Questions people ask us

Yes — and here's what we mean by that, in plain words. The contents of your vault are stored encrypted, which means they're kept as scrambled data that would be useless to a thief. Your password is the only way in day to day - the one exception is the emergency-access process you set up yourself, described below. And we deliberately designed Sparrowkeep to hold locations and institutions rather than passwords or account numbers, so even the worst case isn't catastrophic. We won't claim any system is unbreakable — nobody honest can. But we've made careful choices about what we store and how.

Our advice: no, and the vault is designed so you don't need to. Write down where things are — "checking and savings at First National, retirement at Fidelity" — not the credentials to get in. When you die, your family doesn't actually need your passwords. They need to know which institutions to contact. Banks and insurers have proper legal processes for families and executors, and using those processes is safer for everyone. A vault full of locations helps your family completely and is worth almost nothing to a criminal.

An honest question that deserves an honest answer. Sparrowkeep is run by our founder as a small, sustainable business — $179 from each customer, low costs, no investors pushing for an exit. But if we ever did close, we would give every customer clear notice and plenty of time to export everything. And you don't have to wait for that day: you can download your full vault as a PDF or spreadsheet file anytime, and print a paper copy today. Your information is never trapped here.

Through your keyholders. When you set up your vault, you name one to five trusted people. When the time comes, any one of them requests emergency access. A waiting period begins — fourteen days unless you've chosen otherwise — and you're notified by email in case the request is a mistake. After the waiting period, the vault opens to that keyholder. No lawyer required, no court order, no guessing your password.

You can reset it by email, like most websites — click "Forgot password" on the sign-in page and follow the link we send you. If you get stuck, call us and a real person will walk you through it. This is also a good reason to keep a printed copy of your vault at home.

No, and it's important to be clear about that. A will is a legal document that says who inherits what, and it has legal force in court. Sparrowkeep is a map, not a legal document — it tells your family where your will is, where your accounts are held, and who to call. You need both. If you don't have a will yet, there are good online will services that can help, and we're happy to point you to one. Your vault then makes sure your family can actually find it.

A notebook is a fine start — truly. But notebooks get lost, thrown out in a move, or found too late. Spreadsheets sit on a computer nobody can unlock. Neither one prompts you with what to include, so things get missed. And neither has an answer for the hardest question: how does the right person get it at the right time, and nobody before then? Sparrowkeep guides you through what to record, keeps it encrypted, stays easy to update, and hands it to your keyholders only when it's truly needed. If you like paper, print your vault and keep both. We recommend it.

No. You pay $179 once and the vault is yours. You can sign in, update, and export for as long as you like. There is no renewal, no annual fee, and no premium tier hiding the good features.

If you decide within 30 days that Sparrowkeep isn't for you, tell us and we'll refund the full $179. You don't need to give a reason, and nobody will try to talk you out of it.

No one, by default. Not your keyholders — not until an emergency request runs its full course. Not our staff: vault contents are stored encrypted and reading them is not part of anyone's job, with one exception we'll state plainly — if you write in for help and explicitly ask us to look at something in your vault, we can, with your permission, and only at your request. Not advertisers: we never sell your personal information and we never share vault contents with anyone. The companies that help us run Sparrowkeep — our payment processor, our database host, our email service — handle data strictly on our instructions, and they're all named in our privacy policy.

Yes — that's what gifting is for. Go to sparrowkeep.com/gift, pay once, and we give you a gift code. Your parent creates their own free account and enters the code — no card needed on their side. The vault belongs to your parent from the first moment: their password, their choices, their keyholders. You can't see inside it unless they add you as a keyholder — and most parents do add the child who gave it. Then set it up together as a weekend project: you at the keyboard, your parent talking. If your parent isn't comfortable with computers, you can do all the typing; the answers are theirs.

Most people get the basics in place in one sitting — an hour or two for accounts, insurance, document locations, and key contacts. The wishes-and-letters section takes as long as you want it to; some people write for weeks, and that's fine. Your vault saves as you go, so you can stop anytime and pick up where you left off.

You're exactly who we built this for. Sparrowkeep asks one plain question at a time, in large readable type, with no jargon. If you can write an email, you can do this. If you get stuck, call our phone line and a real person calls you back — patiently, within one business day. And there's no app to install: Sparrowkeep works in the web browser you already use, on a computer, tablet, or phone.

Yes. Call our phone line and leave a message; a real person calls you back within one business day. We're a small company, so we do callbacks instead of hold music — you'll never spend an hour listening to a recording. There's also a chat assistant on the site for quick questions anytime. It's an AI — we label it honestly — and it will offer you the callback whenever a question needs a human.

Never. Not to advertisers, not to data brokers, not to "trusted partners." We show no ads inside Sparrowkeep and have no side business in data. (We do advertise Sparrowkeep itself — our marketing pages carry an ad-measurement pixel, described in our privacy policy. It never runs on your vault or account pages.) You pay $179; that's how we make money, and that's the whole arrangement. It keeps our interests exactly where they should be: with you.

The waiting period, and you. A keyholder who requests access starts a clock — fourteen days by default, and you can set it from seven to thirty. The moment a request is made, you get an email, and one click cancels it. So a keyholder gets in only if a request goes uncancelled for your entire waiting period. Usually that means you genuinely couldn't respond - but it would also happen if our emails went to spam or reached an address you no longer read, which is why keeping your account email current matters. Choose people you trust, but know the design doesn't depend on trust alone.

Not yet. Sparrowkeep works in any web browser — on your computer, your tablet, or your phone — so there's nothing to install or update. Just go to sparrowkeep.com and sign in.

No. There's nothing to pay — no renewal, no reactivation fee, nothing. The $179 was the whole price. When your keyholder gains access, they can read everything, print it, and export it. No renewal, no ransom, no fine print.