Who Gets What? A Fair and Fast Way to Divide a Household's Belongings

We all accumulate a lifetime of belongings. But before decisions can be made on what to keep, sell, or let go of, the harder questions need to be addressed like, what's actually here, what's it worth, and who gets it? That's the part of estate settlement that can cause the most family friction, especially when family members live in different states, everyone has a different attachment to the same lamp, and no one wants to be the one who brings up money.

The webinar, Who Gets What? A Fair and Fast Way to Divide a Household's Belongings, kicks off our Fall series with practical ways to catalog what's in a home, get a rough sense of what things are worth, and divide belongings fairly among family members, without a single spreadsheet, group text, or awkward negotiation. Sarah, who has helped families through this process for years (and later founded Nemu, a tool that automates parts of the process), will walk through the real bottlenecks families hit during life transitions or estate settlement, and show how a structured, friendly process can turn weeks of back-and-forth into a few clear steps everyone can trust.  

What you'll learn

• Why "who gets what" is usually the part of estate settlement that causes the most family conflict, and why it's a process problem, not a people problem
• A simple way to build a shared household inventory quickly
• How price estimates help families make informed decisions about what to keep, sell, or donate
• A private-preference method that lets everyone say what they want before the family discusses it out loud
• What to do with what's left: realistic options for selling, donating, or getting help from an appraiser for items no one claims

Who this is for

Anyone managing the division of belongings among more than one person: empty nesters, adult children helping aging parents, executors settling an estate, or couples navigating divorce.

Sarah Powers is the founder and CEO of Nemu, an home inventory app for families. Sarah started Nemu after watching her own mother navigate the emotional and logistical weight of settling her grandparents' estate, and she has been building tools to make that process easier for other families ever since. Today, Nemu is designed for any household with 'stuff,' helping families organize, value, fairly divide, and protect their personal property. Sarah holds an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and lives in Seattle with her husband and their two young children.