Settling an estate often starts with the assets that are easiest to see: a home, bank accounts, retirement accounts, vehicles, brokerage statements. But some of the most valuable items are harder to find because they live online, sit inside an employer portal, or arrive as paperless statements no one remembers to look for.
Whether you're a family member serving as executor or an attorney guiding one through the process, the pattern is the same. These assets are often tied to an old email address, a benefits login, a digital wallet, or something else entirely. If no one knows where to look, they get missed.
At Perpetua, we see this pattern constantly in our work with executors and estate attorneys. Below are 10 digital or digitally managed assets families commonly overlook after someone dies, along with where to search and what to do first.
Life Insurance Policies and Annuities
Employer Stock Plans, RSUs, Stock Options, and ESPPs
Deferred Compensation Plans
Cryptocurrency, NFTs, and Blockchain Assets
Health Savings Accounts and Flexible Spending Accounts
Mineral Rights and Oil, Gas, or Land Royalties
Royalties From Music, Books, Patents, Content, or Licensing
Credit Card Points, Airline Miles, Hotel Rewards, and Loyalty Accounts
Long-Term Care Insurance Benefits
Timeshares and Vacation Club Memberships
How Executors Can Find Missing Digital Assets
If you're settling an estate, start with the records most likely to reveal hidden accounts.
- Review the last two years of tax returns for interest, dividends, stock sales, HSA activity, royalties, and other income.
- Search bank and credit card transactions for recurring premiums, benefit providers, subscription platforms, travel programs, and financial apps.
- Search email for terms like "benefits," "stock plan," "RSU," "HSA," "life insurance," "annuity," "royalty," "crypto," "wallet," "timeshare," and "points."
- Contact current and former employers to ask about retirement plans, stock plans, insurance, deferred compensation, and health benefit accounts.
- Search state unclaimed property databases under the deceased person's name, prior names, and past addresses.
- Preserve devices, password managers, cloud accounts, and physical records before canceling services or clearing out electronics.
The Bottom Line
Many missed estate assets aren't lost because families don't care. They're lost because no one knows they exist.
Perpetua helps close that gap. By securely linking a deceased person's email accounts, Perpetua helps executors identify financial accounts, insurance policies, employer benefits, subscriptions, rewards programs, and other digital records buried across years of inbox history, instead of searching one keyword at a time.
If you're settling an estate or advising a client through one,
