To inventory personal property after a death, walk the home one room at a time, photograph anything of real value, and write a short list with a description and an approximate value for each item. Do this before anything leaves the house, and before anyone takes anything home. Most estates need the list for a court filing, an insurance claim, or both, and the families who make it early are the ones who avoid an argument about it later.

It is not a fun task. Almost nobody wants to photograph their mother's jewelry two weeks after the funeral. But it is one of the few jobs in an estate that gets harder every day you wait, because houses empty out quietly and memory is not evidence.

Why the list matters more than it looks

Three reasons, and any one of them is enough.

A court may require it. In many states the personal representative has to file an inventory of estate assets, sometimes within 60 or 90 days of appointment. Household goods usually get reported as a single line with a total value, but you cannot produce that total without having looked.

Insurance needs it. If a pipe bursts, a fire starts, or something is stolen out of an empty house, the claim depends on proof the item existed. Photographs with dates on them are the proof.

It settles disputes before they start. Most family conflict after a death is not about money. It is about a watch, a ring, a set of tools, or a painting that two people remember being promised. A list made in the first weeks, before anything moves, is the cheapest insurance policy there is against that fight.

What counts as personal property

Personal property is the movable, tangible things a person owned. It is separate from real estate, and separate from financial accounts.

Include jewelry and watches, art and prints, collections of any kind, antiques, firearms, musical instruments, tools and shop equipment, cameras, computers and phones, rugs, china and silver, furniture worth naming, sports and outdoor equipment, lawn and farm equipment, cash found in the house, and the contents of any safe or safe deposit box.

Vehicles, boats, trailers, and campers are personal property too, but they have titles, so they get handled through a title transfer instead of a household goods list. Note them and move on.

Skip the ordinary. Nobody needs a line item for the toaster, the towels, or a bookshelf from a big box store. A single entry reading "kitchen contents, ordinary household goods" is a normal and acceptable way to handle most of a house.

Before you start, one thing not to do

Do not give anything away, sell anything, or divide items among family yet.

This is the single most common mistake, and it is made with good intentions. A relative asks for a keepsake. Someone offers to clear out the garage. A neighbor wants to buy the truck. It all feels harmless, and none of it is, until the estate has legal authority and you know whether the will says something different.

Once an item leaves the house, getting it back is a conversation nobody wants to have. If the estate turns out to owe money, distributing property early can also put the personal representative personally on the hook. Wait until you have letters from the court or have confirmed the estate qualifies for a simplified process in your state.

The exception most states allow is ordinary preservation. Feeding the pets, securing the house, changing locks, and turning off a leaking valve are fine. Handing out the silver is not.

The room by room walkthrough

Print this or keep it open on your phone. Do one room per session if that is all you have in you.

Entry, living room, and family room. Art, mirrors, rugs, electronics, media collections, clocks, decorative items of real value, furniture worth naming.

Kitchen and dining room. China, crystal, silver and flatware sets, serving pieces, small appliances of real value, dining furniture.

Bedrooms. Jewelry, watches, furs, designer clothing and handbags, bedroom furniture, anything in a nightstand or dresser drawer. Check under mattresses and inside shoe boxes, because people hide cash and documents there.

Home office or den. Computers, tablets, cameras, books of value, collections, a safe, filing cabinets, anything with account statements in it.

Basement, attic, and closets. Stored collections, holiday decorations of value, luggage, sports equipment, old furniture, boxes nobody has opened in years.

Garage and shed. Tools, power equipment, lawn and garden machinery, bicycles, ladders, workbenches, automotive parts, fuel and chemicals.

Outdoors. Vehicles, boat, trailer, camper, patio furniture, grill, generator, outbuildings and their contents.

Safes and safe deposit boxes. Record the contents but photograph them separately, and if you do not have legal authority yet, ask the bank what it needs before opening a box. Some states seal a box until the court says otherwise.

How much detail to record

Keep it light. A useful entry has four things: what it is, where it was, a rough value, and a photo.

For most items, one photo and one line is plenty. "Gold pocket watch, engraved, bedroom dresser, approx $400." For a collection, photograph the whole thing and count the pieces. For anything you think might be worth more than about a thousand dollars, take several photos including any maker's marks, serial numbers, signatures, or hallmarks.

Your phone already timestamps photos and records where they were taken. That metadata is part of what makes the record credible, so do not screenshot the photos or send them through an app that strips it. Back the whole folder up somewhere off the phone the same day.

A spreadsheet is ideal, but a notes app works. The list existing matters more than the format.

Find the paperwork while you are in there

You are already opening drawers, so look for the documents at the same time. They matter more than most of the objects.

Look for the will and any trust documents, the deed to the house, vehicle titles, insurance policies including life and long term care, recent account statements, tax returns from the last few years, military discharge papers, marriage and divorce records, and any safe deposit box key. A small unlabeled key taped inside a drawer is almost always a safe deposit box.

Statements and policy notices are also how families most often discover an account nobody knew existed, which is why the mail is worth going through carefully in the same pass.

When to bring in an appraiser

Most households do not need one. Consider a professional appraisal when an item is likely worth several thousand dollars, when heirs disagree about what something is worth, when the estate is large enough to owe federal estate tax, or when a court or insurer asks for a formal valuation.

For everything else, a reasonable estimate is acceptable. Courts expect fair market value, meaning what the item would sell for now in its current condition, not what it cost new and not what it would cost to replace. Used furniture is worth far less than people expect. Jewelry is usually worth less than its insurance appraisal.

What happens to the list afterward

The inventory feeds the estate accounting, which is the record of what came in, what went out, and what was distributed. If you are the personal representative, that accounting is how you show the court and the heirs that you handled things properly.

It also becomes the working document for distribution. Once you have authority and you know what the will says, the list is what you and the family actually divide from, instead of dividing from memory.

Frequently asked questions

Do I have to list every single item in the house? No. Group ordinary household goods into a single line with one total. Itemize anything valuable, anything specifically mentioned in the will, and anything more than one person wants.

Who is supposed to make the inventory? The executor or personal representative named in the will, or the administrator appointed by the court if there is no will. In practice a family member often does the walkthrough and the representative signs off.

Can I throw away obvious junk? Use judgment. Spoiled food and genuine trash can go. Anything you are unsure about should stay until the estate is further along, especially paper.

What if someone already took something? Write down what it was, who has it, and when it left. Most of the time it gets returned or counted against that person's share without much drama, and a contemporaneous note is what makes that possible.

How long does this take? A modest home is usually a few hours spread across two or three sessions. A house someone lived in for forty years can take a full weekend, sometimes more.

Where Sunset fits

Sunset handles the financial side of an estate, which is the part the inventory does not cover. We search thousands of banks, brokerages, insurers, and public records for accounts and assets belonging to the person who died, prepare the county specific probate paperwork, open an FDIC insured estate account, and notify each institution so the money reaches the heirs. We have helped more than 10,000 families, and it is free to use.

The belongings in the house are yours to sort through. The accounts, the paperwork, and the phone calls are ours.