The Estate Asset Map
Your executor can't find what you haven't listed — and your crypto dies with you if there's no access trail.
A will specifies who gets your estate, but it cannot distribute what the executor cannot find. Sam Grice makes an under-appreciated distinction: you do not need to list the value of your assets in or alongside your will — you need to list what exists and, for digital assets, how to access it. The values change; the existence and access do not.
The episode's most striking example is crypto. Cold storage wallets secured by hardware fingerprint scanners or long private keys are by design inaccessible to outsiders. If no access instructions exist, that asset is not lost in the usual sense — it is simply permanently locked. Unlike a forgotten pension, which a professional executor can trace through government systems, crypto with no key trail cannot be recovered. Grice notes this is quietly happening already: people are dying with significant crypto holdings that vanish from the effective money supply.
The broader problem applies to any distributed portfolio. Multiple ISAs, crypto exchanges, LISA, workplace pensions from previous employers, brokerage accounts, digital bank accounts — a person with five previous jobs may have five unclaimed workplace pensions. The executor's job without a map is an investigation: searching government systems, checking bank statements for direct debits, trying to reconstruct a financial life from clues. The estimated £9,700 indirect cost of dying intestate is partly this investigation cost.
- You do not need to list asset values in your will — only what exists, where, and how to access it.
- Assets your executor cannot find or access are effectively not part of your estate, regardless of their value.
- Crypto is the most extreme case: cold storage with no access trail is permanently inaccessible after death.
- Distributed asset portfolios — multiple ISAs, exchanges, pension pots — require explicit documentation to avoid months of investigative work.
- A list of assets is a living document that should be updated when substantial new assets are acquired, not only when you rewrite your will.
- Inventory all asset accounts by type and locationList every account: bank accounts, ISAs, LISAs, SIPPs and workplace pensions (including from previous employers), brokerage accounts, crypto exchanges, and cold storage wallets. Include the institution name and account type — not the balance. This is your executor's map.Pro tipWork through bank statements and email confirmations from the last 3 years to catch accounts you might have forgotten. Direct debits and standing orders often reveal forgotten subscriptions and savings pots.WarningDo not include private keys or passphrases in the will itself — the will becomes a public document during probate.
- Create a separate secure access document for digital assetsFor crypto and digital accounts, create a separate document — not the will — that covers: exchange accounts and login method, hardware wallet locations, key storage approach, and any seed phrase storage. Store this document in a way that is secure against unauthorised access but accessible to a specific trusted person.Pro tipA solicitor-held letter that references a physical location (e.g. 'in the green folder in the home safe') is a workable pattern — it avoids listing credentials in a public document.WarningAny access document creates a security vulnerability. Consider whether the value of the asset justifies the documentation risk, and use a multi-step retrieval design.
- Consolidate where possible before deathMultiple workplace pensions from previous employers are a major source of estate complexity. Consolidating them into a single SIPP while alive dramatically reduces the investigative burden on your executor — and usually benefits you directly through lower fees and better visibility.Pro tipThe Pension Tracing Service (UK government) can locate lost workplace pensions — use it now rather than leaving the task to your executor.
- Tell your executor where the map isThe asset list and access document must be findable. Tell at least one trusted person — your executor or a close family member — where the documents are stored. A perfect asset map that lives in an unknown location is as useless as no map at all.Pro tipReview and update the map each time you open a new account or acquire a substantial new asset.
The podcast host holds significant crypto on multiple exchanges and on a cold storage device secured by a fingerprint scanner. He acknowledges that no one in his life knows he holds crypto at all.
Sam Grice describes clients who have worked at five different companies, each with a workplace pension, and have not consolidated. The executor's starting point is a blank sheet of paper.
Sam Grice observed through Octopus Legacy's professional executor service that a significant proportion of estates involve asset discovery work that could have been pre-empted. The rise of crypto made this dramatically more acute — a held pension can be traced; a cold wallet with a dead owner's fingerprint cannot. His framing of 'no access instructions = no one's money' emerged from seeing this pattern repeatedly across clients who were otherwise careful planners.