1) You can loose control of the home. If a child predeceases you, the home may go to their spouse and the home could be sold out without your permission.
2) Liabilities. If theres a divorce or lawsuit
3)Taxes.
What can you do? An Asset Protection Trust where your home is protected and you get all the favorable tax advantages and if something happens to the kids, nothing can happen to the house.
A few months ago, we had existing clients, Bill & Margaret come in for a review of their trust and other documents. Their concerns and questions were not so much related to their documents as they were centered around their middle aged daughter who had recently remarried. They explained they felt a certain amount of discomfort or even distrust of the new son in law, who by the way had no gainful employment. Their daughter was an only child and would be heir to about a half a million dollars at the death of her parents. Their question was simple “how can we protect our daughters inheritance?”
Answer = Legacy Trust
Keeping Your Assets in the Family
As is the case in most wills, the majority of people who set up revocable and irrevocable trusts leave their assets outright to their beneficiaries, such as children, when they die. So, what’s wrong with that? Well, there may be a better way.
Instead of leaving your assets directly to your beneficiaries, why not leave them to your beneficiaries’ Legacy Preservation Trusts, which gives the “benefits of the assets” to your children while protecting the assets from outsiders, such as creditors, spouses, and in some cases estate taxes.
You can create a Legacy Preservation Trust naming your child both as trustee and beneficiary
when you die. A Legacy Preservation Trust has a set of rules for managing assets for the benefit of your children as beneficiaries. The rules may be broad or narrow.
Reasons to Create a Legacy Preservation Trust
There are a number of good reasons to create trusts for your children today. Just as you’ve
learned about the benefits of a trust, undoubtedly your children will wish to avail themselves of the same opportunity one day. But in the case of your children, there are a number of additional benefits to leaving assets to them in their own Legacy Preservation Trust.
These are:
Legacy Preservation Trusts can provide that, during your children’s lifetimes, your children have access to the income and the principal in their trusts for their health, education, maintenance and support – so that you’re not giving them a “gift with strings attached: or “ruling from the grave.” But, when your child dies, you can arrange of the unused portion of their inheritance to go to other beneficiaries, such as your grandchildren. You may also choose to have younger beneficiaries be restricted to receiving benefits for health and education only.
For more information, please call our office today 800-798-5297
By Attorney Thom Cooper
We frequently meet in our office with clients who have adult children with disabilities or other special needs. Beyond planning their own affairs, they have the added worry of what will happen to their special needs child when they are gone. For many, a special needs trust can provide answers and peace of mind. Donald D. Vanarelli, a New Jersey Elder Law attorney, recently published an excellent list of considerations to help in the planning process.
The following list contains some of the most frequently encountered issues faced by parents of a child with special needs who wish to arrange a secure future for their disabled child through estate planning.
If you have a special needs child and wish to discuss your options, please call our office to schedule a free consultation.
One of the hallmarks of our practice at the Cooper Law Firm has been our willingness to work with the senior and their family in estate planning and medical crisis situations. In working with our elderly clients it often desirable and sometimes necessary to involve the children. While many of our clients are from “the old school” and want to keep their business private, I encourage them to consider the fact that it is likely that their children will “inherit their problems” well before the children “inherit their money.” I know this certainly happened for me with my grandmother and mother. I explain to our clients that at minimum they should let their children know that a plan is in place, who is in charge, and that our office would be available to help with questions. I have found that this gives the children great peace of mind. I also encourage parents to discuss their plan in more detail with their children “when it makes sense.” My clients sometimes ask: “How will I know when it makes sense?” and I respond: “You will know.” We also encourage the parents to bring their children to the office so that we can help the parents to explain their plan and answer technical questions.
I recently ran across a New York Times news article that discusses the topic in more detail and I would encourage both parents and children to read it.
by Kathy Cooper
One of Thom’s colleagues in the American Association of Trust, Estate and Elder Law Attorneys, Greg Schlender, recently wrote a blog about including your memoirs in your estate plan. It is excellent, don’t miss it (Make Your Memoirs a Part of Your Legacy). His thought is that we wait until it’s too late to talk with our loved ones about their lives, how they met their spouses, what it was like when they were young and other interesting details that become more and more important as we get older ourselves. The problem is that I don’t think most of our parents are willing to use a pre-packaged software program or fill-in-the-blanks book to get the information down for us! This, of course, assumes that we haven’t waited so long that they can’t remember anyway.
Thom and I had the same experience when his mother, Arlene, passed away a couple of years ago. We cleaned out her apartment and found picture albums and other memorabilia that was clearly saying something although we weren’t sure who many of the people were or even when they were happening. We kept those albums and I have some ideas for creating a memoir for our children that includes them.
I started to think about how we can use some of the capabilities we have today to create memoirs that can become part of our legacy and part of our children’s estate package. See what you think, and please feel free to add your own ideas.
Call us if you would like to add a video memoir to your Estate Plan.
One of the most unusual memories I have about meeting with Thom’s clients after a death in the family makes me thinks of some things to do – and not do – when you’re planning where your “stuff” will go when you’re gone. It stared with a phone call from the daughter who I will call Sally, who scheduled a meeting for herself and her brother, Bill, to talk about Mom’s death. Mom died with assets that had to go through probate because they had no beneficiary. Further, Sally and Bill could not meet on their own without coming to blows.
When Sally and Bill arrived for the meeting, they sat across from each other, each staring at the floor. We reviewed the estate to determine what needed to be done. Neither had much to say, but it was obvious there was some tension about who got what. Mom had not been specific and each felt entitled to the diamond ring, the box of family pictures and the chess set. At the end of the meeting, Sally opened a bag and pulled out a small box and a coffee can. She handed Bill the coffee can and asked if he was ready to split the ashes!
