Every Estate Planning Tool We Vetted, and What Each One Costs
Vaults for the documents, organizers for the paperwork, journals for the stories, and hardware wallets for the crypto nobody can recover without a key. Ten tools we checked ourselves, each priced at what you actually pay.
Some listings pay us a commission at no cost to you, which is what keeps this free. Nothing is here because it pays, and several of the most useful entries pay us nothing.
In Short
- What this is: every legacy tool and product we have checked ourselves, in four groups: vaults, organizers, memory keepers, and crypto inheritance.
- What it costs to use: nothing. Prices shown are the provider’s, with our discount codes already applied.
- Cheapest way in here: $59, which gives you all 72 double-sided instructional checksheets and the labels, while you supply your own folders and box.
- Lowest ongoing cost here: $84 a year, about $7 a month, for 25GB of encrypted storage with delegate access and a built-in password manager.
- How the links work: every listing goes straight to the provider, with our full review underneath it if you want the long version first.
Jump Straight to the Kind of Tool You Need
Four groups below, then an honest comparison of how they stack up against each other and against the alternatives people search for by name.
Digital Vaults Organizers Memory Keepers Crypto Inheritance Memberships How They Compare
Not sure which gap you have? Use a tool instead of reading. Free, no email, under two minutes.
- Estate Readiness ToolTen questions, then a scored list of what your plan is missing and whether a trust earns its cost
- Probate Cost CalculatorWhat it would actually cost your family, by state, in real dollars
- Inherited Annuity Tax CalculatorWhat an inherited annuity leaves after tax, before you decide how to take it
| Tool | Best for | Lowest real price | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Your Digital Vault | Encrypted storage your named people can actually reach | $84/yrAbout $7 a month. 25GB encrypted, delegate access on a verified death certificate, guided organization, built-in password manager. | Go › |
| LVED ★ | A vault bundled into a full estate plan, so documents and access live together | $65/yrVault alone. Will Plan $199 one time with code YFY63MX8 for 33% off. Trust Plan $333 single, $500 couple. | Go › |
| The Nokbox ★ | The paper system nobody has to be taught how to open | $59Lite, contents and labels only. Base Kit $129, Original $159, Fireproof $169. Bundled legal-document tiers run $159 to $269. | Go › |
| Remento ★ | Recorded answers in their own voice, printed as a real book | $89/yrWith code MEMORIALMERITS. Or $99 plus a free extra book worth $59 using MMFREEBOOK. Recordings stay yours whether you renew or not. | Go › |
| Should Tomorrow Never Come ★ | A guided legacy journal for someone who does not know where to start | See AmazonPremium hardcover with themed sections and writing prompts. Featured across ABC, NBC, CBS and Fox. | Go › |
| How to Legacy Journal | 200 prompts built for aging parents and seniors | See AmazonCompanion to the Legacy Edition. Written for the parent who says they have nothing interesting to tell. | Go › |
| Turning Hearts ★ | A scannable medallion linking a headstone to their whole story | $67.99Two identical medallions, normally $79.99, with 15% applied automatically through our link. Lifetime warranty on the disc. | Go › |
| Ledger ★ | Cold storage your heirs can actually recover from | From $79Nano S Plus, up to $399 for the Stax. The entry model does the same core job as the flagship. | Go › |
| Trezor Safe 5 ★ | Shamir backup splits the seed so no single copy is a point of failure | $129Certified secure element and colour touchscreen. Open source firmware anyone can audit. | Go › |
| AARP ★ | Member planning tools, a fraud line, and discounts that outlive the fee | $15First full year with automatic renewal, then $20/yr. Free gift at signup and a free second household membership. | Go › |
Digital Vaults and Encrypted Document Storage for Your Family
A vault is the difference between a plan that exists and a plan your loved ones can actually reach. Encrypted storage, named people who get access on a verified death certificate, and a password manager so nobody is sitting at a locked laptop guessing. A password manager is the single change CISA recommends first, and the cheapest vault here runs about $7 a month on its own. The most complete bundles the vault into a full estate plan so the documents and the key to them live in the same place.
