Florida Probate for Digital and Financial Accounts: A Practical Guide

Florida probate for digital and financial accounts is the court-supervised process of identifying, gaining legal authority over, and distributing a deceased person’s bank accounts, brokerage holdings, cryptocurrency, email, and other online assets. A personal representative appointed by a Florida circuit court derives that authority from Letters of Administration, and access to digital records is governed primarily by the Florida Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act (Chapter 740, Florida Statutes). Without the right court papers and the right requests, banks and tech platforms will refuse to release anything.

I have watched too many families assume that knowing a password is the same thing as having the legal right to use an account. It is not. In Florida, a username and PIN scrawled on a sticky note does not make you the lawful custodian of someone’s estate. What follows is how this actually works, the statutes that govern it, and the traps that catch even well-meaning relatives.

What counts as a “digital asset” in a Florida estate?

Florida law draws a useful distinction. A digital asset is the electronic record itself: the content of an email account, the photos in cloud storage, a social media profile, a domain name, loyalty points, or the ledger entry representing cryptocurrency. A financial account is more familiar territory: checking and savings accounts, certificates of deposit, brokerage and retirement accounts, and the increasingly common hybrid of fintech apps that hold cash and crypto in the same place.

The line between the two has blurred. A single Coinbase or PayPal account can hold spendable money, an investment position, and a transaction history that is itself evidence. That is why probate of online accounts now routinely sits at the intersection of two bodies of law: the rules for collecting and distributing money, and the rules for accessing electronic communications.

• Pure financial: bank accounts, CDs, brokerage and IRA accounts, annuities, business accounts.
• Pure digital: email, cloud photos, social media, gaming accounts, blogs, domain names.
• Hybrid: cryptocurrency wallets and exchanges, PayPal, Venmo, Cash App, rewards and airline-mile programs with cash value.

Why the category matters

Categories drive procedure. Money flows to heirs after creditors are paid. A Facebook account, by contrast, may have no monetary value at all but enormous sentimental weight, and the federal Stored Communications Act restricts who can read its contents. Treating every login the same way is the fastest route to a denied request and a frustrated family.

The governing law: RUFADAA and Chapter 740

Florida adopted the Revised Uniform Fiduciary Access to Digital Assets Act, codified at Chapter 740, Florida Statutes. The statute establishes a tiered order of authority, and understanding that hierarchy is the whole game.

1. The online tool. If a platform offers a built-in directive—Google’s Inactive Account Manager or Facebook’s Legacy Contact, for example—and the decedent used it, that choice controls. Under section 740.04, a properly used online tool overrides even the will.
2. The estate planning documents. If there is no online tool, instructions in a will, trust, or power of attorney govern. This is why a well-drafted estate plan now includes an explicit digital-asset clause.
3. The terms-of-service agreement. If neither of the above speaks to the question, the platform’s own contract controls—and many default to denying access entirely.

The practical lesson: section 740.04 means a five-minute setting buried in a Google account can defeat a meticulously drafted will. I always ask clients whether they have configured these tools, because the answer changes our strategy before a single court form is filed.

Catalog versus content

RUFADAA also splits access into two levels. A personal representative is generally entitled to the catalog of electronic communications—the metadata: who emailed whom and when—which is often enough to locate accounts and assets. Access to the content of those communications is harder and frequently requires that the decedent consented, or a specific court order. For most estates, the catalog is what unlocks the hunt for hidden financial accounts; you rarely need to read the emails themselves.

Getting the authority: Letters of Administration first

Nothing happens until a Florida circuit court issues Letters of Administration appointing a personal representative. Formal administration under Chapter 733 is the usual path for estates of any real size. For smaller estates, Florida offers summary administration (available when the probate estate, less exempt property, does not exceed $75,000, or when the decedent has been dead more than two years) and the streamlined disposition without administration for very limited assets.

Banks and brokerages will demand certified Letters before they move a dollar. Tech platforms will demand them too, usually along with a death certificate and a sworn request that tracks the language of Chapter 740. Skipping the appointment step and simply logging in with the decedent’s credentials can expose you to liability under both the federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act and Florida’s own computer-crimes statutes. Do not do it.

If you are weighing whether your situation needs full administration, a focused consultation about will save you weeks of guesswork. The right procedure depends on asset size, creditor exposure, and whether the estate holds digital property that platforms will fight over.

How financial accounts move through probate

Most pure financial accounts follow a predictable arc. The personal representative collects them as estate assets, uses them to satisfy the costs of administration and valid creditor claims, and distributes the remainder to beneficiaries under the will or, absent a will, under Florida’s intestacy statutes in Chapter 732.

Two shortcuts bypass probate entirely and are worth checking first:

• Payable-on-death (POD) and transfer-on-death (TOD) designations. A bank or brokerage account with a named beneficiary passes directly to that person and never enters the probate estate.
• Joint accounts with right of survivorship. These vest in the surviving owner by operation of law.

