

Here's another story, somewhat related:

Putting things away in our closet, I found two copies of the Dr. Seuss book Oh, the places you'll go. My husband was right there, and I asked him why he had them -- he was a little embarassed, but he told me to look inside. The books each contained a card addressed to each of our daughters, instructing them to open them upon their high school graduation day. And there was a $100 bill between each page of the book. He explained that two years ago, when he'd been very sick, he'd worried that he might not live to see them graduate . . . yet he wanted them each to have something from their daddy on that special day. He said that if he'd died, he knew I'd have found them and would've figured out that they were graduation gifts. I'm crying a little telling that. How can you not love a man like that?

That is really sweet. i wish I had a Daddy like that!!


I keep a copy of all our important stuff in a Ziploc in the freezer. I read somewhere that refrigerators/freezers are fireproof? I can't say if that is true or not?? I also figure burglars probably aren't looking through the freezer.

 

[apnep]

Here's another story, somewhat related:

Putting things away in our closet, I found two copies of the Dr. Seuss book Oh, the places you'll go. My husband was right there, and I asked him why he had them -- he was a little embarassed, but he told me to look inside. The books each contained a card addressed to each of our daughters, instructing them to open them upon their high school graduation day. And there was a $100 bill between each page of the book. He explained that two years ago, when he'd been very sick, he'd worried that he might not live to see them graduate . . . yet he wanted them each to have something from their daddy on that special day. He said that if he'd died, he knew I'd have found them and would've figured out that they were graduation gifts. I'm crying a little telling that. How can you not love a man like that?

OMG, that is so touching. I teared up!

 

[jgates]

I would have figured that one out in a heartbeat - my son read that book as part of his speech when he was Valedictorian. That is so sweet.

 

[tink2dw]

My Mom had put all her and Dad's Important Doc's together and told me and my brother where they were She put them... In the big chest freezer so that in case of a fire...

Well, when I was 14 Mother Died of Cancer in just 4 month's. My Dad had no Idea where all that important stuff was, he and my Aunts had looked everywhere. He finally in desperation ask me if I knew where the papers were and I said they were in the freezer. He still couldn't find them. So I went to the freezer And showed Dad where Mom had taped the papers to the inside front wall of the freezer!! to keep them safe from fire, and thief!!

 

[Ericandjenng]

OMG, that is so touching. I teared up!

Me too!