The first 48 hours: what a family needs to find

In the first two days, almost nothing that needs deciding is about money. It is about people to call, arrangements to make, and documents that unlock the administrative steps that follow.

Families who struggle in this window are rarely struggling with a complicated estate. They are struggling to find a phone number, or to work out whether there were wishes about a funeral, or which of three people was supposed to be told first.

A list of names and numbers, ordered, with a word about each. "My sister — tell her before anyone else." "My business partner — she has the keys to the office and can pause things."

It sounds almost too simple to write down. It is the item families mention most.

Wishes about a funeral, burial or cremation, music, who should speak — these are usually not in a will, and even when they are, a will is often not read until well after the decisions have been made.

Keep them somewhere reachable immediately and label them clearly. Whether they are legally binding varies and is rarely the point: what they do is spare the people you love from guessing what you would have wanted.

Identity documents, any will and the name of whoever holds the original, insurance policy details, and the deeds or tenancy agreement for where they lived. Each one is a gate: without it, a later step waits.

Note where the originals are, not just that they exist. "Original will held by the solicitor who drew it up; a copy is here" answers the question that copies alone raise.

Who feeds the cat. Where the spare key is. Which neighbour has the alarm code. Whether the car is on a lease that someone should be told about.

None of this is estate administration. All of it is what somebody has to sort out on day one while also grieving.

A perfect record nobody can find helps nobody. Tell at least two people that it exists and how to reach it, and make sure at least one of them is not in the same household as you.