Planning for Aging Parents: Legal Essentials for Aging Well

Early Conversations and Legal Documents for Aging Parents: Jordan McIntyre emphasized the importance of discussing aging and estate planning early to ensure legal documents are in place. These crucial documents include powers of attorney and a will, which help manage assets outside of probate. Greg McIntyre highlighted the dangers of not having these documents, such as losing capacity and needing to go through guardianship proceedings to manage financial, legal, or healthcare matters.

Protecting the Home and Tailored Planning: Jordan McIntyre suggested a "lady bird" deed as a simple and powerful way to protect a home. Greg McIntyre added that a trust could also protect the home and other financial assets, stressing that each family's situation, assets, and needs are unique, requiring an individualized plan. They mentioned that foundational documents like a general durable power of attorney, healthcare power of attorney, living will, and last will and testament are mandatory to avoid future complications and forced guardianships.

Key Planning Tools and Consultations: Greg McIntyre further elaborated on essential planning tools, including deed protections like life estate deeds and ladybird deeds, as well as various trusts such as revocable living trusts and irrevocable trusts like Medicaid asset protection trusts. They concluded by offering consultations for families to create a tailored plan for their specific needs, which can be scheduled at mcelderlaw.com/scheduling

Episode Transcript

Greg McIntyre (00:11):
planning for aging parents.
I am a parent.
I am here with my son.
If I'm lucky, I'm going to keepaging.
Jordan, you're an attorney atour firm.
You plan for clients agingparents all the time and you see
areas where how about, wherethere's room for improvement or

(00:36):
things that are dangers forparents as they age.
What are some of the thingsthat you see?

Jordan McIntyre (00:44):
Well, I think the most important thing that
everyone should do is have theconversation early.
You know, I thought that my dadwas going to stay 25 forever.
That's what he's been tellingme my whole life but the reality
is that everyone's going to age.
So I think you want to be in asituation where the parents are

(01:06):
unwilling to get estate planningfigured out, or their dad's not
planning figured out, or, youknow, their dad's not an elder
law attorney.
Then really have thatconversation early and get the
right legal documents in place.
Get your powers of attorneys,get a will, figure out how to
get your assets outside ofprobate and just start thinking

(01:28):
about it right, and then you cangive your experience to add on
what you've seen right and thenyou can give your experience,
dad, on what you've seen.

Greg McIntyre (01:38):
What are some of the dangers as we age and not
having key things in place likea general, durable power of
attorney or health care power ofattorney.
What, what are some of ourdangers in that situation?
Losing capacity and having togo after guardianship right.
The family having to step inand go after guardianship to
manage financial, legal orhealthcare matters right.

Jordan McIntyre (02:02):
Yeah, and having to go through the courts
to get that authority, ratherthan during your life and while
you're competent, just choosingthat person you trust yourself,
sure, sure.

Greg McIntyre (02:13):
Sure, sure, absolutely.
And and then you know, if wehave those things in place, we
might want to look at anotherdanger.
You know the the whether wemight need long-term care or not
, right.
And whether a parent might needlong-term care for assisted
living or nursing home care,right.

(02:34):
And then let's say we have ahome.
What are some options toprotect my home in that
situation?

Jordan McIntyre (02:45):
I think the most powerful one and a simple
plan is to have that Lady Birdiein place.

Greg McIntyre (02:51):
Sure, you know, I could also use a trust to
protect the home and otherfinancial assets as well.
So, you know, I think the mostimportant thing is everybody's
family is different, everybody'sassets are different.
Everybody's assets aredifferent.
Everybody's needs are different.
Therefore, everyone's plan canbe different and should be an

(03:16):
individualized plan.
So our attorneys includingmyself, my son, jordan McIntyre,
who may be planning for thisaging parent one day Although
when I asked him he said youprobably plan for yourself and
he's probably right but and I doplan to stay young forever, and

(03:38):
I think we all do but there's adanger in that and it's
sometimes a failure to plan.
We sit down with families, theparents, with the entire family
sometimes and we help look atwhat the goals are and flesh out
the goals and create a plan tofit your needs health care,

(04:03):
power of attorney, living will,last will and testament.
That is really mandatory to putin place if you want to avoid
friction and problems and jamsand kind of being forced to go
after guardianships in thefuture and leave someone
available to help kind of cleanup things and protect assets if

(04:26):
you fail to plan.
I think, from a planningperspective, investigating deed
protection, like life, estatedeeds, ladybird deeds, as well
as trust revocable living trustversus irrevocable trust like a
Medicaid asset protection trustthose are extremely important
planning tools that we use inour estate planning process.

(04:46):
So if you would like toschedule a consultation to sit
down and tailor a plan to yourneeds and your family's needs,
we would offer that.
Give us a call 1-888-999-6600,or you can go online and
schedule directly on ourcalendars at mcelderlawcom slash
scheduling.
Thank you, jordan.

Jordan McIntyre (05:08):
Thank you, dad.