Life Happens 04-26

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
For individuals and their families. We address challenges that we
all face as we age. We talk about aging as
a lifestyle, the issues that must be confronted, and the
careful planning that's required to avoid crises in the future.
We're here to provide you with tools to educate and
prepare yourself for events like preparing for retirement, protecting your
income and assets, planning to pay for a nursing home

(00:20):
and home, cares for special needs, for wills and trusts,
planning for an untimely death, and then resolving disputes in
and out of court. As the laws and necessities for
planning and care continue to evolve, life happens. Will help
you make smart decisions to assure that your goals are
reached and your needs are met for both yourself and
your family. So again, I'm Frank, coming from Pierre O'Connor

(00:40):
and Strauss. Thanks for dealing with the few technical issues
we're having on our end. The crews working hard. They're
doing a great job. I am sitting alone in the studio,
but thankfully that does not mean that I will be
not joined by a guest. So I believe on the
line is our one of our great associates, mister Tommy Morasco.

Speaker 2 (00:58):
Tommy, good morning, Yes I am, thanks for having me
from man.

Speaker 3 (01:01):
You sound great coming through. Like how you doing, Tommy?

Speaker 2 (01:05):
I'm doing well this morning, Thank you, Frank. How are
you guys?

Speaker 1 (01:08):
It's wet up here. It is gross, it is rainy,
it is dreary, it is cloudy. I would not spend
a lot of time outside so far today. How was
it down there with you?

Speaker 2 (01:16):
Now?

Speaker 4 (01:17):
We got doused last night as well, so not not
looking too wonderful at the moment, but let's see if
that changes during the day.

Speaker 3 (01:23):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:23):
Yeah, And obviously if you're if you're driving around in
your car, you're staying inside because the weather's not so
great today. Obviously, we we enjoy having you here. Thanks
for spending your Saturday morning with us, and Tommy obviously,
thanks for jumping on and you know, being here to
help me today.

Speaker 2 (01:38):
My pleasure.

Speaker 1 (01:39):
So April is stress Awareness month apparently, which I didn't know,
so then I had inherent stress because I didn't know
that that's how that goes. So we have a few
topics planned of what we want to talk about of
maybe doing some things to help avoid stress and get
a plan together so that way, you know, you have

(01:59):
a way of dealing with things if something happens, or
your family as a way of dealing with things.

Speaker 3 (02:03):
If something happens, then you pass away.

Speaker 1 (02:05):
But before we get there, I always kind of like
to kind of ease into the show, So usually I
like to talk about current events or cases that we've
seen in the office. I think last time I was here,
like Gene Hackman had passed away, so we had that
to talk about, and we've had some other celebrities that
have passed away. I didn't see anything recently of anyone passing.

(02:28):
The last one that comes to mind that I know
that we spent some time talking about was Val Kilmer.
So I guess for the good of Hollywood, I don't
think we've lost anybody of note that I've seen recently.

Speaker 4 (02:39):
No, but there was one, I mean not so recently,
but some news kind of resurfaced. And the reason I'd
like to highlight it is this because that I know
that when people are thinking about age, people that are
younger might think they're impervious to life happening right as
we say, But Michelle Trachenberg, she was only the thirties
and she recently.

Speaker 1 (03:01):
I think I think I did the show right after
her death too, or or very close in time, because
I remember talking with with Patty who was on the
show with me, and asking Patty if if she was
aware of who she who Michelle Trachtenberg was, and if
she was like how she knew her, because I think
I remember her originally being like Harry's By movie. Yeah,

(03:24):
and then I know she did she did some co
starring on like Buffy for a while, which I think
I had fallen off watching Buffy at that point, but
I certainly recognized her, and then she was in she
was in like this like teen college comedy called euro Trip,
which is one of my favorite, like you know, bad
comedies that but but but yeah, no, so obviously you
know great pull by you, Tommy. Just because you're younger

(03:45):
doesn't mean something couldn't happen to you. And I think
I think I did see recently now that you bring
her up. I think I did see that they that
they ruled her death to be of just natural causes,
but I also believe that it was also said that
she had a I think a liver transplat or something
very close.

Speaker 3 (04:01):
In time to the time of her death.

Speaker 1 (04:02):
Yea, well, it may have been natural causes that took
her life or that resulted in her death. I don't
think she might have been like the healthiest person just
because of maybe some other you know, medical things.

