Estate Planning Starter Checklist

1. 1

   Take inventory of what you actually own

   Most plans stall here. You cannot decide who gets what until the list exists — and the list is almost always longer than people expect.

   • Bank and brokerage accounts, including any you opened years ago and stopped using
   • Retirement accounts — 401(k), IRA, pension, and anything left at a former employer
   • Life insurance policies, including any provided through work
   • Real estate, plus how the title is held on each property
   • Business interests, partnership stakes, and any buy-sell agreement already in place
   • Vehicles, valuables, and personal property that carries real money or real meaning
   • Debts — mortgages, loans, and balances that survive you and get paid before anyone inherits
   • Digital accounts: email, password manager, photo storage, domains, and anything with a balance
2. 2

   Name the people

   Every role below gets filled whether or not you choose. If you leave one blank, a court fills it with someone who never met you.

   • Executor (in some states, personal representative) to carry out your will
   • Successor trustee, if you have or plan to open a trust
   • Guardian for any minor children — the single hardest decision most parents postpone
   • Financial power of attorney to act for you while you are alive but unable
   • Healthcare proxy and an advance directive covering the care you would want
   • A named backup for each role above, because the first choice is not always available
   • Confirm each person has actually agreed — being named is a job, not an honor
3. 3

   Check your beneficiary designations

   This is the step that most often quietly breaks an otherwise good plan. Retirement accounts and life insurance pass by beneficiary designation, outside your will — so the form on file wins, even when your will says something else.

   • Pull the current named beneficiary on every retirement account
   • Pull the current named beneficiary on every life insurance policy
   • Add contingent (backup) beneficiaries, not just primary ones
   • Re-check anything set up before a marriage, divorce, birth, or death in the family
   • Confirm transfer-on-death and payable-on-death designations on bank and brokerage accounts
   • Make sure no designation names a minor child directly, which typically forces court involvement
4. 4

   Decide what your plan actually needs

   A will and a trust do different jobs. The right answer depends on what you own, where you own it, and how private and how fast you want the handoff to be.

   • A will: directs what you own in your name alone, and names guardians for minor children
   • A living trust: can keep assets out of probate and keep the details private
   • Consider how many states you own property in — property in multiple states can mean multiple probates
   • If you open a trust, fund it — an unfunded trust is paperwork that does nothing
   • Check your state, since probate cost, timeline, and privacy vary considerably
5. 5

   Find the liquidity gap

   The gap is rarely about estate tax — the federal exemption is high enough that it reaches very few families. The real question is whether your family can reach cash quickly enough, and keep the income they were counting on.

   • Estimate what your household would need in the first year without your income
   • List which assets could be converted to cash quickly, and which realistically could not
   • Identify what must keep getting paid regardless: mortgage, tuition, care costs, business payroll
   • Check whether existing life insurance actually covers that gap, rather than assuming it does
   • Ask what happens if the person managing the money is the one who is gone
6. 6

   Put it somewhere findable — and tell someone

   A perfect plan nobody can locate fails exactly like no plan at all.

   • Store originals somewhere secure but reachable — a home safe or with your attorney
   • Tell your executor and trustee where the documents are
   • Leave a way in to your digital life: password manager access or a written recovery path
   • Keep a one-page summary of accounts and contacts alongside the legal documents
   • Re-read the whole plan after any marriage, divorce, birth, death, move, or business sale

This checklist is education, not legal or financial advice. Estate law is state-specific and the right structure depends on your situation — for that, talk to a licensed attorney or advisor in your state.