The recurring problem is mismatched intent. A father updates his will to split everything equally, then forgets that one bank account names a single child as POD beneficiary. That account ignores the will. These conflicts are among the , and they surface constantly with accounts that were opened decades apart under different assumptions.

Cryptocurrency and the access problem

Crypto deserves its own warning. With a self-custodied wallet, the asset is the private key. If no one can find the seed phrase, the value is gone—permanently, with no bank to call and no court order that can conjure it back. I have seen six-figure holdings evaporate simply because the decedent never told anyone where the recovery phrase lived.

Assets held on an exchange like Coinbase or Kraken are more recoverable, because the exchange is a custodian that will respond to Letters of Administration and a proper Chapter 740 request. But valuation is its own headache: crypto can swing wildly between the date of death and the date of distribution, which matters for both the estate inventory and any tax reporting.

Practical steps for digital and crypto assets

1. Inventory devices and password managers immediately; data can be lost to inactivity timers.
2. Locate any seed phrases or hardware wallets and secure them.
3. Send platform requests citing Chapter 740, with certified Letters and a death certificate attached.
4. Document date-of-death values for volatile assets like cryptocurrency.
5. Preserve the account catalog before requesting closure, in case it reveals other holdings.

When access turns contested: from guardianship to probate

This is where digital accounts get genuinely difficult. Many of our matters begin not at death but during a guardianship, when an incapacitated person’s online finances were already under a guardian’s control. The transition from a living person’s guardianship to a deceased person’s probate is a fault line where disputes erupt.

Imagine a guardian who managed a ward’s brokerage and crypto accounts for years. When the ward dies, the guardian’s authority ends and the personal representative’s begins—but the passwords, the device access, and the institutional relationships do not transfer cleanly. If different family members held those two roles, expect friction. We frequently litigate questions about whether the former guardian properly accounted for digital assets, whether funds moved appropriately in the final months, and who now controls the seed phrase.

Contested transitions like these reward early, disciplined documentation. The personal representative should demand a full accounting of all financial and digital accounts as they stood at the moment guardianship ended. Gaps in that record are where allegations of misappropriation take root.

Out-of-state coordination and larger estates

Florida snowbirds rarely keep their lives in one state. A decedent may have a Florida homestead, a New York brokerage account, and a co-op back in Manhattan—which can require ancillary administration in another jurisdiction. When New York assets are in play, coordinating the Florida estate with counsel handling prevents duplicated effort and conflicting filings. Digital accounts complicate this further, because a single cloud login may touch property administered in two different states.

For families who want to avoid putting their heirs through any of this, the cure is upstream. A thoughtfully drafted will with an express digital-asset provision, paired with configured online tools, removes most of the friction described above. You can also reach our office through our contact page to discuss whether your current plan addresses online accounts at all—most plans drafted before 2016 do not.

The bottom line

Florida probate for digital and financial accounts is governed by a clear but unforgiving framework. Letters of Administration give you standing; Chapter 740 and its online-tool hierarchy decide who actually gets access; and the difference between a payable-on-death designation and a probate asset can quietly rewrite who inherits what. Move methodically, preserve records before timers erase them, and never improvise with someone else’s credentials. The estates that resolve cleanly are the ones where the personal representative understood the rules before logging in.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I just use my deceased relative's passwords to access their accounts?

No. Knowing a password does not grant legal authority. In Florida you need Letters of Administration from a circuit court, and access to digital records is governed by Chapter 740 (RUFADAA). Logging in with the decedent’s credentials can expose you to liability under federal and Florida computer-crime laws, even when you are next of kin.

Do bank accounts with a named beneficiary go through Florida probate?

Generally no. Accounts with a valid payable-on-death (POD) or transfer-on-death (TOD) designation, and joint accounts with right of survivorship, pass directly to the named person or surviving owner and bypass the probate estate. Conflicts arise when these designations contradict the will, because the beneficiary designation usually controls the account.

What happens to cryptocurrency if no one can find the private key?

For self-custodied wallets, if the seed phrase or private key cannot be located, the cryptocurrency is effectively lost forever, with no institution able to recover it. Crypto held on an exchange like Coinbase is more recoverable, because the exchange will respond to Letters of Administration and a proper Chapter 740 request, though date-of-death valuation still requires care.

Does a will control access to digital accounts in Florida?

Only if the decedent did not use a platform’s online tool. Under section 740.04, Florida Statutes, an online tool such as Google’s Inactive Account Manager or Facebook’s Legacy Contact overrides the will. If no online tool was used, instructions in the will, trust, or power of attorney govern; if neither exists, the platform’s terms of service control.

How do disputes during guardianship affect later probate of digital accounts?

When someone under guardianship dies, the guardian’s authority ends and the personal representative’s begins, but device access, passwords, and institutional relationships do not transfer automatically. If different people held those roles, disputes often arise over the final accounting of financial and digital assets. The personal representative should demand a complete accounting as of the moment guardianship ended.