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by will_brown 4855 days ago
>We were creating a solution for which there was no problem.

As a lawyer I have always had a similar idea in mind for a '"mint" for assets."

I know you tried to pivot and already made the always difficult decision to shut down, but your UI looks great and please consider the following:

Let me just sell you on the market first, there are about 40 million US citizens 65+, 2.5 million US citizens die every year, and 55% die intestate (without a will). I could not find any specific number, but as a practicing attorney I can tell you it is not uncommon for those that do have a will to have multiple versions and people (typically family) fight over assets, and it can be an expensive fight.

At this point you should know where I am going, a "mint" for assets would be an unbelievably useful tool for probate lawyers and estate planners. In terms of the business just quick ideas: 1. license the software to probate attorneys, 2. cut out lawyers and be your own non-legal entity providing these estate planning services (similar to legalzoom but you have a niche on estate planning).

Feel free to email me, I am non-technical, but this is a unique occasion on HN where I might have a little knowledge to offer.

1 comments

This was exactly what I was thinking, also for insurance purposes. Another 'hook' here would be that you partner with a homeowners insurance company which can give more accurate home owners insurance rates based on what someone actually has, and it helps in making a claim. I do the cheezy thing and basically walk around with an HD video camera every couple of years and film what is on the shelves and in the drawers. If nothing else it helps refresh your memory.
We actually talked to a few insurance people and the consensus was that insurance company didn't want something like it. It's not in their interest for you to make claims. Our response from users was basically that it was valuable whenever they needed to make claims or inventory to buy insurance but otherwise wouldn't use it often. That was key for us. As a free service, we didn't see a way to monetize if users didn't come back.