Crypto Inheritance: How to Make Sure Your Family Can Access Your Crypto

Bring up wills at a family gathering and someone will say "God forbid" before you've finished the sentence. Fair enough. Nobody enjoys planning for the worst.

Crypto makes the conversation more urgent, though. A bank has your name, your BVN and a branch your family can walk into. A crypto wallet may have nothing but twelve words written down somewhere only you know. If those words are lost, nobody can get the coins back: not your family, not a lawyer, not a court.

This guide shows you how to set things up so the people you love can reach your crypto if you die or can't manage your own affairs, without handing anyone the keys today.

How crypto gets lost

It usually happens in one of three ways.

• Nobody knows it exists. There's no paper statement in the post. Your family may have your phone and still have no idea which apps hold money.
• They know, but can't get in. A recovery phrase that was never written down, a backup nobody can find, or a hardware wallet with no instructions.
• They get in, then something goes wrong. A rushed transfer on the wrong network, or a "helpful" stranger who offers to recover the funds. Grieving families are a favourite target for recovery scams.

A plan fixes all three.

First, know which kind of crypto you hold

What your family will need depends on who holds the keys. If you're not sure, our guide to custodial vs non-custodial wallets explains the difference.

Crypto in an app or exchange account

If your coins sit in an account on an app or exchange, KWIQ included, the platform holds them for you, a bit like a bank holds your naira. Your family doesn't need your password. They need to know the account exists, and then they contact the platform's support, which has its own process for this and will tell them what it needs.

What you can do now:

• List every platform you use, with the email address or phone number each account is registered to.
• Keep your account details matching your ID. If your name is written one way on the app and another on your NIN slip, sorting things out later gets harder.
• Don't leave your passwords for your family. Logging in as someone else can break a platform's rules and muddy things. The official route through support is the safer one.

Crypto in a wallet you control

If you use a wallet app where you wrote down a 12- or 24-word recovery phrase, or a hardware wallet, there's no support team to call. Whoever has the recovery phrase (also called the seed phrase) has the coins. That cuts both ways: your family must be able to find it, but nobody else should. Our guide to the seed phrase covers how to store one well.

A few practical points:

• A sealed backup. The phrase written on paper, or stamped into metal (which survives fire and flooding better), sealed in an envelope and kept in a safe at home or with a lawyer you trust.
• Split the knowledge. Your letter says where the backup is. The backup lives somewhere else. Someone who stumbles on one without the other can't do much.
• The phrase matters more than the device. A hardware wallet can break or get lost. The recovery phrase restores the wallet on a new one.
• Don't forget an extra passphrase. If you added one (sometimes called a "25th word"), your family needs it too. Without it, the phrase opens a different, empty wallet.

And never keep the phrase as a photo in your gallery, a note in your email or a message to yourself on WhatsApp.

Write an inheritance letter

This is the most useful thing in this guide, and it takes one evening. It's a letter to your trusted person that says what you have and what to do. Keep it with your important papers and tell that person where it is.

Put these in it:

1. Every platform and wallet you use, what each is for, and the email or phone number on each account.
2. Roughly what's in each. Approximate amounts are fine, since balances change. Note the coin and network, for example "USDT on TRC20".
3. Where the backups are, but not the words themselves.
4. Who to contact: each platform's official support, your lawyer if you have one, and anyone else who knows the plan. For KWIQ, that's live chat in the app or on kwiq.app, admin@kwiq.app or +2348098460000.
5. What not to do: rush, trust anyone who calls or DMs offering help, or share a recovery phrase with anybody.
6. How to turn crypto into naira if that's what the family will need. Point them to a simple guide such as how to sell crypto in Nigeria, and remind them to send a small test amount first.

Leave out passwords, PINs and the recovery phrase itself.

Here's how the opening might read:

To Ngozi. If you're reading this because I can't manage my affairs, this is what I hold in crypto and how to deal with it. I have accounts on two apps, listed below with the email I use for each. I also have one wallet I control myself. Its recovery phrase is in a sealed envelope in the place we talked about. Don't share those words with anyone, ever, including anybody who says they're from support. Take your time. Nothing here needs doing in a hurry.

Choose a trusted person and teach them a little

Your plan is only as good as the person carrying it out. Pick someone calm, honest and hard to rush. They don't need to be a crypto expert, but they should understand three things:

• crypto transfers can't be reversed, so addresses and networks must be checked;
• genuine support teams never ask for passwords, PINs or one-time codes;
• anyone promising to "recover" or "unfreeze" funds for a fee is running a scam.

If your trusted person is a parent or an older relative, our guide on explaining crypto to your parents has a gentle way in. It also helps if they set up their own account on an app you use, so the screens look familiar when the day comes.

Put it in a will

A letter says how. A will says who gets what. Ask a lawyer how to include crypto and other digital assets in your will, and who should act as your executor. Bring your list of platforms (not your passwords or phrase) to that meeting.

This guide is general information, not legal advice.

Plan for "can't", not only "die"

A long stay in hospital or a serious accident can leave school fees and rent unpaid while your money sits in apps nobody can reach. The same letter helps here too. Ask your lawyer whether you need a document that lets someone act on your behalf if you're unable to.

Keep it current

Put a reminder in your calendar for every January. Update the letter when you open an account, move to a new wallet or change where a backup is kept. Fewer accounts make a shorter, clearer list, so it's also a good moment to close the ones you no longer use.

Write the list tonight

You don't have to finish everything this week. Start by writing down every app and wallet you use, and tell one person where that page is. That one page could save your family months of searching.

If you want one place to sell crypto for naira, with 24/7 support your family can reach too, download the KWIQ app or create a free account on the web.