Speaker 2 (04:13):
No, it's absolutely right.

Speaker 4 (04:15):
But then as far as current events are in the
office goes I mean, we think young, and I'm sure
some people listening on the show were like thirty, yeah,
of course that's sung, but also in their fifties. I
had a client recently who came to me that husband
suffered from a stroke and he's no longer capacity, he
is no longer has capacity.

Speaker 2 (04:32):
And what do you think they don't have?

Speaker 1 (04:33):
Frank, Well, there's probably there's several things that come to mind,
But what typically first thing that comes to my mind
when you when you talk or you lead something like that,
I'm going to say, no power of attorney time.

Speaker 2 (04:43):
That's exactly right, yeah, talk.

Speaker 1 (04:45):
So why don't why don't we I mean we're going
to dive more into this as the show goes along,
but why don't why don't you lay out for for
our listeners what that document is and why it's so
important that that they have one and one that does
the right kind of things.

Speaker 2 (04:59):
Yeah. Absolutely.

Speaker 4 (04:59):
And and also I was talking to a client yesterday
who retained us. But their children are in college, and
you know when I told them, hey, by the way,
just so you know, they're over eighteen, they're their own
adults now, and it doesn't matter whether you're their parent.
You have no say over their finances, you have no
say or involvement in their health care. And they were

(05:20):
slightly taken aback. So what happens is that a lot
of the times when we think what do we need
to plan? A lot of the times people go to
that the doomsday scenario, okay, when I die, But a
lot of people forget that there's things that happen during
our lifetime that require us to need assistance. And as
I was just saying, doesn't matter what your relationship is

(05:42):
to an individual, could be a spouse, could be a parent,
a sibling. You do not just have the autonomy or
the right to just step in and start making those
decisions on behalf of people. So exactly so with the
power of attorney.

Speaker 2 (05:55):
The reason why that's.

Speaker 4 (05:56):
Such a powerful tool is that it is a means
to a allow an agent that you designate or agents.
We'll go further into that to take financial or legal
action on your behalf, meaning they could step in your
shoes and be able to make the same decisions that
you could have made. Now, the reason why it's so
important to have this is that in the absence of

(06:17):
one is such as in the situation that I pointed
out earlier with my client, there's no way of going
back and doing it. Once somebody does no longer has
the capacity, they can't sign this document. So now I
need to go to surrogate's court petition for a guardianship,
which takes quite a bit of time and is expensive.
I mean you're talking probably at the minimum around ten

(06:38):
thousand dollars on average, just to get the court to say, yes,
we believe you, the spouse, the parent, whomever, that you're
the right person to be able to make decisions on
this person's.

Speaker 1 (06:48):
Behalf and not to jump on your toes there. But
that's also assuming that there are any fights among the
potential guardians who could be named to take over, you know,
decision makingory for that individual exactly. Sometimes we have situations
where there may be a spouse, there may be parents,
there may be children, and there might not be a

(07:11):
clear cut. I don't say winner, but like a good
who the best decision would be. You know, there might
be positives and negatives to several of them.

Speaker 4 (07:19):
Think about blended families, people with second or third marriages,
and sometimes the people may not be the person that
you would have wanted if you were to make the
decision yourself.

Speaker 2 (07:29):
So that's why these documents are so important. It gives
you the.

Speaker 4 (07:33):
Ability to name the people and also successors. Okay, well,
what happens if something happens to this individual, great, I
know who I would want next in line. And guess what,
it's not always a family member, which is another thing.

Speaker 1 (07:45):
Well, yeah, obviously, if we're looking at this more towards
maybe a potential guardianship situation, if the planning isn't done Unfortunately,
you know, courts don't always like kind of being the
ultimate deciders of like which family members they're going to
put against other family members, and if no one can
get or if everyone can't get on the same page,

(08:05):
it's certainly in the in the ability of the court
of the court to appoint a neutral third party and
pick none of the family and say, you know what,
like we were thinking it was going to be this,
but we're not doing that anymore. We're going to pick
this independent person, someone that none of you know, because
you guys couldn't get on the same page. So rather
than pick and choose, you all lose. And this person's

(08:28):
now involved. So you have a you have a new
best friend to take care of mom or dad, brothers,
sister's financial affairs.

Speaker 2 (08:35):
And then everything.