Your Digital Vault: Who Gets Access, and Exactly When
Delegate access that opens on a verified death certificate, not on a guessed password.
The question a vault has to answer is not where the documents live. It is who can open them and what proves they are allowed to. Your Digital Vault lets you name delegates in advance and releases access to them on a verified death certificate, so nobody is calling a support line during the worst week of their life trying to prove a relationship. Twenty five gigabytes, a password manager built in, and prompts that tell you what your plan is still missing.
- $84 a year flat, about $7 a month, with no per-document or per-delegate charges
- 25GB encrypted storage, enough for scanned deeds, policies and medical records
- Named delegates gain access on a verified death certificate, not on a shared password
- Password manager built in, so logins sit beside the documents they open
- Guided organization walks you through what is still missing rather than leaving you a blank folder
LVED Digital Vault: The Vault Half, Priced on Its Own ★
The one vault here you can buy alone or fold into a complete estate plan.
Code YFY63MX8 takes 33% off any plan. It is the only Memorial Merits exclusive estate discount online.
Most vaults are a product. This one is half of an estate platform, which matters because the documents and the access to them end up in a single account rather than two subscriptions somebody has to remember separately. Bought alone the vault runs $65 a year. Bought with the Will Plan it is $199 one time with our code, and the plan keeps updating as your life does instead of freezing on the day you signed it.
- $65 a year for the vault on its own, 25GB encrypted
- $199 one time for the Will Plan with code YFY63MX8, a 33 percent discount
- Trust Plan $333 single or $500 couple, both including the vault
- Automated escrow delivery releases documents to named people on a verified death certificate
- Unlimited updates, so a move, a marriage or a grandchild does not mean starting over
Family Organizers and Estate Binders That Keep Documents Findable
Paper still wins for the things that have to be found fast by someone who is not thinking clearly. A labelled box sits where anyone can open it, and every folder carries a sheet that tells your next of kin what belongs there and what to do with it, which is most of the job the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau describes for anyone managing another person’s money. Systems here start at $59 for the contents alone, run to $159 with the box included, and reach $269 when legal documents are bundled in. Our full breakdown of how the Nokbox system works covers which tier fits which household.
The Nokbox: Four Tiers, and How to Pick the Right One ★
The same 72 checksheets in every tier. What changes is how much of the container you buy.
The confusing part of the Nokbox is not what it does, it is which version to order, because all four hold the identical set of instructions and differ only in what ships inside. The Lite is the contents alone, for someone who already owns a file box. The Base Kit adds the folders. The Fireproof and the Original add the container, and right now the Fireproof is the cheaper of those two.
- Lite $59: 72 double-sided checksheets and the labels, you supply folders and a box
- Base Kit $129: everything but the container, drops into a file cabinet or a safe
- Fireproof $169: the full kit in a fire-resistant container
- Original $159: the full kit in the standard portable file box
- Bundled tiers $159 to $269 add legal documents, fulfilled through LifeLegacy, a third party
Still need the will, the trust or the powers of attorney themselves? Open the Estate Planning and Wills directory.
Memory Preservation, Voice Recording and Ethical Wills
The documents settle the estate. These settle the questions nobody thought to ask while there was still time. Recorded answers in your own voice, guided prompts that pull stories out of a parent who says they have nothing interesting to tell, and the kind of writing that outlives the paperwork by decades. An ethical will, which is simply the letter explaining what you valued and why, costs nothing to write and is the one item on this page that money cannot substitute for.
Remento: An Ethical Will You Speak Instead of Write ★
Their stories, in their voice, bound into a book they never had to sit down and write.
Code MEMORIALMERITS takes it to $89. Or MMFREEBOOK adds a free extra book worth $59. One or the other, not both.
An ethical will is the part of a legacy that has nothing to do with assets: what someone believed, what they regretted, what they want remembered. Almost nobody writes one, because the writing is the barrier. Remento sends a prompt, the person answers out loud into a phone, and the answer comes back transcribed and bound into a hardcover book with a QR code beside each story that plays the original recording.
