Legacy Binder Part Two

In my previous post I shared a template of the excel file created to give a quick overview of our family finances to those who would care for our family in the even of the death of either Ryan, myself or God forbid, both of us. Since we are not guaranteed tomorrow, it seems a loving gesture to lay out for our spouse or loved ones who would need to step in and assume the leadership of our family finances in the event of our death. Today I’m going to outline the physical structure of the Legacy Binder, what documents to include and who should see your the fruits of your hard work. Basically there are three tasks at hand: collect, store and share

Collect:

I felt a little like Jason Bourne locating and storing all of my documents in one place. I remember vividly the scene where he opens a safe and finds an assortment of passports, birth certificates, currencies and weapons. Before you rush to assume that you’re friends with an international hit woman, let me assure you, I am not. I found the collection part of this task to be kind of fun. I knew where all of these items were throughout the house. Having them safely stashed in one spot felt great.

I included the following items in our Legacy Binder: 

• “Irreplaceable documents” for each member of our family such as passports, birth certificates, social security cards, an adoption decree and our marriage license. 
• Life Insurance Policies for both Ryan and I.
• Notarized, signed wills for both Ryan and I.
• Mortgage Paperwork signed at our closing and the payoff document from our second mortgage.
• Vehicle Titles for each of our cars.
• Savings Bonds.
• A paper copy of the Summery of our Legacy Binder.
• Wills and Health Care Directives given to us by our parents and those who have asked us to care for their children in the event of their deaths.

Store:

The binder I used to gather all these documents is a simple accordion style binder that I  picked up in Target. It has 13 slots and each category of documents gets it’s own file. We’ve chosen to place the binder in our fire proof safe. The key is that those who would need access know where the Legacy Binder is and how to get it.

Share:

It was exciting to get all of this information together, and we felt it was important to share it with the Godparents of our children who would raise our kiddos in the event the death of both Ryan and I. We felt like it was important that they know the assets that are in place to care for our children now and what insurance policies would kick as well. The conversation was pretty awkward and unceremonious but the peace of mind I had was worth it. My hope is that we can briefly revisit this topic every year or so until the kids all reach age 21, at which point our wills state they would have access to our money without any oversight.

The peace of mind that comes from this act of love is worth an afternoon or two of tracking down papers and passwords. As the new year approaches maybe this project will be your first goal of 2015. I’d love to hear how this post lands with you and yours and what you plan to include in your family Legacy Binder.