Speaker 1 (08:36):
And you know that that person would not have been
the chosen person by the incapacitated individual.

Speaker 4 (08:41):
Yeah, but then making decisions even after that point, Tommy's
still there, I'm.

Speaker 2 (08:46):
Here, can you hear me?

Speaker 3 (08:47):
Yeah?

Speaker 4 (08:48):
Yeah, And then I said, the problem is that it
even just administering after that is really difficult because now
at the time you need approval, oh to be able
to do anything right.

Speaker 2 (08:58):
Yeah, and it becomes extremely extremely restrictive.

Speaker 1 (09:01):
And and to this point, I think, I think it.
I think it. It's a good thing to dive into
since we're on the topic of the power of attorney.
But not having the document is obviously the first bar.
Right you want to have it because if you don't,
you have big issues. So that's what we're talking about now.
But I think just as just as much of an
important thing to keep mind of isn't not only do

(09:22):
you have the document, but is it is it well done?
Does they have the correct powers? The most common things
that we're looking for are, you know, agents who's appointed,
what their abilities are, and what their relationships are to
one another. So if you have multiple people, can they
act independently? Can they do they have to act jointly
or concurrently, because sometimes that can bring headaches and unforeseen

(09:45):
issues that like if sometimes you know people they might
have multiple children, or they might have multiple people that
they want to have involved with their finances, which is
perfectly fine, but then it they have to make a
decision of the act independently or do they act act jointly.
If you have people acting jointly and they're not close
in proximity, or they're deciding they don't agree on an issue,

(10:06):
or say their whole relationship deteriorates and they're just not
talking any longer, well that really puts that person potentially
in a bad spot because now you may have agents
that are not in power to do what you need,
when you need it, how you need it. And then
the other thing that I commonly see and Tommy, obviously,
if you're you know, seeing something different than by all means.

(10:27):
Certainly I had your opinion here, but I can't tell
you how many times we see documents come in from
either other offices or that people have downloaded off the
internet and they've tried to kind of do some things
on their own, and the power of attorney is lacking
in the powers that it grants. So in my practice,
I do a ton of medicaid work, I do a
lot of planning work, I do a lot of asset

(10:48):
protection work. And the power to transfer assets, move assets,
create trusts, you know, do a whole lot of things
is vital to do many of those things, and often
that's where the power of attorney is lacking. Where people
can't make gifts, they can't make transfers, they can't form trusts,
they can't fund trusts. And what then we're sometimes putting

(11:10):
this in the predicament of is finding out whether we
can do a new power of attorney, one that's better
and has you know, better things on it, or better
powers on it, or whether we're going to have to say,
you know, unfortunately, we thought, just based on you having
the document, we were going to be in a good place.

Speaker 3 (11:27):
We're not.

Speaker 1 (11:28):
And now we have to go the whole guardianship route.
And it's not because they didn't try to do the
right thing.

Speaker 4 (11:33):
I can't tell you how many times that's occurred, and
to the point where thankfully they came to us in
a position where we could execute new ones. But a
lot of times people, you know, I call them my
Google warriors, right, they go out online and they searching everything.
And I love that. I love when my clients come

(11:53):
in prepared. I love when they've done some research. I
love when they come in with some background because obviously
I know that they care, they're taking the time to
understand or to learn about it. But then there's certain
things that I agree with, you want to take in
your own hands to be proactive. But then when it
comes to legal documents, sensitive legal documents.

Speaker 2 (12:11):
Is there a short form on the New York State website?

Speaker 3 (12:14):
Yes?

Speaker 4 (12:14):
Does that mean that you should download yourself and try
to execute it yourself? I wouldn't recommend it, okay. Number
one is that there are specific requirements behind how they
need to be executed, let alone how they should be
filled out. So many times I'm missing specific provisions. And likewise,
with Frank, I do a lot of long term care
and other planning and involved with Medicaid planning. But they

(12:38):
come in or some people are trying to save money
or they want to do things on their own, and
they come in with a document that's not sufficient. And
I've actually had a situation where I had a consult
with a client who did not retain on the first round.
We had a great conversation. I guess what they did
is they took the information that I provided them, and
then they went on their own and they tried to

(12:58):
see if they can do it on their own, because
you know, they wanted to save some money.

Speaker 2 (13:02):
What do you think happens.

Speaker 3 (13:04):
I don't think it went well.

Speaker 4 (13:06):
It didn't.

