When A Loved One Dies, This Company Helps With Handling The Details Of What Comes After

Life after death is complicated for loved ones who are left behind, says Diana Milian, the CEO of Steps After Life, a Michigan-based startup helping families get the deceased’s affairs in order.

The idea for Steps After Life originated following Milian’s difficult experience with five sudden deaths. While in a state of distress, Milian, along with her husband and business partner, were burdened with time-consuming and expensive funeral planning and estate services, accounts reconciliation, as well as packing and moving.

“Others are having similar problems,” Milian added. “We developed Steps After Life to help these families handle their loved one’s bank accounts and mortgages, as well as transfer and cancel subscriptions or memberships.”

Steps After Life Vice President of Business Development Khal Hanna, who has a decade or more of experience in the death space, joined the conversation to express his excitement over the buzz they’re creating.

Hanna explained it can take upwards of 420 hours to get a loved one’s affairs in order. Often, 20% of that time is spent on the phone holding for help.

“We’re revolutionizing the industry,” he said. “We’ve become the ultimate complement to funeral homes, and we’re helping the 80% of families who do not know what to do after their loved one passes away.”

Steps After Life is a first-mover of sorts banking on a B-to-B-to-C model to scale. The startup connects and onboards potential clients through funeral homes with an app streamlining the intake process. A selling point is the app technology and personal human concierges who assist with the finding of documents and submitting forms, closing accounts, as well as cleaning up online profiles, and identity theft prevention.

“When it comes to professional services, whether legal or accounting, we do that through our own in-house or partner counsel,” Hanna noted.

In judging Steps After Life’s impact, Hanna put forth a case study where Steps After Life helped retrieve thousands in excess of the $1,500 service charge they charged.

“The husband is a foreign national who employed our services when his beautiful wife of seven years, an American, passed away. We offloaded his frustrations starting with the frozen joint bank accounts and credit cards; we immediately contacted the credit bureaus and financial institutions to expedite the process while working with the funeral home to give them an unforgettable service which was overcapacity by 850 people.”

Milian added a case study regarding one woman’s husband, a military man, who died. Steps After Life managed to secure the family their Social Security and Veteran Affairs benefits while cutting and refunding costly subscriptions.

“Essentially, it’s all about alleviating headaches,” Milian said.

“In 2023, we will be focused on improving our technology, expanding our services to hospice, and changing the way more people handle death.”

To learn more about Steps After Life, click here.