One of the things we started when the kids were little was to have all of our important family documents organized in a binder (god forbid something were to happen to us). We did this for two reasons, one we have been thru the chaos of settling family estates where their affairs were not in order and two we wanted our children’s guardians & our estate executors to easily be able to do what they needed to do. We update annually and keep in our safety deposit box. It has all of our important info that anyone would need to figure out our lives (if something happened to both Will & I). I recommend you keep your family emergency binder kept in a secure location that is both fire and waterproof or in a bank safety deposit box.
Here is what is in our Family Emergency Binder:
- Will & Medical Power of Attorney Documents
- Legal Guardianship Info
- Social Security Cards & Birth Certificates
- Passports & copies of Passports
- Marriage License
- Kids Medical Records (birth & most recent immunization records and pertinent biological family health records)
- Mortgage Info
- Homeowners Insurance Policy & Home inventory list & pics
- Utility companies plus account numbers
- Life Insurance Info
- Auto Insurance Info
- Other Insurance
- Rental Property Info & Insurance
- Investment Account Info
- Health Insurance Info Copies of your insurance card (front and back)
- College Fund Account Info
- Credit Card Copies & phone numbers
- Car Titles
- Memorial Service Preferences
- Password info
- Business Info
- Emergency Cash
- Evacuation checklist
Other things in our safety deposit box:
- Photos stored on USB drives if you don’t have them on the cloud (we back them up on the cloud, google photos & on hard drives).
- Journals for both kids (I write them letters each year and add fav photos). These are in the safety deposit box after we’ve been thru 2 wildfire evacuations the past decade.
Do you have an emergency binder? Are you prepared if something were to happen to you?
