Family · Land · Inheritance · Pilot concept

Family, land & inheritance proof.

Land, marriage, birth, death, gifts, loans, and who-holds-what for whom — in many families these facts live in memory and paper, not in a registry anyone can reach. PlenaProof helps a family make witnessed, retrievable receipts of those facts while the people who know them are still here to say so, on a phone, in their own language. PlenaProof complements courts, registries, and legal aid. It does not replace them.

The problem

When a death, a dispute, or a land claim arrives, families are often asked for documents they never had a way to make. Who owned the field. Who was married to whom. Which child belongs to which parent. What was given, lent, repaid, or promised. The institutions that resolve these things — courts, land offices, legal-aid clinics, elders, registries — can act only on evidence a family can produce. PlenaProof does not decide any of these facts. It helps a family record them, clearly and with witnesses, before they are contested — so there is something to bring to the people who do decide.

What a family can record

Each one is a receipt: a witnessed account of what was said and by whom, kept where it can be found again. None of them is a ruling, a title, or an official certificate.

Land

Family land declaration

Who the family understands to hold a piece of land, where it is, its boundaries as neighbours know them, and any paper that exists for it.

Land

Boundary & neighbour witness

Neighbouring landholders confirm, on the record, where a boundary runs and who farms which side — the testimony elders and courts ask for first.

Land

Land gift or transfer record

A witnessed account that land was given, sold, or passed within a family, so a later "that never happened" can be checked against the record.

Family

Marriage & union record

A witnessed record that a marriage or union was formed, recognised by the family and community, with the people who were present named.

Family

Birth & parentage statement

Who a child's parents are, as the family and witnesses attest — useful where a birth was never registered. Complements, not replaces, civil registration.

Family

Death & survivors statement

That a person has died, when, and who the surviving family members are — the starting point most inheritance processes require.

Inheritance

Heir & dependants declaration

Who the family understands the dependants and likely heirs to be. A record for a court or clan process to weigh — not a determination of who inherits.

Inheritance

Held-for-another declaration

That property is held by one person for another — a child, a widow, an absent relative — so "I was only minding it" cannot quietly become ownership.

Inheritance

Wishes & intentions record

An elder's spoken wishes for what should pass to whom, captured while they can still say it. A complement to a will, not a substitute for one.

Assets

Livestock & assets inventory

Cattle, equipment, savings, and valued belongings, described and witnessed, so what existed can be checked against what remains.

Assets

Debt & loan receipt

Money or goods lent or borrowed within or beyond the family, with terms as both sides understood them, witnessed at the time.

Custody

Document custody receipt

Who holds the title, the ID, the savings book, the letter — so "who has my paper?" has an answer that does not depend on one person's word.

Custody

Preserved-copy survival receipt

A receipt-backed copy of a land deed, title, boundary paper, purchase agreement, succession document, or family property file, with a proof trail — so a fire, flood, theft, or displacement does not erase what the family kept. It does not prove ownership by itself, but it can help show what document the family had, when the copy existed, and whether that preserved file has changed.

Family

Surviving Spouse & Orphaned Child Property Protection Packet

Preserve property records for surviving spouses and orphaned children before documents disappear, are altered, withheld, burned, or disputed — a widow's property records, a widower's property records, surviving spouses' property records, an orphaned child's property records, or orphaned children's property records. May include land records, title copies, inheritance documents, guardianship papers, succession files, marriage and death certificates, family agreements, boundary papers, purchase records, and family property inventories. PlenaProof does not decide ownership, appoint guardians, validate inheritance claims, replace courts, replace land registries, or replace lawyers. It helps preserve the records and proof trail so the right people can later review what existed, when it existed, and whether the preserved files changed.

Continuity

Yearly check-in

An annual refresh confirming a held-for-another arrangement still stands. A missing check-in is itself a signal worth noticing.

Continuity

Handover record

That property held for someone has been returned to them — or a record that it has not, which is useful evidence in itself.

Continuity

Multilingual handover packet

The bundle a family can bring to a clinic, legal-aid office, land desk, or court, drafted in a form an office can read.

Built for phone, paper, witness, and office

Not only for laptops.

Any phone

Capture works on an ordinary phone. Slow and clear beats long and fancy.

Low bandwidth

Light pages, short steps, no heavy media required to make a record.

Paper-friendly

Receipts print to a sheet a family can keep, and an office can read.

Your language

Made in the family's own words; the human reviewer queue is growing.

Identity made simple

No national ID required to begin.

A person can be identified by the people who know them — named witnesses, a community or faith leader, a school, a clinic, a savings group. Where an ID or paper exists it can be referenced; where it does not, the witnessed account stands as a receipt of what was declared. PlenaProof is not an identity authority and does not issue identity.

What this does not do

PlenaProof does not determine inheritance, ownership, parentage, marriage validity, or who is a lawful heir or guardian. It does not register land, transfer title, or issue identity, birth, marriage, or death certificates. It is not a court, lawyer, land registry, notary, government office, or probate authority. A PlenaProof receipt is not a court ruling and is not, on its own, legally binding or guaranteed to be accepted by any court, registry, or office. Offline capture, automatic handover, long-term storage, and any cryptographic anchoring apply only where actually implemented for a given pilot. PlenaProof records what was declared, by whom, and when — so the people and institutions who do decide these matters have a clearer record to work from.

Existing instruments this complements

  • National land registries, title offices, and customary land documentation
  • Civil registration and vital statistics (CRVS) — births, marriages, deaths
  • Succession, probate, and guardianship law and the courts that apply it
  • Customary and clan inheritance structures and elder mediation
  • Legal-aid clinics and paralegal networks
  • World Bank ID4D, UN-Habitat / GLTN, and community land-rights programs

PlenaProof sits beside these and feeds them a clearer record. It complements official ID, registries, notaries, courts, and public authorities — it does not replace them.

Related PlenaProof receipt grammar

Protect an Orphan's Property For Inheritance & Probate Firms Government, UN & NGO Programs Diaspora Inheritance & Continuity PLENA Inheritance Protocol Beyond the Will Agreements & Contracts ($5) Informal Savings Groups Public Verify

For legal-aid clinics, land programs, faith networks & humanitarian organisations

If family, land, and inheritance records are part of your work, PlenaProof welcomes pilot conversations.

Please do not submit case data here. Do not submit sensitive child, inheritance, land, identity, refugee, court, witness, or legal evidence through any public form on this site. Real client-data pilots require signed agreements, defined data scope, secure intake channels, safeguarding controls, and attorney-reviewed terms.