Getting Your Affairs in Order Checklist — and the One Document That Holds It Together

The call comes on a Tuesday. By Wednesday afternoon, somebody in the family is standing in a kitchen opening drawers, looking for a will nobody is sure exists, a life insurance policy somebody once mentioned, and the password to a phone that is now the only way into everything else.

That search is what “getting your affairs in order” prevents. Not the dying — the hunt afterward. And the honest truth about it is that the hunt is almost never caused by a missing document. It’s caused by a document nobody could find, an account nobody knew about, or a phone nobody could unlock.

This page is a getting your affairs in order checklist written for the person actually doing it — you, or the parent you’re helping — and it comes with the thing most checklists leave out: a place for every answer to go. That place is a book, What My Family Needs to Know — you fill it in by hand, put it on the shelf, and your family knows exactly where to look.

What “getting your affairs in order” actually covers

The phrase gets used as a euphemism, which is part of why people put it off. Strip the euphemism away and it is three separate jobs, and they fail in different ways.

The legal layer is the documents that carry authority: who can make medical decisions, who can handle money, who settles the estate, what happens to the house. These need to be signed, witnessed correctly, and — the step families skip — current. A will from 1998 that names a dead executor is a problem, not a plan.

The information layer is everything a family needs to act on those documents: where the will is, which bank, which insurer, which accounts pay the bills automatically, who the attorney is, where the deed lives. This layer has no legal force at all. It is also the one that, when missing, turns grief into a scavenger hunt.

The people layer is who knows. A perfectly organized folder in a safe-deposit box that only the deceased could open has accomplished nothing. At least two people need to know the folder exists and where it is.

Government checklists — the National Institute on Aging publishes a good one — cover the legal layer thoroughly. They are thin on the information layer and silent on the digital life. This page fills that in, and the planner gives the information layer somewhere to live.

The checklist

Work through it in order. The first group is the legal layer; everything after is information to write down. If you want each item with a place to write the answer, the book is this checklist as a fill-in planner.

1. Legal documents that must exist

• A will. Names the executor — the one person with authority after death — and says who gets what. Without one, state law decides both. If there’s no will, this is the first thing to fix; everything else on this page is easier once there is one. What a power of attorney does and doesn’t do explains why the will matters even if a POA exists.
• A durable financial power of attorney. Lets someone handle money, bills, and property if you can’t — while you’re alive. It stops at death.
• A health care proxy and advance directive. Names who decides about medical care and records what you’d want. State forms and witnessing rules differ, and the wrong state’s form may not be honored: how to fill one out correctly, and the state-by-state guides.
• A POLST or DNR, if it applies. The medical order paramedics can actually follow. POLST vs. advance directive explains the difference, which surprises most families.
• Beneficiary designations, checked. Retirement accounts, life insurance, and payable-on-death bank accounts pass by the name on the form, not the will. An ex-spouse still listed on a 401(k) will inherit it. Review every one.
• A trust, if you have one. Where it is, who the successor trustee is, and whether the house was actually retitled into it — many trusts are signed and never funded.

2. Where the papers are

• Birth certificate, Social Security card, marriage certificate, any divorce decree, citizenship or adoption papers, military discharge papers (DD-214).
• Deed to the home, vehicle titles, the last three years of tax returns.
• Every insurance policy: life (including any through an employer), health and Medicare, long-term care, homeowners, auto, umbrella.
• Prepaid funeral contract and cemetery deed, if any.
• Safe-deposit box location, key location, and who is authorized on it. One caution: a box in one name alone often can’t be opened until the executor has court papers — so the will should not be the only thing in it.

3. Money: the information nobody can reconstruct

• Every account — checking, savings, brokerage, retirement, CDs, HSA — by institution and last four digits. Never the full number.
• Every source of income that will need to be stopped or claimed: Social Security, pensions, annuities, rental income.
• Every bill paid automatically, and from which account — so the mortgage and the lights stay on while the estate is sorted.
• Every debt. The estate pays valid debts; the family does not inherit them personally and should not pay from their own pockets.
• Things of value that aren’t accounts: airline miles (often transferable), a coin collection, jewelry, cryptocurrency — for which you write where the wallet is kept, never the keys.

4. The digital life

This is the section government checklists don’t have, and it is where families get locked out.

