Why does no one deal with emotional assets?

I was talking to a wealth management startup the other day, and they showed me an aggregation service that can harvest all of your physical, digital and emotional assets, combined with a death management service that alerts your key people to all the things they need to know to find those assets when you die.

What really struck me is the fact that you can add your emotional assets. Physical things like your house and vehicles are easy; digital assets may be more difficult, but if you can give your username and password, then it is ok; but emotional assets – what are they?

Well, they are the things you treasure – often physical assets – but that no one knows you treasure them. Making this personal, I treasure a range of things I collect from first edition books, rare comics, coins and banknotes, masks from around the world … you name it. I’m a terrible collector.

The thing is that when I die, I’ve got no idea if my children and partner will know the value of these things. It’s the reason why incredibly valuable items end up in car boot sales.

Further than this, there are things I own that are not valuable but are emotional. A good example is my mother’s collection of rare ornaments called “fairings”. She collected many during her years and now I have them. What are they? Small collectible porcelain ornaments that used to be given out as prizes at Victorian fairs. Mother loved them so much because her mother did, and she ended up with a sizeable collection of them which, after her passing, has given to me.

The thing is that I know the meaning of these things, but will my family if I died tomorrow? And this is the critical question: do you have any way of giving your family knowledge of all of your assets and what they mean if you died tomorrow?

I doubt many people do.

So, it makes you wonder why there hasn’t been a service like this before, especially as I was blogging about it ten years ago.

If you disappear tomorrow, how will your family find your usernames and passwords? How will they know what is of value and what is not? And will they know what is of value to you versus value in dollars and euros?

That last point is a critical one, as it is not necessarily the value at auction that counts. It is the value in the heart that counts.

This is why the TV show The Repair Shop brings tears to the eye on regular occasion. People bring in some old, broken item that looks like rubbish and then you hear the back story: a mother’s retirement clock from 1962 that tells a story of women’s rights in Ireland; a daughter’s harp handmade by her father; a potter’s wheel whose daughter wanted restored so that she could make her own pots on their dad’s prized possession … the list is endless.

Quite clearly, physical assets are easy to value as you can touch and feel them – a house, a car,  a jewel; digital assets can also be easily valued if you can find them, by which you need a username and password or other credentials; but emotional assets are undervalued and ignored. Something that means everything to you – a wedding ring of your father; a piece of art by your mother; a handwritten book written by your dead sister; a violin played by your brother who has passed … all of the things you see on the The Repair Shop – are often uncatalogued, unvalued and unknown.

Emotional assets are a big area to explore in the future, and I thank Teleskop for demonstrating their ideas to include these emotional assets in the portfolio of investments and assets of users. Well done you!

 

Full disclosure: Teleskop did not pay me to write this. I was just inspired after talking to them!