Are You Ready To Protect Your Spouse and Family?

“Help me protect my family –  I am currently healthy, but I want an excellent strategy to be prepared for the real possibility that some day, I will be incapacitated and possibly in assisted living or in a nursing home.”

Long-term care is expensive. When someone in your family lives in an assisted living facility, the cost will likely exceed $3,000 a month or more.  If your loved one needs the services of a nursing home facility, the cost of their residential care will likely be $5,000 a month or more.

In looking to the future and trying to create a plan, each question seems to lead to another question…

• Can the life savings be protected if a parent or spouse has to enter a nursing home someday?
• How do we make sure someone is allowed to make health care and financial decisions for the incapacitated family member?
• What will long term care cost?
• Will we have to sell the house?
• How can I stay at home as long as possible?
• How do I make my wishes known concerning end of life decisions and funeral planning?
• How much income will my spouse be allowed to keep if I go into a nursing home?

We work with clients to assist them in developing a long term care plan with appropriate protections so that in the event that they are disabled and unable to adequately manage their personal and financial affairs, they and their loved ones are protected!

When a long term care plan is put in place a substantial time prior to someone needing to go into a nursing home, we have a much greater chance of saving all of the person’s assets

Ideally, a long term care plan is put into place years ahead time.  Generally, a good time to think about such a plan is around age 70 or sooner if someone develops a chronic disease such as Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s.  However, if a family member has to enter a care facility on short notice or is already in a care facility, contact us immediately.  We can still help.  You can also click here to read more on crisis planning.

With a long term care plan in place, family members have peace of mind that their loved one will receive the proper care when the time comes and that assets and income will be available to take care of the healthy spouse and/or preserved for the family.  Planning ahead avoids a last-minute scramble if a spouse or parent suddenly becomes ill, and avoids conflicts within the family.

Long Term Care Planning is Different than Traditional Estate Planning

We have found that the traditional estate planning attorney has developed documents primarily to serve as tools to distribute assets at death.   Attorneys trained in the area of Elder Law understand that fully 50% of the individuals alive today who are 65 years of age or older will spend some period of their lives needing physical and/or custodial care.  The important question is not what happens when I die but what happens if I don’t die, get sick and need care for an extended period of time?

It is critical that your documents be written in such a way that you control how you wish to be cared for in this type of situation.  Unfortunately, most estate planners spend pages detailing complicated trusts that will be in effect only after your death, and little or no attention is given to your desire for quality of life in the event of a disability of you or a loved one.

Our goal is to counsel you so that you can achieve peace of mind. We listen to what you have to say, so that we can learn your most important desires.  Nobody can give you the advice you need unless they understand your own personal situation, including your unique blend of assets, risks, and life event probabilities.   We never elevate our technical skills over our clients’ stated objectives and comfort zone.

Long term care planning with us gives your life much more predictability and better prepares you and your family to deal with the curves life throws at you, whatever they turn out to be.  Our planning is designed to help our clients sleep well at night.

Having an attorney who knows you and your family and keeps up with your life as it changes is the very best way to avoid having that crisis arrive without warning.

Please call us for a confidential discussion of these concerns.

Did the Crisis arrive without warning? Click Here For More Information on Crisis Medicaid Planning.  Doing planning before a crisis develops is far better than the other way.    But crisis Medicaid planning to avoid impoverishing your spouse and help preserve for your family something of what you have worked so hard your whole life to amass is certainly possible.  So if your spouse or a loved one is already in the nursing home, call us as soon as possible because we can still help and likely save your family large sums of money.