• Use a password manager, and record where the master password is — in a sealed envelope in the safe, say. That one envelope opens everything. The planner gives you a place to write where that envelope is.
• Write down where the phone passcode is kept. Two-factor codes go to the phone. A locked phone is a locked life.
• Set up legacy access now, while you’re alive: Apple’s Legacy Contact (Settings → your name → Sign-In & Security), Google’s Inactive Account Manager (myaccount.google.com → Data & privacy), and Facebook’s legacy contact or memorialization setting. Each takes about five minutes and works better than any clause in a will.
• Ask your attorney for a digital-assets clause. Under the law most states follow (RUFADAA), an executor usually needs explicit written authority to access online accounts. Without it, companies can lawfully refuse.
• List the accounts worth closing or memorializing — social media, shopping, streaming, cloud storage — and what you want done with each.

5. Home, keys, pets, and anything that can’t wait

• Spare key, alarm code location, mailbox key, storage unit, the utilities and who provides them.
• Pets: the vet, the medications, who should take them. Animals are the first living thing that needs attention and the last thing anyone writes down.
• Anyone who depends on you — a spouse with memory loss, a disabled adult child, a parent whose care you coordinate — and who should step in.
• If you own a business or rental property: the registrar, the hosting, the business bank, who can sign, and who could run it for 90 days.

6. Health and final wishes

• Doctors, pharmacy, current medication list, organ donation status.
• Burial or cremation; any prepaid arrangements; the service, or no service; the obituary facts; organizations to notify.
• The people you would not want contacted. Families need this too.

7. The people layer

• Pick the two people who will know where everything is, and tell them. Today.
• Tell the executor they’re the executor. A surprising number find out at the reading.
• Put a “last reviewed” date on the whole thing and look at it every January. Stale is worse than missing, because the family trusts it.

The book: What My Family Needs to Know

Everything above, bound and built to be written in. What My Family Needs to Know is a fill-in end-of-life planner: fifteen sections — the people to call first, the accounts and where the passwords live, the house, the insurance, the doctors, the pets, the funeral — plus pages on who to notify, what the family will hear in the first days, and a yearly review page. And a section a checklist can’t hold: your final wishes, the personal ones.

It records pointers, not secrets. No password goes in it — only where the password lives. Found by a thief, it’s nearly useless. Found by your executor, it’s a map to everything. And because it’s a book and not a stack of printer paper, it stays together, sits on a shelf, and gets found.

Need something today? A shorter printable version (PDF, 26 pages) is free to download.

The things nobody tells you until it’s too late

The power of attorney dies with you. Families often assume the person holding the POA can keep handling things. They can’t. At the moment of death, that authority ends completely and the executor named in the will takes over. If there’s no will, nobody has authority until a court appoints an administrator — which takes weeks. This single fact is the reason a will matters even when a POA exists.

Beneficiary forms beat the will. A will can say “everything to my children” and a 401(k) will still go to the ex-spouse named on a form from 2004. Life insurance, retirement accounts, and payable-on-death accounts pass by designation. Check every one; it’s a phone call each.

Cancel the phone last. When the family starts closing accounts, the cell phone feels like an obvious early cut. It’s the worst one. Every two-factor code, every password reset, every “confirm it’s you” goes to that number. Keep it active until the digital life is settled.

Order more death certificates than seems reasonable. Ten to fifteen. Nearly every institution — each bank, each insurer, the pension, the DMV — wants a certified original, and ordering more later is slow.

Identity theft of the dead is common. The three credit bureaus — Equifax, Experian, TransUnion — should be told to flag the file as deceased in the first month. Few families know to do this.

A dementia diagnosis is not legal incapacity. If a parent has early dementia and none of this is done, it may not be too late. Capacity is judged for the specific document at the specific moment. An elder law attorney can assess it and arrange a physician’s note. Don’t assume the window has closed; find out. When dementia gets harder covers the timing.

If you’re doing this for a parent

The hardest part of getting a parent’s affairs in order is usually not the paperwork. It’s the conversation. Three things that help, from thirteen years of watching families have it — and often have it too late, in a hospital hallway:

Lead with the information layer, not the legal one. “Where’s the deed?” is a question about a filing cabinet. “Have you done your will?” is a question about dying. Start with the first; the planner makes that natural because most of it is filing-cabinet questions.

Do yours first. Fill in your own planner and show it to them. It stops being something you’re asking of them and becomes something the family does.

