Digital Estate Planning

What this guide covers

This guide is written as a practical reference for New Zealand families organizing private records before they become urgent. It focuses on the details that make a plan understandable to someone who may need to act quickly and carefully.

• Digital assets need a clear inventory and access context.
• Online accounts should be organized by purpose, provider, and recovery path.
• Trusted access should be selective and reviewed over time.

Start with a digital inventory

A digital estate inventory should identify accounts, subscriptions, devices, cloud storage, documents, photos, business systems, and other digital assets that may matter later.

• Email, cloud storage, banking, investments, and subscriptions
• Devices, password managers, backup drives, and recovery methods
• Digital files, family records, business assets, and online profiles

Explain what should happen to each asset

Some accounts should be closed, some files should be preserved, and some records should be transferred or reviewed by an executor, advisor, or family member.

• Preserve important family or business records
• Mark subscriptions and accounts that should be cancelled
• Document who can interpret each digital record

Keep access instructions controlled

Digital estate planning should not mean sharing every password in advance. Store context securely and share only the sections needed by each trusted person.

• Separate account references from high-risk credentials
• Use role-based sharing for family, executors, and advisors
• Review access when devices, providers, or responsibilities change

Common New Zealand questions

How this fits in Legacy Toolkit

Use this guide as a working checklist inside the desktop vault. Create or review the relevant information profile sections, attach files in the document vault, add reminders where information can go stale, and prepare trusted access without sharing the whole vault by default.

The goal is not to turn a private life into a public folder. The goal is to keep the plan legible, current, and controlled so the right person can find the right information without receiving the whole vault by default.

• Profile sections keep the plan readable instead of turning it into a loose notes file.
• Document attachments keep proof beside the account, asset, policy, or instruction it supports.
• Trusted access lets you prepare a handoff without exposing the full vault by default.

Digital estate planning checklist

Treat this as a first pass, not a final legal packet. Review the items, fill in what is missing, and return to the plan whenever a provider, account, advisor, family role, or document changes.

• Inventory online accounts, digital assets, devices, and subscriptions.
• Attach documents and proof files to the records they support.
• Record recovery paths, backup locations, and provider contacts.
• Write instructions for preserving, closing, transferring, or reviewing assets.
• Set trusted access for the people who may need selected sections.

New Zealand references

These links are included for context. Legacy Toolkit helps organise records and does not replace legal, financial, tax, medical, or court advice.

• Own Your Online: Protect your privacy online
• New Zealand Government: What to organise before you die
• Citizens Advice Bureau: Process for administering an estate