Estate Planning Through the Ages
December 5, 2010
Can you remember what you were doing in your early 20s? Can you imagine what kind of life you’ll be living in your 70s or 80s? We experience incredible changes as the decades roll by—not just to ourselves, but in the world at large. With our lives changing so much, our estate planning documents and strategies should hardly remain static. Here is a guide to how your estate plan may or may not evolve through the decades.
In Your 20s: You’re young, just finishing school and starting in your career, unlikely to be married yet… the last thing you’re thinking about is estate planning! At this time of life, who gets your “stuff” may not be as important as who will make your decisions. Choosing your financial and healthcare agents and creating your power of attorney and healthcare directive are the important things to do at this time.
In Your 30s: Marriage, children, home ownership—most of these things happen in your 30s, and your estate plan should reflect that. Now is the time to choose guardians for your young children, decide with your spouse how your joint property will be distributed, and get serious about life insurance.
In Your 40s: This is when your strategy may switch from simple direction of inheritance to more serious asset protection. You’ve worked hard and saved, and you’ll want to think about the best way to maximize your assets with trusts and tax planning. Consider investing in long-term care insurance.
In Your 50s: As your children start to become independent you may have more freedom with your income. Some people choose to create charitable trusts, some prefer to invest for retirement, and still others decide it’s time to take a risk and start over with a second career. Your estate planner can advise and help with all of these.
In Your 60s: Ah retirement! Making the big change from work to retirement means making changes to your estate plan as well. If you’ve been keeping up with your planning through the decades all that is required now will be some basic maintenance; changes to account for marriages of your children, the birth of grandchildren, and your own relocation to someplace warm and sunny. But beyond the basic maintenance, you may want to start doing some basic planning for long-term care —just in case.
In your 70s and Beyond: Health is the key word now. Our life-spans are getting longer, but so are our illnesses. You need to be ready. Tighten up your estate plan, and although it may sound morbid, talk to your doctors and family about your end-of-life decisions. Consult with an Elder Law Attorney about options for funding long term care expenses, and seek assistance in revising your estate plan to coordinate with those options. You may be surprised to learn that you may be able to qualify for a government subsidy under the Medi-Cal program while still preserving your assets for your loved ones, providing that appropriate authorizations are in place.
The life alterations that come over a span of decades are difficult enough; you don’t want to have to find a new lawyer every time your circumstances change. Our firm makes it our business to keep up with you at every stage.
“Second Childishness and Mere Oblivion”
July 30, 2009
Shakespeare wrote about the seven ages of man, in which he describes the human journey from helpless child to adult and back to helpless child again:
“…Infant, schoolboy, lover, soldier, justice, pantaloon, and second childhood, ‘sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything’”.
Anyone who has had to watch as their parents age knows how true this passage can be. And just as difficult as watching your parents age can be talking to them about it. No parent wants to show weakness in front of their child, or admit that they need help; and often their reluctance to talk is fueled by the fear that they’ll be “put away”, or have their freedom and independence taken from them. Adult children are reluctant to bring up the subject as well—they’re afraid of angering their parent, or sometimes their afraid of having their worst fears confirmed.
But ignoring the subject won’t make it go away, and waiting too long can be disastrous. The best way to talk to your parents about aging is to bring it up early, before fear and obstinance have set in. Having these discussions ahead of time prepares both parent and child for what may lie ahead, insures everybody is on the same page and that there are no surprises in store.
However, even with advance discussions and planning, it is likely that a few uncomfortable subjects will still come up. This article from Reader’s Digest has some advice on how to broach these difficult subjects (including the subject of estate planning), and even provides a few scripts to help get the conversation started. If you’re still uncomfortable, having a third party mediator can be helpful; a trusted doctor—or even your estate planning or elder law attorney—can be a calm voice of reason in deep emotional waters.
Jinies.com