Use a milestone. A seventieth birthday, a move, a surgery, the start of the year. Families who tie it to a date get it done; families who wait for the right moment are usually waiting in the hallway. If the parent won’t engage at all, when an aging parent refuses help is the page for that. If you’re coordinating from another state, long-distance caregiving covers how to do this from afar.

Free, independent help

• Eldercare Locator — 1-800-677-1116 — your Area Agency on Aging, including free or low-cost legal help for seniors in many areas.
• Your state bar association’s lawyer referral service — for an elder law attorney; many offer a low-cost first consultation.
• Social Security Administration — 1-800-772-1213 — for what survivor benefits will exist and how they’re claimed.
• The National Institute on Aging’s checklist — the government’s version of the legal-document list, useful as a second pass.

Questions families ask

What does getting your affairs in order mean?

Getting your affairs in order means three things: having the legal documents that carry authority (a will, a durable financial power of attorney, a health care proxy or advance directive, and a POLST or DNR if it applies), writing down the information a family needs to find and act on everything (accounts, policies, papers, passwords’ locations), and making sure at least two people know where it all is. Most families complete the legal documents and skip the other two steps, which is why the first weeks after a death so often become a search.

What documents do you need to get your affairs in order?

The documents with legal force are a will, a durable financial power of attorney, a health care proxy or advance directive, and, where appropriate, a POLST or DNR order and a trust. Beneficiary designations on retirement accounts, life insurance, and payable-on-death accounts should also be reviewed, because they override the will. Everything else — account lists, insurance policies, deeds, titles, and the location of the phone passcode — is information to record rather than a legal document.

Is there a printable getting your affairs in order checklist?

Yes. AgingAtHomeSupport.com offers the checklist two ways. What My Family Needs to Know is a bound, 84-page fill-in planner by Mark Duda, available in paperback on Amazon, with fifteen sections covering contacts, accounts, insurance, the home, health, final wishes, and a yearly review. A shorter 26-page printable version is also free to download from this page. Both record where things are rather than passwords or account numbers.

Does a power of attorney continue after death?

No. A power of attorney ends at the moment the person dies, and the agent loses all authority. After death, only the executor named in the will — or an administrator appointed by a court if there is no will — can act for the estate. This is why a will is necessary even when a power of attorney exists.

How do I give my family access to my online accounts after I die?

Set up the legacy-access features the major services provide: Apple’s Legacy Contact, Google’s Inactive Account Manager, and Facebook’s legacy contact or memorialization setting. Use a password manager and record where its master password is kept, such as a sealed envelope in a safe, rather than writing passwords anywhere. Ask an attorney to add a digital-assets clause to your will or power of attorney, because under the law most states follow (RUFADAA) an executor usually needs explicit written authority to access online accounts.

Where should I keep my end of life documents?

Keep originals in one secure place a trusted person can reach — a fireproof box at home or your attorney’s file — and tell at least two people where it is. A safe-deposit box in one name alone can be a problem, because the bank may not open it until the executor has court papers, so the will should not be stored only there. Avoid unsecured computer files, and keep a “last reviewed” date on everything so your family knows it is current.

What should a family do first after a death?

Call the hospice if the person was on it, or 911 if not; then call the executor and the funeral home. In the first week, get 10 to 15 certified death certificates, locate the will, call the attorney, start life insurance claims, and ask banks to freeze rather than close accounts until the executor has authority. Keep the mortgage and utilities paid from the estate, do not pay the person’s debts from your own money, and cancel the cell phone last because two-factor codes go to it.

Last verified: 14 October 2026 · Against: NIA checklist, RUFADAA, Apple/Google/Meta legacy-access documentation, SSA survivor-benefit guidance · Next review: April 2027, or immediately on a relevant change

Written by Mark Duda. Thirteen years serving seniors alongside one of New Jersey’s largest home health and hospice organizations, including the families who found out in a hospital hallway that none of this had been done. More about me → · How this page was checked →

This page, the planner, and the printable are educational and are not legal, financial, or medical advice. Mark Duda is not an attorney, a financial advisor, a physician, or a nurse. The planner and the printable are not a will, trust, power of attorney, or advance directive and does not replace any of them. Wills, powers of attorney, advance directives, and digital-asset rules are governed by state law and differ between states; consult an attorney licensed where the person lives. See our disclaimers.