What to do When Someone Dies
An Article of the Modern Survival Guide
You’re reading the Modern Survival Guide, a blog I’ve been writing to help people handle all sorts of things we encounter in life. One of those things is the realization that no one gets out of life alive. Another is the realization that, at some point, we will likely be responsible for someone’s affairs after they pass.
This is a very sensitive topic for me, as my father recently died and my family went through all of the stages of grief, including figuring out what to do with his stuff and his house. This was a devastating, draining, painful process… and it’s something that almost everyone will have to do, at some point, for someone.
With this in mind, here are a few key takeaways about what to do when someone dies, in the order in which you should do them:
- Call a funeral home
- Find the will
- Secure valuables
- Secure the deceased’s home
- Set aside time to grieve
- Contact relatives and friends
- Arrange and communicate a funeral
- Get a death certificate
- Assign an executor
- Determine the distribution of assets
- Dispose of non-asset belongings
- Close out the estate
Death is a non-trivial process, and more stuff a person has, the harder it is to get through the post-death work. I’ll cover these tasks point-by-point for the rest of the article.
Call a Funeral Home
Funeral homes are very, very useful institutions. In the US, there is a lot of paperwork that surrounds a deceased person. A quality funeral home can help you get through this paperwork and walk you through decisions that must be made regarding the disposition of the deceased’s body. If you know that a loved one is in the process of dying, it is best to arrange as much of this as possible with the funeral home before the person dies… if only because you won’t feel like doing it immediately after they pass.
They also are immensely helpful for dealing with a very difficult object: the body. If you’ve never been around a dead body, and most people really haven’t, you likely don’t know what to do with one. Funeral homes are experts in the storage and preparation of dead folks, and frankly it’s worth it to have that expertise helping you out.
Ideally, you want your loved one’s journey from home, hospital, or hospice care to the place of their final rest to be as smooth as possible. The funeral industry takes a lot of flak, and deserves some of it, but they undeniably grease the wheels of this process.
A note on finances: funerals can be expensive things. A “quality” casket will cost thousands of dollars, in addition to the preparation fees for the body itself if you want an open-coffin funeral, not to mention any rental fees for a room to hold the funeral itself. Some churches also charge for these services, although the more circumspect of them will phrase it as a request for donation. Be prepared for sticker shock.
Note that if your loved one didn’t want to go to a funeral home after their death, you should honor their wishes as best you can, but you can still use a funeral home for consultation on next steps with regard to things like the death certificate, obituaries, and other death-related documentation.
Find the Will
This is the first and most important thing that you should do after you have ensured that the deceased person’s body has been given over to the care of a reputable institution. A person’s will is the definitive legal document that will make every other piece of the post-death process more clear. A good will outlines what the person wanted done with their body, how they wanted their assets dispersed, who will be responsible for these actions, and may contain instructions for their funeral or memorial activities that can take some of the stress off the family.
If at all possible, find out where a person’s will is before they die, and retrieve it. If you can’t do this, you’ll need to go on a search through their house to try to find it. I do not recommend this; it is an intensely difficult thing to do if you liked the deceased person at all, to go rooting through their home. But you absolutely must do it if you don’t have the will to hand, because you’ll need it to do most other things related to their estate.
If the deceased had retained a lawyer prior to death, contact the lawyer — they may have a copy of the will, or might have been given the original to hold. Similarly, if the deceased had a safety deposit box or some other form of secure storage, checking there is an obvious step — but you will likely need to be the executor and have a death certificate in hand before such places will grant you access.
Once you have found the will, depending on its contents, it may be wise to retain the services of a lawyer. I would recommend this in any case where you suspect that the disposition of assets would be protested by anyone in your family, a business interest, or other concerned party. I would also recommend retaining a lawyer in any case where you can’t find the will, because at that point you will firmly enter into the realm of estate law, and it’s helpful to have someone on hand who understands that arcane disciple.
Secure Valuables
Most people store valuable objects in their home. Most people’s neighbors will learn of their death fairly quickly, especially in rural settings. Not all of a person’s neighbors are trustworthy individuals. Nor should we assume that all of our family members are necessarily going to do the right thing. Death creates strong emotions, and those strong emotions can make people act contrary to their normal patterns — and that’s a charitable interpretation, in some cases.
