The fall season is a beautiful time of year, but it also marks the beginning of flu season, which can pose a serious threat to your elderly loved ones. Fortunately, there are several steps you can take to ensure their well-being during the colder days ahead, including making sure you’re able to step in and help them with their medical and financial needs.
Keep reading to find out how.
Read MoreAs our senior population continues to expand, an increasing number of elder abuse cases involving professional guardians have made headlines. The New Yorker exposed one of the most shocking accounts of elder abuse by professional guardians, which took place in Nevada and saw more than 150 seniors swindled out of their life savings by a corrupt Las Vegas guardianship agency.
The Las Vegas case and others like it have shed light on a disturbing new phenomenon — individuals who seek conservatorship to take control of the lives of vulnerable seniors and use their money and other assets for personal gain. Perhaps the most frightening aspect of such abuse is that many seniors who fall prey to these unscrupulous guardians have loving and caring family members who are unable to protect them.
In the first part of this series, we detailed how criminally minded individuals can take advantage of an overloaded court system and seize total control of seniors’ lives and financial assets by gaining court-ordered conservatorship. Here we’ll discuss how seniors and their adult children can use proactive estate planning to prevent this from happening.
Read MoreThis is the first in an ongoing series of articles discussing the true costs and consequences of failed estate planning. The series highlights a few of the most common — and costly — planning mistakes we encounter with clients. If the series exposes any potential gaps or weak spots in your plan, meet with your Personal Family Lawyer to learn how to properly address them.
When it comes to estate planning, most people automatically think about taking legal steps to ensure the right people inherit their stuff when they die. And these people aren’t wrong.
Indeed, putting strategies in place to protect and pass on your wealth and other assets is a fundamental part of the planning equation. However, providing for the proper distribution of your assets upon your death is just one part of the process.
And it’s not even the most critical part.
Planning that’s focused solely on who gets what when you die is ignoring the fact that death isn’t the only thing you must prepare for. You must also consider that at some point before your eventual death, you could be incapacitated by accident or illness.
Read MoreVacations are a time to relax, unwind, and create beautiful memories with your loved ones. But before you set off on your adventure, it's essential to ensure that your legal affairs are in order so you can fully relax during your travels.
Can’t imagine doing one more thing before you take some much-needed time away?
Don’t worry! Our Personal Family Lawyer® is here to guide you through these important tasks, so you can enjoy your vacation worry-free. Plus, these steps only take a little time to complete and can provide you with peace of mind knowing that you have made proper arrangements if the unexpected happens to you or your family while you’re away.
Read MoreIf you are a single parent, life for you right now probably couldn’t get any busier. You are likely being pulled between work, school activities, and home — and the inevitable emergencies that fill the lives of single parents everywhere.
Being a single parent is a huge responsibility, even if you do share time with a parenting partner, and especially so if you don’t. Regardless, as a single parent, your children’s lives are now largely in your hands. So what would happen to them if something happened to you? Who would take care of them? Who would pay for their housing and food? Who would pay for their education? These are questions you need to get answered, and the best way to do that is through estate planning.
Having an estate plan that covers the care of your children in case you should be in a severe accident, fall ill, or die provides peace of mind for the single parent. It is worth knowing that everything and everyone you love is taken care of.
Here are the must-haves that can protect your children if something were to ever happen to you:
Read MoreAt this time of year, young people across the country are about to reach a key milestone: high school graduation. If you have a child claiming their diploma, now is the time to prepare them for life after leaving the nest.
Graduating high school is a significant accomplishment. However, it comes with serious responsibilities that your child probably isn't thinking much about right now. Once your child turns 18, they become a legal adult, and specific areas of their lives that were once under your control will, by law, be solely their responsibility.
While your child will now be a legal adult, you still have essential parental duties. Yet, if you don't support your child to step into adulthood with legal documents in place to help both of you, it can be challenging and costly for you to help them in the event of an emergency.
Read MoreWhen it comes to estate planning and wills, you have a variety of options for legal documents. The most common of these options is a “last will and testament,” which is also known simply as a “will.” But you may have also heard people talk about a “living will” or “advance health care directive” and wonder what that is, and whether you need a living will in addition to a regular last will and testament.
Both terms describe important legal documents used in estate planning, but their purpose and function differ significantly. In this article, we will review some of the most critical things you need to know about living wills and why having a living will is essential to every adult’s estate plan. And it may be that a living will is even more important than a last will and testament.
Read MoreWhen it comes to estate planning, most people automatically think about taking legal steps to ensure the right people inherit their stuff when they die. Although that is not wrong, it also leaves out a very important piece of planning for life, and perhaps the most critical part of legal planning.
Planning that’s focused solely on who gets what when you die is ignoring the fact that death isn’t the only thing you must prepare for. Rather, consider that at some point before your eventual death, you could be incapacitated by accident or illness.
Like death, each of us is at constant risk of experiencing a devastating accident or disease that renders us incapable of caring for ourselves or our loved ones. But unlike death, which is by definition a final outcome, incapacity comes with an uncertain outcome and timeframe. And yet, statistically, over 80% of us will be incapacitated at some period during our lifetimes.
Read MoreThese days, more and more young people are delaying — if not totally foregoing — a life that involves marriage and parenting. The lack of jobs, crushing student debt, multiple recessions, and the pandemic have pushed many young people into a life path that has left little room for settling down with a partner and getting married — and even less room for having children.
For other young adults, staying single and childless for now is simply a matter of choice. Regardless of the reason, as more young adults opt for growing older without marriage or children, the number of single childless households is likely to steadily increase in the coming years. But, while such a life may not be permanent, these are not years to forgo the responsibility of legal and financial planning.
While most adults don’t take estate planning as seriously as they should, if you are single with no children, you might think that there’s really no need for you to worry about creating an estate plan. But this is a huge mistake. In fact, it can be even MORE important to have an estate plan if you are single and childless.
Read MoreVacations can be the perfect opportunity to relax, disconnect from work and responsibilities, and enjoy the company of your spouse, kids or friends. But before you head off on your next getaway, there’s something else you should consider doing that might not sound quite as fun — creating an estate plan. While it may not sound like the most thrilling way to spend a day, here are some reasons why you need to think about your estate plans before you travel.
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