- $89 a year with code MEMORIALMERITS, or $99 with MMFREEBOOK for a free extra book worth $59
- Prompts arrive by text or email and are answered by voice, with no typing at any point
- Every printed story carries a QR code that plays the original audio in their voice
- The recordings remain yours whether you renew the subscription or not
- Built for the parent or grandparent who insists they have nothing interesting to tell
Should Tomorrow Never Come, Legacy Edition: The Written Version ★
For the person who would rather write it down than say it out loud.
Not everyone wants a microphone. This is the Memorial Merits flagship journal, a premium hardcover built around themed sections and prompts that move from early memories through beliefs, regrets, and the things a person wants said after they are gone. It is made to be filled in slowly, a page at a time, and to be readable years later by somebody who never met the person who wrote it.
- Premium hardcover, built to survive being handled and reread for decades
- Themed sections carry a writer from childhood through beliefs and final wishes
- Written by Memorial Merits, featured across ABC, NBC, CBS and Fox
- Pairs with the prompt guide below for anyone who stalls on a blank page
- Sold through Amazon, so pricing and delivery follow Amazon rather than us
How to Legacy Journal: 200 Prompts for a Blank Page
The book you buy when the first journal has sat untouched for a month.
The most common reason a legacy journal stays empty is not reluctance. It is that nobody knows what to write first. This is the companion volume, more than two hundred prompts written specifically for aging parents and seniors and sequenced so the easy memories come first and the harder ones arrive once the habit is already there. It works alone and it works better beside the Legacy Edition.
- More than 200 prompts, sequenced from easy recall toward harder reflection
- Written for aging parents and seniors rather than general journalling
- Designed as the companion to the Legacy Edition, and useful entirely on its own
- The answer to a journal that has been open to page one since Christmas
- Sold through Amazon, so pricing and delivery follow Amazon rather than us
Turning Hearts Medallion: Where It Goes and What It Holds ★
Two medallions ship, because one goes on the marker and one stays with someone.
15% off, applied automatically through our link. Nothing to enter at checkout.
A headstone holds a name and two dates. The medallion fixes to the marker with adhesive rated for outdoor stone, and anyone who scans it reaches a page that can hold the biography, the photographs, the video, and the stories other people keep adding for years afterward. The order ships two identical discs, which is the detail most people do not expect: one for the marker, one to keep.
- $67.99 for two identical medallions, normally $79.99, with 15 percent applied automatically
- Fixes to headstones, urns, benches or plaques with outdoor-rated adhesive
- Scanning opens a page holding biography, photographs, video and visitor memories
- Loved ones can keep adding to the page long after the service is over
- Lifetime warranty on the disc, and nothing to type at checkout
Crypto Inheritance and Hardware Wallet Recovery for Your Heirs
Crypto is the only asset on this page that disappears permanently when nobody has the key. Leaving it on an exchange does not solve that either, because Coinbase offers no beneficiary designation and the account passes only through a fiduciary claim. There is no bank to call, no probate court that can compel access, and no recovery process built for the people you leave behind. A hardware wallet runs from $79 to $399, and the part that actually decides whether your loved ones ever see the money is free: writing the recovery phrase down and telling one person where it is. Our guide to crypto estate planning walks through what to write and where to store it.
Ledger: What Your Heir Actually Has to Do to Recover It ★
The device costs $79. The part that decides whether your family inherits anything costs nothing.
Recovery is the whole question, and it works identically on every model. The device holds your private keys offline, and a 24-word recovery phrase written on paper is what rebuilds the wallet on any Ledger if the original is lost, destroyed, or sitting in a drawer nobody can open. An heir does not need your PIN and does not need the original device. They need the words. Everything above the entry model buys convenience, not survivability.
- From $79 for the Nano S Plus, up to $399 for the Stax
- The entry model recovers in exactly the same way as the flagship
- A 24-word phrase on paper rebuilds the wallet on any Ledger device
- Supports the widest range of coins and tokens of any wallet on this page
- An heir needs the phrase, not the PIN and not the original hardware
Trezor Safe 5: Splitting the Recovery Phrase Across People ★
Shamir backup means no single piece of paper is the thing that loses everything.
A public code, TAKECONTROL10, circulates for 10% off. It is not a Memorial Merits code and we cannot verify what it does at checkout.