Therefore, while you are locating the deceased person’s will, it is wise to secure any items of significant financial or sentimental value. Do this as soon as possible. Make a list of all items you are securing, and take pictures. If at all possible, have other people with you while you do this, preferably family members, preferably trustworthy, who can vouch for your actions.
Common valuable items include house and car keys, jewelry, cash, deeds and titles, checkbooks, wallets, purses, art, computers, entertainment devices, high-dollar appliances, expensive clothing, collectible items, password records, and weapons. Guns and passwords in particular should be removed immediately.
Let everyone who might have a future claim on these items know what you’ve taken and where you’ve put them. This is often where friction with other family members will start (“I can’t believe you took Aunt Belinda’s prized jade poodle statues out of her house without asking me!”), so try to put out those fires before they catch. But this is still preferable to leaving those things around where they can be stolen.
Secure the Home
If the deceased person had a home, condo, apartment, etc., ensure that doors are locked, windows are shut, the garage is closed, and alarm systems are activated (assuming you know the codes — if you don’t that’s a different problem, and you’ll need to talk to the alarm company immediately). It is also advisable to turn off the main water line if you know where it is; the last thing you want is a flooded house.
Set the air conditioning to turn on if temperatures get above 75 degrees Fahrenheit or 23 degrees Celsius, and set the heat to turn on if the temperature gets below 50 degrees Fahrenheit or 10 degrees Celsius. You don’t want mold, and you don’t want frozen pipes.
Lastly, remove any pets. They need to go to someone who can care for them, and if you can’t find anyone, they will need to go to a shelter.
Set Aside Time to Grieve
The preceding steps will have likely taken a day or two, and those will be busy days. It’s very easy to get caught up in frenetic action at this point, and you may prefer that to the alternative, which is to grieve. I am here to tell you that you can and should take time to grieve.
Grieving is the normal response to losing a loved one. You will likely be grieving for a long time, if you were close enough to them that wrapping up their affairs falls to you. That is also normal. The first few weeks and months will be very difficult, if you were close to the person, and that too is normal. Take time to process your grief, to let is flow over you, to feel the loss. It means something when we lose someone. Part of honoring their memory is feeling that loss, and recognizing who they were and what they did for us in life.
Grief will creep up on you, and when you are going through a deceased person’s home and belongings, it will grab you by the throat. Seeing mementos, smelling old clothes, being in a room where you are very used to seeing and talking with another person who will never be there again is hard. You should not expect to feel normal. You may not feel normal for a long time. That’s ok, and it’s ok to take time and energy to not be normal.
Alternately, if you hated the deceased person’s guts and just got stuck cleaning up their mess, take a moment to celebrate. I’m not going to judge, some people’s only positive contribution to life is to leave it.
Contact Friends and Relatives
The strangest part of my Dad’s death was that the world kept spinning. People didn’t just know that a Very Important Person had died; they went on with life just like normal, and though word of his death did spread naturally, it didn’t spread as far or as fast as I expected.
It typically falls to close relatives to spread the word that a person has passed on. It is likely worth your while to make a list of everyone who might need to be told that a person has died, and then go down the list methodically and ensure that everyone who needs to know, knows.
At the same time, it is important to send out an obituary. There’s an old saying that “more men know Jack than Jack knows,” and what you’ll find when someone dies is that their lives touched many more people than you knew about. Many of those people will want to know about funeral arrangements, or want to send a note or gift to the family, and an obituary is the traditional means of passing on this information. Contacting two or three local newspapers is usually sufficient to get an obit out into the world.
There are prompts to help you write an obituary online, and a discussion of how to write a good obituary is an article on its own, but the basics are as follows:
- Tell the reader when the deceased died, their age, and those members of their family who continue on.
- Give a brief summary of important events or accomplishments in their life.
- Tell the reader when and where the funeral or memorial service will be.
- Tell the reader where condolences or gifts can be sent.
Given that an obituary is going to be widely shared and widely read, it’s important to get it right. I would advise sharing any draft of an obituary with the deceased’s immediate family to get their opinion and make sure you’re capturing the things they want to say.
In the digital age, it’s also important to put the information out online. Posting a status update to social media, using the language from the obituary, is a good way to get the word out online.