What did I learn from this? Here are some pointers for helping your children after you are gone, particularly if they don’t have the most perfect relationship:
Did you know…?
When a child with special needs receives government benefits to pay for his/her cost of living, receiving an inheritance (no matter how big or how small)greatly impacts whether he/she will continue to be eligible to receive those benefits. It is critical for the parent creating an estate plan to consider both the needs of the aging parent and the needs of the aging child. Take these the three steps to ensure a child with special needs is protected:
Call today to find out how you can protect your child with special needs after you are no longer able to do so yourself.
by Attorney Thom L. Cooper
Often after our clients lose a loved one they find someone else with whom they want to spend the rest of their life. Getting married again late in life can offer renewed happiness & purpose, but it can also result in heartbreak without planning.
As Elder Law Attorneys we are often asked: “Does this marriage make sense from a financial point of view?” The answer, like so many things in life, is that it depends. For example should your new spouse go into a nursing home they can require you to spend your assets to pay for your new spouse’s nursing home bills. The state may also put liens on your home. Even a pre-nuptial agreement doesn’t help in a nursing home or catastrophic health care situation. In addition, if a widow is entitled to VA benefits due to her husbands prior service, those benefits may be cut off after a new marriage.
In spite of some of the above negative consequences there are things you can do legally to avoid many of the legal pitfalls as described above. It is absolutely critical in considering remarriage to receive advice from both a domestic relations attorney and an elder law attorney.
If you are interested in receiving a free checklist of some of the issues to consider upon remarriage, please sign up and we will e-mail it to you.
by Kathy Cooper
I sometimes describe my mother as a cat. I am sure she has gone through at least ten lives since I was a teenager. She’s passed out at the mall and fallen down the stairs at the at West Point Cadet Chapel during my cousin’s wedding. We’ve had to call the emergency squad to an untold number of restaurants when she’s had a mini stroke and slipped off her chair. It seems like she’s had an operation on most of her internal organs and I know she’s had pneumonia at least five times in my memory. Nevertheless, she continues and most of the time she scoots around our house with her walker with little trouble or fuss.
The reason I share this with you is to remind you about the importance of being ready for an emergency with your loved ones. Don’t let them go out without important contact information and make sure you have the authority required to access to their medical records and to make decisions in a critical situations. Having a lot of experience with emergencies, I can tell you that you will need at least the following:
What is it? Names and phone numbers of your emergency contacts
Why do you need it? If you pass out at the mall or have an accident on the freeway, you will want to have your representatives ready to provide information and decisions.
What do you do with it? Carry it with you at all times, in your wallet or purse.
Don’t forget … Check the phone numbers periodically to make sure they are up to date. Also, remember to include cell phones which are often the best way to reach your loved ones.
What are they? A legal document naming the person or persons who can make healthcare decisions for you if you cannot. This is normally a family member or friend.
Why do I need them? If you are unconscious and cannot tell your doctor what you want done when a decision needs to be made , the hospital can only take direction from the person you have designated as your Healthcare Power of Attorney.
Where should I keep them? Keep your original Healthcare Power of Attorney with your important legal papers. Give a copy of your Healthcare Power of Attorney to the person or persons who will act for you. They should keep a copy in a location where they can get to it easily in an emergency as they will need them at the hospital to prove that they can speak for you.
What is it? A legal document authorizing a person you choose to have access to your medical records.
Why do I need them? Your Healthcare Power of Attorney will need your HIPAA Authorization to prove to the hospital or medical emergency personnel that they have the right to look at your medical records to help them make medical decisions on your behalf when you are unable to do so.
Where should I keep them? Keep your original HIPAA Authorization with your Healthcare Power of Attorney in your records for safekeeping and give a copy to the person you have designated to act as your Healthcare Power of Attorney.
What is it? A legal document that whether you want heroic efforts to keep you alive to be taken if you are in a permanent coma or at end of life and cannot express your wishes. This is the document that Terry Schiavo did NOT have.
Why do I need them? The Living Will indicates whether or not you will be kept alive with a feeding tube giving you food and water if that is the only thing keep you alive.
Where should I keep them? Keep the original Living Will with your important papers and give a copy to your Healthcare Power of Attorney.
What is it? A list of current medications, dosages and the doctors who prescribed them along with their phone numbers. Also, note any alergies, believe me, you will forget them in an emergency. If you are in an emergency you can simply take the prescription bottles in a plastic bag.
Why do I need them? This is one of the first questions they ask you at the hospital. They do not have this information there and it can delay treatment if they don’t have it.
Where should I keep them? If you keep a list, it should be easily accessible so that you can take it to the doctor to update it when your prescriptions change. You will need it with you in an emergency.
A good elder law attorney will prepare these documents for you as part of your overall estate plan. Call or email us if we can assist you in getting your affairs in order.
Clients come to the office every week and ask this question. I am amazed at the number of families that own investments and they don’t understand what they have. They have either forgotten from the time of the purchase of the investment what they bought or never understood what they bought and just took the salesman’s advice. The bottom line is that they don’t know what they own and they worry that what they own is not right for them.
When you evaluate an investment to determine if it’s right for you, there are a number of considerations. These things should reveal the answer to that big picture question. Is this investment right for me?
When we evaluate an investment, these are the main issues that we explore with clients. Most importantly we look at all other investments and savings and we look at how the investment in question fits into the entire portfolio. Remember that your savings and investments are like pieces of a puzzle and if properly coordinated can make a great picture. You must look at all investments together, not just one piece at a time.
Please refer back to the blog in the future as I talk about how risk, liquidity and nursing home protection affect investments. Additionally, I am always available to answer questions regarding your investments. Feel free to call and ask for me personally. 1-800-798-5297
