How to find out if a deceased parent had life insurance

When a parent dies, you have to grieve and you have to manage paperwork at the same time. One of the hardest pieces of that paperwork is figuring out whether a life insurance policy exists — and if so, where, with which carrier, and for how much.

More than one billion dollars in life insurance benefits sit unclaimed every year in the United States. Most of it is unclaimed for one reason: the family did not know the policy existed. Here is how to find out, step by step.

Start at home

Before you make a single phone call, do a thorough search of your parent's home, mail, and digital accounts. Look specifically for:

• Policy documents stored with their will, in a safe, or in a filing cabinet labeled insurance, important, or personal
• Premium notices and billing statements from insurance carriers
• Bank statements showing recurring payments to an insurance company
• Tax returns — Form 1099-INT or 1099-R sometimes references a life insurance carrier
• Email inboxes for keywords like policy, premium, beneficiary, term, whole life, and the names of major carriers
• An address book or contact list that might include an agent or broker

Check with their employer

If your parent worked for a company at any point in the last ten years, contact the HR department. Group life insurance is standard at most employers, and many retirees keep group coverage in retirement. The HR department will tell you whether a policy exists and how to file a claim.

Use the NAIC Life Insurance Policy Locator

The National Association of Insurance Commissioners runs a free service that lets surviving family members search for policies across participating carriers. You submit one request with the deceased's name, Social Security number, and date of death. Participating carriers search their records. If they find a policy where you are the beneficiary or executor, they contact you directly.

The service is at eapps.naic.org/life-policy-locator. It is free. It takes about 90 days for results. Most major carriers participate, but not all — so this is a starting point, not a complete answer.

Search state unclaimed property databases

When a life insurance benefit goes unclaimed for several years, carriers are required by law to turn the money over to the state where the policyholder lived. Every state runs a free unclaimed property database. Search your parent's name in:

• The state where they lived at the time of death
• Every state they lived in for any meaningful period of their life
• MissingMoney.com, which searches multiple state databases at once

Bring a copy of the death certificate and proof of your relationship to the deceased.

Contact carriers directly

If you find any reference to a specific carrier — a letter, a statement, an old check — call that carrier's policy services department directly. You will need:

• A certified copy of the death certificate
• Your government-issued ID
• Proof of your relationship to the deceased (birth certificate, marriage certificate, court order)
• The policy number if you have it — they can usually search by name and Social Security number if you do not

Check with their financial advisor, attorney, and accountant

Any professional who managed your parent's finances likely knew about any policies they owned. Call them. Ask specifically about life insurance, annuities, and any policies held inside a trust.

Check the MIB Group

The MIB Group maintains a database of life insurance applications submitted in the last several years. For a small fee, surviving family members can request a search. If your parent applied for life insurance in the last seven years, it will likely show up — even if they did not end up buying a policy.

How long will all of this take?

Realistically, expect 60 to 120 days from the time you start searching to the time you have a complete picture. Some carriers respond in days. Others take weeks. State unclaimed property claims can take three to six months.

The lesson for your own family

There is a reason this article exists. Every family that goes through it walks away with the same thought: this should not be this hard. The single most loving thing you can do for your own children is to make sure they never have to do any of this for you.

Put every policy you own in one place. Make sure one trusted person knows where it is and how to access it. That is what EverKeep is built for — so your family never has to spend three months tracking down what you already knew.