Arrange and Communicate a Funeral
Funerals are tricky and can be very expensive. The first step should be to check the deceased’s will to see if they left instructions regarding their funeral or memorial service arrangements. If you valued that individual, then to the best of your ability follow those instructions. This is one of the last things they wished for, it’s their sendoff from the world, and funerals are enormously meaningful for friends and family. There is good incentive to get it right.
Be aware that you may not be able to follow the deceased’s instructions or wishes to the letter. Funerals average around $8,000 in the US¹, which may be more than the family has available to spend. Some people think ahead and leave enough money available in a trust or bank account to cover their funeral expenses; others do not or cannot.
If you find yourself in a situation where you are not able to 100% meet the wishes of the deceased person, either due to cost or due to lack of instructions, bear this in mind: funerals are for the living. The dead are past caring. The point of a funeral is to allow people to say goodbye, to share their grief, and to remember the person who has died by sharing stories and memories of their life. So long as you are meeting that goal, the trappings are less important.
It can be useful to work with a funeral home or funeral services provider to arrange the funeral; those folks are experts, and you generally get what you pay for. If the deceased was religious, their place of worship and religious leader are also good to check in with, as they may have particular rites or services that they know the deceased preferred. Both funeral homes and religious institutions are well-versed in the procedures and protocols of laying someone to rest, and consequently you can offload a lot of that responsibility and stress.
Once you have arranged the details of the funeral, communicate them. Again, typically you would do this through the obituary, but putting notices in relevant newsletters, online, and simply emailing or calling people are all good ideas for pushing the details out into the world.
Get the Death Certificate
Ok, now we’re getting into legal territory. It seems odd to say, but typically you will bury a person before you are able to get the state to legally recognize their death. That’s because all legal recognition of death requires a death certificate, and death certificates take time to process — often weeks. Your hospital, doctor, coroner, or funeral home can help put you on track to get one of these and you really need one, so don’t lose it.
Death certificates are absolutely vital legal documents that state that a person has legally died. You need the death certificate to do literally anything related to a deceased person’s estate. Selling property or assets, accessing accounts or records, closing out bills or debts — all of these things will likely require that you are able to present a death certificate on demand.
Assign an Executor
Once you have a death certificate, you can assign an executor. An executor is the person legally charged with closing out a deceased person’s estate — their remaining worldly affairs, in other words. They are responsible for carrying out the details of the deceased’s will, representing the estate in court, and disposing of property. They are typically the only person who is legally authorized to do these things.
In most cases, a person’s will identifies who they would like to be their executor. To assign the executor you will need the deceased’s will and a death certificate, and you’ll need to make a trip to the county courthouse. Unless the executor doesn’t want the job, whoever gets tapped in the will as the executor will have the responsibility for the deceased person’s estate.
Assuming you’re the person who’s done everything else on this list, it’s pretty good odds that the executor is going to be you. If it’s not you, congratulations, you have dodged about six months’ to a year or more worth of work.
Pro tip: get a will and assign an executor who you trust before you die. If you wait until afterward, things get sticky very quickly in probate court.
Determine the Distribution of Assets
The executor carries out the deceased person’s will, distributing their assets as specified by the will. In most cases this means transferring money, property, or both to one or more people or organizations. The death certificate gets a lot of play in this step, as the executor will use it every time they need to transfer a license, deed, or the contents of a bank account to someone else.
Not infrequently, the executor will find something that the deceased didn’t clearly specify. This gets more likely the more assets the deceased had, and the more complex they made their will. “The boy gets it all” isn’t that hard to parse, but a will that specifies specific payments or allotments to specific people or groups can get very complex very quickly, and it’s possible for assets to get lost in the shuffle. In such cases, it is typically up to the executor to decide how things go and who gets what.
This can make the executor a very unpopular person, which is why families tend to have fights after someone dies.
In the same vein, if the deceased owned a business it is the executor’s job to ensure that their wishes with respect to their business are carried out. This will usually involve accountants and lawyers.
In fact, this is the step of the post-death experience where lawyers are most likely to be called in for all sorts of things. Families arguing over the language of a will is a time-honored tradition, as is people suing each other for a piece of their deceased relative’s pie.
Pro tip: try not to be those people. If it is humanly possible to do so, work out the distribution of the deceased person’s stuff with the minimum of fuss, so that future family gatherings remain happy occasions.
