Do you know where your will is? Does your family? The National Will Registry, a service offered by Family Archival Solutions, Inc., is a new service that stores the location of important end-of-life documents such as wills, trusts, living wills and powers of attorney. It also allows attorney names, safe deposit box locations and other important information to be listed in a consumer-friendly Web app equipped with military-grade security.
Designed to prevent the frequent problem of missing estate documents when a family member passes away, subscribers to
http://www.nationalwillregistry.com appoint several friends, family members or legal advisors that are authorized to contact the service as a routine part of the estate administration process, particularly if the family is unable to locate these important records. The new offering is part of a suite of estate protection products from
Los Angeles startup Family Archival Solutions, Inc., whose founder and CEO served as a financial services attorney and estate professional for over two decades.
Inspired by the staggering statistics of death-time document chaos (over 60% of U.S. adults will die without a basic estate plan; nearly
$2 billion in life insurance is unclaimed annually;
$4.9 billion in other unclaimed assets are turned over to the government annually with only
$1.7 billion reclaimed; and countless wills are lost, damaged or left unclaimed), Family Archival Solutions has designed a consumer-friendly suite of solutions for estate and life planning.
According to
Mark Nicholas, CEO of Family Archival Solutions, “Most wills held by lawyers, CPAs and financial professionals are never claimed and a high percentage of families struggle to find bank accounts, brokerage accounts pension plans, computer login credentials, safe deposit boxes and other essential documents that point to family assets.”
“Many Americans approaching their final years began saving and investing long before the digital era and the location of substantial assets is a preserved in papers, passbooks and statements that are frequently damaged, lost or destroyed. We have developed a program to solve this problem, honor an individual's wishes, and direct the family, court and other professionals to any location maintaining the information.”
Full Article and Source:
The National Will Registry
4 comments:
Interesting new service, by a former financial services attorney and estate professional.
I think it was Nevada's Secretary of State which also offered a will registry or some such.
It sounds like good idea. I wonder how expensive it will be and what the service does if a guardianship rolls over a DPoA or Healthcare Proxy....
It would be much better I think if it could be done in each state with a national database.
I agree that this is a job for each state, because there is no one to oversee a private operation.
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