Why we built Sunset
We built Sunset after personally facing the estate settlement process.
How it started
For ten years, Kaela Worthen and I have been close friends. Sunset is the second company we have built together. The first was the long apprenticeship of figuring out how we collaborate. This one is the company we were always meant to build.
I am a practicing attorney. For most of my career I helped clients navigate the financial side of their lives, from real estate transactions to estate planning to the paperwork that comes when something goes wrong. A lot of what I did, day after day, was act as a translator between families and the financial institutions that hold their money.
Kaela led the payments and fintech product at Podium, where she built systems that moved billions of dollars through American small businesses. She knows what it takes to make money move safely, accurately, and at scale.
We did not set out to start an estate settlement company. We set out to fix something we kept watching happen to people we love.
Peace of Mind
"Nothing happened unless I said so. Knowing my dad’s retirement money was safe until I was ready gave me peace of mind."
Surprising Finds
"I found all of my grandma’s accounts in just a couple days, including one we didn’t even know about. I cried when I realized how much work it was going to take, but Sunset made it quick and easy."
Clear Next Steps
"Clear steps, no stress. I always knew what came next, even for life insurance and car titles."
Made It Doable
"Made something complicated, like probate papers, feel doable and not so scary."
Felt Protected
"I felt safe the whole time. They kept an eye on things for fraud so I could focus on selling the house and being with my kids."
Stress Free
"Simple and stress free from start to finish. Even the life insurance claim."
Guided the Whole Way
"They made a hard process simple and stress free. It felt like they were walking me through step by step."
Less Scary
"They made the hard parts less scary. I just answered a few questions and felt guided."
Easy Process
"Step by step made it easy to get things done without feeling buried."
Felt Cared For
"I felt cared for the whole way. Even when we had to handle my dad’s small business account."
Step by Step
"I did things when I had time. First the bank account, then the car title a few weeks later. It felt manageable."
The day my father-in-law died
When my father-in-law passed away, Sunset was barely an idea. I was a son-in-law with a law degree who happened to know how to find financial accounts.
The day after his death, I sat down with my mother-in-law and gave her a complete picture of his debts, his accounts, and what she would need to do next. It took me hours. It would have taken her months.
That moment changed me. Not the work itself, which was familiar from years of practice. What changed me was watching her shoulders drop. She had been holding a fear she could not name, the fear of unknown bills arriving, of accounts she did not know about, of being blindsided in the middle of her grief. Giving her clarity gave her something she did not know she needed. It gave her permission to grieve.
I kept thinking about every other family that did not have a lawyer in the room.
Kaela was living the same story
Around the same time, Kaela was sitting across the kitchen table from her husband, helping him itemize his parents' assets. She was building spreadsheets, calling banks, decoding statements, doing the same work I had just done, from the other side of the table.
When we compared notes, we realized we were both solving the same problem with two completely different sets of expertise. I knew the legal and financial mechanics. She knew how to turn messy financial workflows into software that runs reliably at scale.
That was the conversation. Lawyer meets fintech expert. Two people who had personally lived this, who happened to have exactly the right skills to fix it, who had already proven they could build a company together.
The aha moment
The real aha moment came a few weeks later, when I was deep into helping my mother-in-law discover and consolidate the rest of her assets.
I realized that the work I was doing for her, hour after hour, was the same work being done badly by millions of families every year. Forms designed for the institutions, not for the families. Phone calls that go nowhere. Letters of testamentary photocopied so many times the seal disappears. Banks that take months to release funds because no one in the building knows what to do.
It hit us at the same time. Kaela and I could build the thing we wished had existed. A platform that finds every account, files every form, and shepherds the assets home, so families never have to do this work alone.
That was the day Sunset stopped being an idea and started being a company.
Why Sunset is free
There was a second breakthrough, and it took us almost a year to find.
When we started talking to families and looking at the existing market, we noticed something that made us angry. Other companies in this space were charging grieving families thousands of dollars in flat fees. Some were taking a percentage of the estate's interest as it sat in their accounts. Families in the worst moments of their lives were being asked to write checks to clean up the financial lives of people they had just lost.
We refused to build that company.
