- Everything you need to know (and do)

If you own bitcoin or any other cryptocurrency, then you must have wondered what will happen to your assets in case of eventualities. You are not alone. So what should you do to ensure this does not happen to your assets?

Have a plan.

It takes two important things to be able to transfer your access.

  1. Keys and access: Your beneficiary must have the needed access to all relevant private keys, passwords, seed phrases, exchange accounts, software or hardware wallets, and everything else required to distribute your assets.
  2. Up to date knowledge on how to handle the transfer process: It's possible to have all this knowledge and no be able to know what to do with it. Turning to a total untrustworthy person may result in your heir losing everything.

Choose where to invest based on this.

Most exchange wallets like Coinbase already have easy ways to transfer assets to beneficiaries if they can provide relevant documents like wills, proof of death, etc. If you are not an experience Crypto investor,  use a trusted exchange for your Crypto investments. Create a plan to pass the credentials to your heir through tools like Cova

Wallets:

If you use a hardware wallet, you own your keys. First, you need to backup your wallet. (If you have not backed up your wallet, top reading this article and do that backup right away). Next is to make a list of what your heir needs to know;

What do your heirs need to know?

  • The name of the wallets you use
  • Where your wallet backups are kept.
  • The name of the software you use. (This is important if you use a single wallet for more than one crypto asset)
  • If you use an encryption password for paper wallets or a passphrase for seeds, your beneficiaries must know this too.

Devices

If you use hardware devices to hold your Crypto assets, your heir must know which device you use. There are chances that you stored copies of your keys on the device, and your heirs must see the device, so they don't throw it away, donate it or destroy the device. Should you give them all access codes and information? No. You can store that information in your Cova account and then set your protocol to pass the information to them if you pass away.

Once set, the next thing to do is select your executor. The Crypto space is still early, but it is essential to note that things are moving faster and the best time to start planning is now.