Estate planning as a Reverb account holder

Reverb is an online marketplace, owned by Etsy, for buying and selling new and used musical instruments and gear. Sellers receive their sale proceeds through Reverb Payments, which pays out to a connected bank account; if no bank account is on file, the proceeds sit as a Payout Balance until a bank account is added. Sellers and buyers may also hold a Reverb Wallet balance (spendable on Reverb but not withdrawable to a bank) and Reverb Credits (from gift cards, refunds, payment balances and differences, and customer service accommodations). The estate-relevant assets are the recoverable cash a seller is owed — an unpaid Payout Balance — versus the on-platform-only Reverb Wallet balance and Reverb Credits, which cannot be withdrawn to a bank and cannot be transferred to another account once held.

After a Reverb account holder dies, Reverb.com LLC (Etsy, Inc.) may transfer balance to a designated recipient, but this is handled case by case. The outcome depends on the documentation provided and is entirely at Reverb.com LLC (Etsy, Inc.)'s discretion.

What happens at death

Reverb publishes a dedicated deceased-account process. For an estate executor or next of kin, Reverb states it is "unable to offer access to a deceased user's account" but "can work with you to close the account and, in some cases, provide certain content from the account," and it asks for documentation "such as a death certificate" to confirm the requester is authorized to act on behalf of the deceased. Reverb does not publish a step-by-step procedure for paying out a deceased seller's balance, so the money asset is handled on a case-by-case review. The recoverable money is the seller's cash proceeds from Reverb Payments — a Payout Balance arises when there is no bank account on file at the time payment is sent, and Reverb states it "will automatically get transferred to your bank account once on file." That cash is money owed to the seller, so the estate may seek to recover it by contacting Reverb support with proof of death and authority. By contrast, a Reverb Wallet balance "must be spent on Reverb, and cannot be withdrawn to your bank account," and Reverb Credits, once held in an account, "can not be transferred to a different account" and cannot pay selling fees — so the Wallet balance and any Reverb Credits behave as non-transferable on-platform value rather than recoverable cash. The seller account itself is not described as transferable to an heir.