Assisting an Elderly Parent with Estate Planning and Asset Protection

As Georgia residents get into their 40s and 50s, their elderly parents increasingly need assistance with various components of estate planning and asset protection, including Medicaid and long-term care planning. When you have a young family of your own and are also trying to manage your own nuclear family’s day-to-day well-being, it can be difficult to know how to help your aging parent or parents with their estate planning and asset protection needs. Ultimately, by assisting your elderly parents with matters pertaining to estate and long-term care planning, you may be able to limit your own involvement in their necessary care down the road, which can give you peace of mind in the present and allow you to focus on your own children and family in the future.

If your parents are rapidly approaching an age or health at which they are likely to soon need long-term care, what are some of the issues you need to consider with regard to estate planning and asset protection? Our Gwinnett County estate planning attorneys can provide you with more information.

Has Your Parent Engaged in Any Medicaid or Long-Term Care Planning? 

Medicaid planning and other aspects of long-term care planning are essential for older adults. Even though Medicaid is a program for individuals with limited income and limited resources, it is the primary way for older adults to cover the cost of nursing home care, even when they were comfortably middle-class earners or even higher income earners during their working years. It is critical to begin thinking about components of Medicaid planning such as a Medicaid asset protection trust, and to consider long-term care insurance if long-term care is not needed immediately.

Does Your Parent Have a Georgia Advance Directive for Health Care?

Does your elderly parent currently have a Georgia advance directive for health care in place? This is essential for ensuring that your parent’s own health care decisions are honored, and that there is a trusted person in place to make health care decisions on their behalf if they become incapacitated.

Does Your Parent Have a Power of Attorney in Place?

Your elderly parent should also have a power of attorney in place to allow a trusted person to make important financial decisions on their behalf if they become incapacitated.

Has Your Parent Created a Will and Named Beneficiaries?

In addition to matters pertaining to your parent’s health care and asset protection, it is also critical to ensure that your parent has created a will or otherwise created beneficiary designations for their assets so that they will not die intestate, leaving their assets to be distributed according to the terms of Georgia’s intestate succession law.

For all of these matters, it is essential to get in touch with an estate planning and elder lawyer who can assist you and your elderly parent with all of the documents and tools that they need to be prepared for the short-term and long-term future.

Contact a Norcross Estate Planning Lawyer for Help with Your Elderly Parent’s Estate Planning Needs

If you have an elderly parent who has not yet completed important components of estate planning, long-term care planning, and asset protection, an experienced Norcross estate planning attorney at Bowman Law Firm is here to assist you. Contact us today to discuss your elderly parent’s current circumstances and to learn more about how we can help to get everything in place that your parent needs.

Sources:

law.justia.com/codes/georgia/title-53/

medicaid.georgia.gov/