Dispose of Non-Asset Belongings
This is the one of the hardest parts of the whole thing: every person who dies owns a certain amount of stuff that instantly becomes junk on the moment of their death. Knickknacks, mementos, old correspondence, birthday cards, old clothes — all the bric-a-brac that piles up in life, but holds no monetary value or sentimental value to others.
The average house is filled to the absolute brim with this stuff, and the longer someone has lived there, the more stuff there is. And the heartbreaking part is that a lot of it becomes trash.
It was incredibly difficult to go through my Dad’s things when he passed, knowing that we did not have room for most of them, knowing that so much of what he had in his house had meaning to him but none for us. This set up a hideous sense of guilt whenever we threw something out, and the saddest part is that you have to throw things out. You can’t become a hoarder just because you don’t want to lose the birthday cards your Dad collected over fifty years, that you never knew existed before but now can barely stand to let go. This will happen, if you liked the deceased at all.
You will encounter this repeated experience of smelling a person’s scent while going through their things, seeing their face in pictures, and finding all sorts of objects and documents that show beyond a shade of a doubt that this was a person who died. Someone who lived and loved and cherished things, someone who left a hole in the world because now there isn’t anyone left in the universe who knows why that weird picture with the eyeball-looking thing was hanging on the wall.
It is devastating. It is heartbreaking.
It is inevitable. You have to find a way to deal with it, and this is the step of the post-death experience where you will very likely have a breakdown. If at all possible, my advice is to avoid going through a loved ones’ belongings by yourself. Have other people around to help shoulder the emotional load, in addition to all the sheer physical work that will be involved in this step.
This is also the step where most people will start to hear the term “estate sale” used a lot. You have to get rid of a bunch of stuff that isn’t trash, but also isn’t really a financial or property asset. Kitchen appliances, furniture, art, collectible items, toys, personal electronics — basically everything in a house that isn’t cash or the house.
Pro tip: assuming you are the executor, contact an estate sale professional to help with this, if you’ve got to deal with more stuff than will fit in an average-sized apartment. Houses hold a LOT of stuff. It’s what they’re for. An estate sale professional or auctioneer is well versed in cleaning out houses and helping you recoup at least some monetary value from things you can’t keep.
Anything you can’t sell, you may be able to donate. Bear in mind that the beneficiaries of the will may be able to claim donated items as charitable giving on their tax returns, which may be very beneficial to them.
Close Out the Estate
This is the final step. All the stuff has been sold, given away, donated, or disposed of. Vehicles and other financial assets have been claimed or sold. Houses and property have been claimed or sold. Everything is neat, tidy, and… done. The deceased lives on in memories and media, but their things no longer belong to their estate. It’s time to move on.
At this point the executor may declare the estate closed, presenting evidence as appropriate to the county clerk. They are legally relieved of the burden of being an executor in this step.
And that’s… it.
Death is like this. In this day and age when most of us can expect to be ill for a long time before dying, there’s a lot of drama before a person’s death, a lot of pain immediately after a person’s death, and a huge job of work to do in the months that follow. It can feel hollow when all that work is done. The family has spent months at this point focusing on the deceased, and now they (have to? get to?) stop. Life goes on.
This is yet another point in the process where a lot of people experience an emotional breakdown, because there’s nothing left to do. And because there’s nothing left to do, that means that their loved one really is dead, really is gone, really is not coming back, and now they have to live with that.
I was not ok for the year after my Dad’s death. I’m not ok writing this article. This stuff is hard. And while they say that time heals all wounds, it’s more appropriate to say that it just scabs them over. You pick at the scab just a little bit, and it’s all still there, and it all still hurts.
If we are lucky enough to live long enough, we will all deal with this. If not with our parents, then with our lovers, spouses, friends, relatives, maybe even children. Death is a part of life. We must prepare for it, because it is always prepared for us. We must accept that it’s ok that it will hurt, because if it didn’t that means that the person we lost wasn’t valuable, wasn’t loved, wasn’t real to us in any meaningful way. The best people leave the biggest holes in the lives of those who survive them, and that’s the way it is.
So, reach out to those you love and make sure they know you love them. Cherish every good moment. Smell every rose you can. We’re here for a good time, folks, not a long time, and these are the things we have to do in a material world when someone dies.
¹According to the National Funeral Directors Association: https://nfda.org/news/statistics