It took us months to find the right model. We finally landed here: when Sunset helps a family discover, close, and transfer accounts, the receiving banks pay us a referral fee on the assets that move. We get paid by the institutions that want the business, not by the families who are grieving.
That means Sunset is completely free for the families we serve. No flat fees. No percentage of the estate. No upsells. Just help, at the moment families need it most.
The day we figured out that model was the day that Sunset became Sunset, not just for us but for our users.
What we are building
Our long-term vision is simple to say and hard to do. We want to do for estate settlement what TurboTax did for taxes.
Today, every estate in America is settled by hand. Forms are typed and retyped. Account balances are written in pen on legal pads. Probate courts run on procedures from the nineteenth century. Families pay attorneys to do work that should take software seconds.
The entire process should be automated, end to end. Asset discovery. Creditor notification. Account closures and transfers. Tax filings. Court submissions. Distributions to heirs. All of it, handled with care, finished in weeks instead of years.
We are not there yet. But every week we get closer. Every family we help, every attorney and fiduciary who joins us, every bank we partner with, every form we automate gets us closer to the day when no American family has to learn estate settlement the hard way.
A note from us
To the families who use Sunset, and to the ones who will:
We know how you found us. Someone you love just died. You are sitting at a kitchen table or in a parked car, looking at a list of accounts and statements and passwords and not knowing where to start. You are tired. You are sad. You are trying to be strong for someone else.
We have sat where you are sitting. That is why we built this.
You deserve better than what the system gives you right now. You deserve to grieve without a second job. You deserve clarity on the day after, not the year after. You deserve a partner that works for you, not against you, and that does not send you a bill in the middle of the worst month of your life.
We will not get everything right. But we promise to work hard on your behalf, every day, because you deserve better. And because we know, from our own families, what better looks like.
Here with you,
Stephen Walter and Kaela Worthen
Sunset Co-founders
Data sources & process
How we find accounts and assets
Sunset is SOC 2 Type II certified with annual independent audits, third-party penetration testing, and encrypted API connections.
Government records
Approved API partner of the IRS and Social Security Administration. We retrieve tax filings, 1099s, W-2s, and benefit records to identify where the deceased held accounts and earned income.
Banking databases
Approved API partner of national banking networks and LexisNexis, covering checking, savings, CDs, and money market accounts at 2,500+ financial institutions nationwide.
Credit bureaus
Approved API partner of Equifax, Experian, and TransUnion. We pull full credit history to identify creditor relationships, outstanding debts, loans, and institutional connections.
Frequently asked questions
What security measures does Sunset have?
Sunset is SOC 2 Type II certified and built with security and privacy at the center of how we handle sensitive estate information.
We use robust identity and fraud-prevention measures to verify deceased individuals and beneficiaries, and we conduct background checks on our employees. We continuously monitor and improve our security practices to protect the financial information, documents, and personal data entrusted to us.
Who can use Sunset?
Sunset can be used by family members, executors, administrators, and personal representatives responsible for settling a deceased person's estate.
Sunset supports asset discovery and probate across all 50 states and every U.S. county, helping you manage the estate regardless of where your loved one lived or where the estate is being settled.
How can I pay estate expenses?
Once you have an estate bank account, you can use it to pay legitimate expenses related to settling your loved one's estate.
If you paid estate expenses out of your own pocket before the estate account was established, you may also be able to reimburse yourself from the estate, provided the expenses are legitimate and properly documented.
Can you settle an estate without a lawyer?
Yes. In many cases, you can settle an estate without hiring a lawyer. Sunset helps families handle the process themselves by finding assets, preparing probate documents, closing financial accounts, establishing an estate bank account, and collecting the estate's assets.
How much does Sunset cost?
Sunset Free is completely free for families settling an estate. There are no upfront fees, subscriptions, or deductions from the inheritance. Families get access to asset discovery, probate document generation, account closure, asset transfers, and estate bank account setup at no cost.
Sunset Pro is our paid product for probate attorneys, licensed fiduciaries, trustees, and aftercare specialists. It starts at $500 per asset search, with subscription plans available for solo practitioners, small firms, and large firms.
Sunset's family product is funded through our bank partnership. The estate does not pay Sunset, and all assets ultimately go to the estate's beneficiaries and heirs.
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