# A legacy binder — where everything is, for the people who will need to know

Recipe No. 29, Home and family. From The know.sh Cookbook: https://know.sh/cookbook/legacy-binder

- For: a parent in their fifties who wants the family to find everything without guessing
- You bring: a plain list of your banks, policies and people, the file box, the password manager you already use, the AI assistant you already use, and an honest hour with whoever will be your executor
- You get: five short documents, Where things are, Home, Insurance, Wishes and People to call, that say where every account, paper and key is kept without holding a single number or password
- Time: an evening to make the list, an evening to fix up what your assistant builds from it, then an hour each year
- Keep it: private while you work; share one document by a read-only link

When a parent dies or falls ill, the family spends weeks as detectives: which bank, which insurer, whether there was a second pension, where the deed is, who the lawyer was. Most of it was known to one person and written down nowhere.

A legacy binder answers those questions in advance. This one is five short documents on a shelf of its own: *Where things are*, *Home*, *Insurance*, *Wishes* and *People to call*. Each account, policy or key is a finding that names the institution, where the paperwork is kept and whom to call. It never holds the secret itself: no passwords, account numbers, recovery phrases or codes, only where they are kept.

The will, the powers of attorney and the password manager stay where they are. The binder is the map to them, and the last step of this recipe is deciding, honestly, how the person who needs the map will get it.

## What you will use

- **Shelf**: A shelf called *Legacy binder*, with one line saying who it is for and when you last reviewed it.
- **Research document**: Five documents: Where things are, Home, Insurance, Wishes, People to call. Each overview says what to do first.
- **Finding**: One finding per account, policy, key or person; the ones needed in the first week marked **Key**; gaps filed as *Question*.
- **The editor**: Where you correct what the assistant drafted, add what only you know, mark the first-week items **Key**, and write *Wishes* yourself.
- **Revisions**: Shows what changed at each yearly review, and lets you restore a finding your assistant rewrote when you only asked it to read.
- **Public link**: A password link with no expiry to each document the executor needs, with private findings left out.
- **Your AI assistant**: Builds the five documents from your list, reads them as your executor would, and reads the binder back as plain text for a paper copy.
- **Star and Focus**: Star the shelf’s documents; put the binder in Focus for the week of your yearly review.

## Method

### 1. Set the rule before you write a word

The rule is **where, never what**. The binder says "the password manager's recovery sheet is in the fire safe", never the password. It says "savings at Lakeshore Credit Union, statements by email", never the account number.

These never go in know.sh, not even in a private document: passwords and PINs, account and card numbers, Social Security numbers, crypto recovery or seed phrases, security-question answers, two-factor backup codes, and door, alarm or safe combinations. Your library lives online, your assistant reads it, and a link can be forwarded. The binder should be safe to read for anyone who opens it.

### 2. Give your assistant a list, not your statements

Go through a month of statements and your file box and write a plain list: each bank, plan, policy and adviser, what it is, how its statements arrive, where the paper is kept, and whom to call. Do not hand your assistant the statements themselves unless every number is blacked out first; a list is safer and quicker.

Give the list to whichever assistant you use and ask it to build a shelf, *Legacy binder*, with five documents: *Where things are*, *Home*, *Insurance*, *Wishes* and *People to call*. Each institution, policy, key and person becomes a finding titled by what it is and who holds it, "Everyday banking — Lakeshore Credit Union", with the same four lines under every one.

### 3. Fix it up in the editor

Open each document and press **Edit**. Correct what the assistant got wrong, then add what no list holds: the password manager and who has emergency access to it, the phone and where its passcode is kept, the fire safe and who holds its combination. Mark as **Key** and drag to the top what the executor needs in the first week.

*Home* should say where the deed is, who services the mortgage, what is on automatic payment, and link to your [house manual](/cookbook/house-manual). *Insurance* needs the agent's name and office number for each policy. In *People to call*, business numbers are fine; for friends, a name and "number in my phone" is enough.

### 4. Write Wishes in your own words

*Wishes* is the one document your assistant should leave empty, because it must sound like you. Burial or cremation, the music, the service or none, the dog, who gets the watch. File each as a *Decision* finding, so it reads as settled.

Be plain with yourself about what this document is: a letter, not a will. If a wish matters legally, such as who gets the house or who raises a child, it belongs in the will or the trust your lawyer drafts, and the finding in *Wishes* should say only where that document is.

