Different Kinds of Storage for Your Family Estate and Asset Protection

Storing personal property, estate planning documents, and other assets is a huge part of preparing to pass on your legacy to your heirs. This kind of task is not for everyday self-storage, as it takes a lot more than just shuttling things into a storage unit for a couple weeks. Your cherished belongings need to be safe, even if stored for a long period of time, but they also need to be accessible to the right individuals at the time of your passing.

With this in mind, here is an overview of the different kinds of storage that can best protect your property, assets, and family estate.

Tangible vs. Digital Storage for Your Estate

Digital photo collections stored in offsite, cloud-based servers is a common protection for an increasing number of tech-savvy folks. Over the last several years, our social media accounts have become the clearest record of our lives. Randy Hooper, estate planning attorney and founding partner at Hooper, Zinn & McNamee, PLLC, suggests “leaving written instructions regarding how you want your personal representative/executor to handle these assets to preserve your personal history and protect your privacy. This includes a listing of accounts, user ids, and passwords.”

Whether it’s account passwords or thumb drives, almost all digital storage has a tangible component. And with Closetbox, your tangible property storage will also deploy digital resources. Our itemized inventory, online dashboard, and on-demand return makes it easy yet secure to get any, or all, of your items out of storage.

Will and Document Storage

You’ll have several options. You can keep the documents yourself, have your attorney’s law office keep it for you, or put it in a safe deposit box or other document storage facility. Hooper tells us, “Over the years, as we have become a more mobile society, the trend has shifted so that almost all clients choose to keep their original will at home. ”

The key is keeping the document safe and accessible. Hooper says that a safe deposit box can be problematic “because the bank is not open after hours or on weekends and holidays. Often the only person who has access to the safe deposit box is the person who just died.”

Similarly, Closetbox storage locations are not open 24/7, but we do have one feature that the bank doesn’t provide—on-demand storage return. Simply log in to your secure online account and tell us where you want the document sent. You can start taking care of the funeral arrangements, while we work on making sure you have the paperwork in hand to avoid a lengthier process in court.

Smart Storage Needs Secure Storage

As an estate planning attorney, Hooper knows a thing or two about storage. “I have visited a number of storage units filled with the old clothing, toys, books, framed diplomas and certificates, furnishings and furniture of a deceased client. Most of it had been stored and forgotten years earlier. Most of it went straight to Goodwill or the landfill. Off-site storage is for important items like a box of important documents, past years tax returns, seasonal items, fine china, crystal, silver and heirlooms you are saving for your children and grandchildren.”

These types of items demand storage that’s a cut above the typical self-storage unit. Deciding what furniture to pitch and which to store may be a telltale example. Particleboard and beat-up furniture may not be worth it, but antique wood dressers, glass curio cabinets, and leather couches are better candidates for storage so long as they’re kept in an indoor, climate-controlled environment.