The Incapacity Gap

Death is not the only failure mode, and not the most common one. Incapacity is more frequent and legally more awkward, because you remain alive and remain the owner. A RUFADAA-compliant durable power of attorney must explicitly grant digital-asset authority; a “springing” power that activates only on a formal capacity determination buys privacy at the cost of delay, exactly when speed matters. The cleaner instrument is the revocable living trust (section “Revocable Living Trust”) with a named successor or co-trustee and a precise definition of incapacity — typically written certification by two physicians — so control passes without a court conservatorship. Remember the funding limit: a trust governs only what is titled into it, and you cannot “title” a self-custodied wallet into a trust the way you re-deed a house. What the trust can hold is a memorandum describing where the keys are and how to assemble them.