### 5. Ask your assistant what your executor would still not know

Ask your assistant to read all five documents on the *Legacy binder* shelf as your executor would, the week after. Tell it exactly what to write: a *Question* finding on the right document for each gap, quoting the finding that raised it, and no answers of its own.

Then answer the questions yourself. Expect it to find the second pension you mention once and never explain, the subscriptions nobody would think to cancel, and the key that is "with the papers". Check **Revisions** afterwards: every change the assistant made is marked as an assistant's, with **Restore** beside it.

### 6. Decide how the right person will reach it

know.sh has one owner per library and no way to hand an account over after death, so choose a route now and tell your executor what it is.

- **A password link given to one person.** Press **Share** on each document the executor needs, leave it with no expiry (the default), and add a password. Copy the link when it appears; it is shown only once. Put the links in the letter kept with your will; give the password separately, in person.
- **Private, and a paper copy.** Keep the shelf private, tell your executor it exists, and once a year ask your assistant to read it back as plain text for a printed copy in the envelope.

Links are one per document, so five documents means five links. The read count on each tells you if one has been opened.

### 7. Review it once a year

Pick a date you will not forget, such as the week you file your taxes, and put it in your own calendar; know.sh sends no reminders. Put the binder in **Focus** that week, walk the file box again, and update what changed: a new insurer, a closed account, a new neighbour with the key.

If circumstances change, a divorce or a falling-out, turn the link off or replace it. A replaced link resets its exclusions and expiry, so set them again and send the new one.

## Prompts to try

Your assistant, connected to know.sh (Claude, ChatGPT or a local model):

> Using know.sh, read the five documents on my *Legacy binder* shelf as if you were my executor and I died last week. What would you still not know? File each gap as a Question finding on the document it belongs to, quoting the finding that raised it. Do not answer any of them.

Your assistant, connected to know.sh (Claude, ChatGPT or a local model):

> Using know.sh, check every finding on my *Legacy binder* shelf for anything that looks like an account number, a card number, a password, a PIN, a code, a recovery phrase or a full date of birth. Tell me the finding and describe the line without repeating the value. Do not change anything.

Your assistant, connected to know.sh (Claude, ChatGPT or a local model):

> Using know.sh, read the five documents on my *Legacy binder* shelf and give them back to me here as plain Markdown, one document after another, overview first and then each finding with its number, so I can print a copy for the envelope with my will.

## Variations

- Sit with your own parents while they write theirs, in their own library, and keep a [care binder](/cookbook/care-binder) beside it for the years when they need help day to day.
- Write a shorter *If I am in hospital* document for your spouse: which bills are due when, who to call at work, where the car keys are. Keep it private.
- Add a sixth document of letters to your children: the stories and values you want them to have. It is not a legal document, and it does not need to be.
- Link *Home* to the [family history](/cookbook/family-history), so the executor who finds the deed also finds who built the house.

## Where it falls short

- know.sh has no legacy contact and no way to pass a library on after death. The only ways in are a link you made or your own sign-in, so the route has to be arranged in advance.
- A public link is read by anyone who has it and the password. There are no named readers, which is why the binder must hold nothing that would hurt you if it were forwarded.
- It is not a vault. There are no encrypted fields for secrets; that is the password manager’s job, and the binder points to it.
- There is no export and no reminder to review. Your assistant can read the binder back as text for a paper copy, and the yearly review goes in your own calendar.
- Whatever you give a cloud assistant passes through its provider, which is one more reason the list holds no numbers. A local model through Ollama keeps it on your machine but calls know.sh’s tools less reliably, so check what it writes.

## A note on what a legacy binder is not

This recipe is for organising your own information. It is not financial, tax or legal advice, and a legacy binder is not a will. It does not name an executor, leave anything to anyone, or give anyone power to act for you. A will, powers of attorney, a health care directive and the beneficiary forms on your accounts and policies are legal documents; make them with a lawyer, and ask how they fit together. The binder only says where they are.

Never store passwords, account numbers, Social Security numbers, seed phrases, PINs, or door, alarm or safe codes in know.sh. Write where they are kept, not what they are.

Assistants make mistakes. Read every finding yours writes before your executor relies on it.

Indexed under: Legacy binders, Executors, Estate planning, Passwords, where kept, Beneficiaries, Wishes.