One written recovery phrase is a single point of failure in both directions. Lose it and the crypto is gone; anyone who finds it owns the crypto. Seed phrase estate planning covers how to split that risk without handing anyone the keys early. Shamir backup splits the seed into shares and lets you set how many are needed to rebuild it, so one share can go to a sibling, one to an attorney, and one stays with you, with no individual holding enough to act alone. For inheritance specifically, that is the feature that matters most.
- $129, with a certified secure element and a colour touchscreen
- Shamir backup splits the seed into shares with a threshold you choose
- No single share can move funds, so no single copy is a point of failure
- Open source firmware that anyone can read and audit
- Set the threshold before you fund the wallet, not after
Membership Programs With Estate Planning Tools Included
One entry, and it does not belong to any of the four groups above. A membership is not a vault, an organizer, a journal or a wallet, but this one includes a free will-writing tool and enough planning support that leaving it off the page would be dishonest.
AARP Membership: The Planning Tools Behind the Card ★
Fifteen dollars for the first year, and the planning side alone outvalues the fee.
Most people join for the discounts and never open the rest. The part relevant to this page is the planning side: a free will-writing tool included with membership, Medicare guidance written in plain language, a fraud watch line answered by people rather than a menu, and caregiving resources aimed at somebody handling a parent’s affairs while running their own household.
- $15 for the first full year with automatic renewal, then $20 a year
- Free will-writing tool included with membership
- Fraud watch helpline staffed by people, aimed at scams that target older adults
- Caregiving and Medicare guidance written for someone doing it for the first time
- A second household membership included, so a spouse is covered by the same fee
Looking for coverage that pays the bills rather than a tool that organises them? Open the Life Insurance directory.
How These Estate Planning Tools Compare, and What People Look For Instead
Almost everyone who lands here arrives with one product in mind and one question behind it: is there something better. That question deserves a straight answer rather than a sales page, so here is how the categories actually stack against each other and against the alternatives people search for by name.
Paper systems against digital vaults
A paper system is found by accident. Somebody opens a closet and there it is, labelled, with instructions inside. A digital vault has to be remembered, reached, and opened, which means it only works if you named the right people in advance and they know it exists. Paper costs once and never expires. A vault costs every year and stops the day the card on file declines. The honest answer for most households is both, with the paper box holding a single page that says where the vault is and who has access.
Lamorial against the Nokbox
This is the comparison we get asked about more than any other, and the two are not really competing for the same job. Lamorial sells an end-of-life planner and journal at $45 printed, or $14.99 as a fillable digital edition, with a free walkthrough guide. It is a book: you write in it, and its strength is the guided writing. The Nokbox is a filing system, 15 hanging folders, 67 labelled folders and 72 double-sided checksheets, starting at $59 for contents only and $159 with the box. It does not ask you to write much, it asks you to file.
If your problem is that your thoughts and wishes have never been written down, the planner is the cheaper and better fit. If your problem is that your documents exist but nobody could find them, the filing system is the answer and the planner will not solve it. Households with both problems, which is most of them, get more out of starting with the filing system, because a written wish that nobody can find is the same as no wish at all.
What people search for instead
Everplans, Trustworthy, Life Ledger and My Life & Wishes come up constantly in the same searches, and they belong to the vault category rather than the paper one. We list the vaults we have checked ourselves above, and we do not list a platform we have not used. If the one you are weighing is not here, the three questions worth asking are the same for all of them: what happens to your data if the company closes, how does a named person prove a death and get access, and can you export everything you entered if you ever want to leave.
Who Should Look Elsewhere
Three situations where nothing on this page is the right answer, and it is better to hear that here than after you have paid.
- You do not have the legal documents yet. A vault with nothing in it and a binder with empty folders are both busywork. The will, the powers of attorney and the healthcare directive come first. The American Bar Association covers what each one does, and our estate planning and wills directory covers those, starting at $109 one time. Come back here once you have something worth organising.
- You are in the first days after a loss. Nothing here helps you today. What helps is knowing what has to happen this week and what can wait, and our guide to being named executor lays out that order. These tools are for the person who still has time.
- You want it free, and free is genuinely enough for you. A three-ring binder, a printed list of accounts and one honest conversation covers more than most paid systems do. CaringInfo publishes free advance directive forms valid in every state, and every one of our planning worksheets costs nothing and always will. The paid systems buy you structure and prompts, not permission.
Getting Started
Pick the gap you actually have, not the one that is easiest to close. Almost everyone has some version of a will and almost nobody has a way for their loved ones to find anything, which is where the lost months come from. The National Institute on Aging keeps a plain checklist of what belongs in order, if you want a list to work against.
Do one thing this week. Write the recovery phrase down and tell one person where it is, or record a single answer in your own voice, or put the four documents you already have into one labelled folder in one place somebody knows about. Each of those takes under an hour and none of them require buying anything first.
I have watched loved ones sit in a room and try to reconstruct a person’s wishes from memory, and I have watched families open a box and find the answer already written down. The difference between those two rooms was never money, and it was never how organised anyone naturally is. It was whether somebody, on an ordinary afternoon when nothing was wrong, decided to spend an hour on it. Every tool on this page exists to shorten that hour, and the ones that do it best are rarely the expensive ones.
Comparing whole services rather than single tools? Open the Legacy and Estate Planning directory.
Who Vetted This List
Every tool here was checked by Gabriel Killian, founder of Memorial Merits and a US Navy Certified Instructor, Missile Defense Systems. Memorial Merits has been cited by CBS, ABC and Fox for its work on end-of-life planning.
Prices come from each provider’s own catalogue, not from another directory, and every one on this page was pulled on 20 August 2026. Where a discount belongs to Memorial Merits, the listing says so. Where a code is public and anyone can use it, the listing says that too, including the one we cannot verify. Two entries here pay us nothing.
Prices and partner terms last verified 20 August 2026. Reviewed every 90 days. One price on this page is a live sale rather than a list price and is marked as such.
Estate Planning Tools Questions Families Ask Most
What are the best estate planning tools?
There is no single best one, because they solve different failures. A digital vault fixes access, a paper organizer fixes findability, a guided journal fixes the things never written down, and a hardware wallet fixes crypto that dies with you. Most households need two of the four, not all of them.
What is a digital vault and do I really need one?
A digital vault is encrypted storage for wills, policies, deeds and account logins, with named people who gain access on a verified death certificate. You need one if your documents exist but nobody could reach them. You do not need one if a labelled box at home already solves that.
Is a paper estate organizer better than a digital vault?
Paper is found by accident, costs once and never expires. A vault has to be remembered and reached, costs every year, and stops the day the card declines. Most households are best served by both, with the paper box holding one page saying where the vault is and who has access.
What is an ethical will?
An ethical will is a letter or recording that passes on values rather than assets: what you believed, what you learned, what you want remembered. It carries no legal weight and costs nothing to make. It is the item families reread most and the one almost nobody gets around to writing.
What happens to my crypto when I die?
Without a recovery phrase somebody can find, it is gone permanently. There is no bank to call and no court that can compel access. A hardware wallet holds the keys offline, and a written 24-word phrase is what lets an heir rebuild the wallet on a new device.
How much do estate planning tools cost?
On this page, $59 buys the cheapest complete organizing system and $84 a year buys the cheapest encrypted vault. Hardware wallets start at $79. Guided journals run under $50. A full estate document bundle with an organizer reaches $269. Nothing here requires a subscription to stay useful.
What is the difference between the Nokbox tiers?
All four hold the same 72 instructional checksheets and differ only in what ships with them. Lite at $59 is contents and labels alone. Base Kit at $129 adds the folders. Original at $159 and Fireproof at $169 add the container. Bundles from $159 to $269 add legal documents.
Do I need any of this if I already have a will?
A will decides who receives what. It does not tell anyone where the deed is, which accounts exist, what the passwords are, or what you wanted said. That gap is what these tools close, and it is the reason estates take months to settle even when the paperwork is perfect.
What does Memorial Merits earn from these listings?
Some listings pay a commission when you buy through our link, at no extra cost to you. Several pay nothing at all and are here because they work. Prices shown include our discount codes where we have them, and nothing on this page ranks higher because it pays more.