Speaker 2 (13:07):
I ended up those same people. I don't think. I
don't I believe it. I don't even think it was.
A month later, came back.

Speaker 4 (13:14):
And they said that the individual that they were that
they were worried about actually had to go into a
rehab center and was at this point no longer had capacity.
It was questionable the first time around when they came in, okay,
but the person was still available, still there and I
don't know if it was a stroke or some other,
but they deteriorated further, and they came in and said, listen,

(13:35):
we needed to do the Medicaid planning.

Speaker 2 (13:37):
We took care of the other documents. Can you help us?

Speaker 4 (13:40):
I said, well, can I see them? So what do
you think they did? They took the short form, They
didn't have gifting powers. This person had a lot of
assets in their name. No one had access to be
able to transfer the assets out. So we were as
if in the same position as though one was never executed.

Speaker 2 (13:55):
So this is what we're saying.

Speaker 4 (13:56):
There's definitely there's certain things where I'm all for, you know,
I have a family of four of trying to say
when we can and being you know, cost conscious, But
when it comes to your planning, this is not something
that you should take lightly.

Speaker 2 (14:10):
Definitely not something you should try to cut corners with.

Speaker 3 (14:12):
I couldn't agree more. So, why don't we do this.

Speaker 1 (14:15):
We're a little we've run a little along here, so
I know we're supposed to take a break, So why
don't we take our first break? So Tommy, hang on
the line. We'll come back right after this break and
we'll talk more about what we can do to maybe
help with your stress and do some planning for people.

Speaker 3 (14:28):
So come on back.

Speaker 1 (14:30):
All right, guys, welcome back, Thanks for sticking through for
the break. This is Life Happens Radio. This is our
Saturday program where you talk about planning, aging and all
the things that come with those. Again, I'm Frank Hemming,
one of the partners of Pierre O'Connor and Strauss, and
joined by our associate mister Tommy Morasco.

Speaker 2 (14:47):
Hello there.

Speaker 1 (14:48):
So Tommy, you were talking right before the break about
how we had some Google warriors I'll use your term,
which again I love that, but unfortunately, you know, they
tried to do a good thing, but they got i
want to say, maybe oriented towards the wrong the wrong
avenue or the wrong you know, the wrong concern right,
and it became a cost concern. And really what they

(15:10):
needed to be concerned about was was that the documents
they had were done correctly. So so just to kind
of put a bow on this, so I'm assuming that
then we were able to kind of step in and
then help these people after it was discovered that you know,
while their their best, their efforts, we were you know,
well intentioned, you know, they weren't they weren't quite carried

(15:33):
out as we would have liked them.

Speaker 4 (15:35):
Yeah, that's true, but but at that point, regardless, their
idea was, you know, trying to hopefully save But at
the end of the day, yeah, thankfully we were able
to help, but it still ended up costing them more
than it should have.

Speaker 1 (15:47):
Yeah, of course. Yeah, which again it's it's kind of
just there's some irony in there, right. They didn't want
to do some things because it was going to cost
a lot, and then they cut a corner and then
wound up having it cost more ultimately.

Speaker 2 (15:58):
So yeah, unfortunately.

Speaker 1 (16:00):
Yeah, I had a family come in to see me.
I think it was Thursday, and it was It was
great because I think some of the things that we
talked about in that meeting actually go hand in hand
with the topic for today, which is again trying to
reduce stress and being more mindful of stressors in people's
lives and being aware of stress and its impact on

(16:22):
your health and your well being and your family. So
I'm gonna I'm not going to go into detail about
all this quite yet, just because we can do that
later in the show. But one of the things that
they that they came that it was great to see
them again because when they came in, they were I
think they were forty seven a married couple. I think
there were forty seven when they came in, and they

(16:42):
did wills originally with us. At that time, that kind
of made the most sense. We talked about probably doing
a trust briefly, but for whatever reason, they didn't think
that that was kind of appropriate for them. But now
it's five years later, So now they're into their early
fifties and they have one child. So their son is
a little older. He's not quite yet in a place

(17:03):
where he could be involved with with anything quite yet,
but they're you know, they're concerned about different things now
for him because he's you know, he's got college kind
of in the horizon and other things going on. And
they they have family members but I don't want to
say they don't have good relationships, but I don't know
if they have the trust that's necessary there for all

(17:25):
of it. You know, they they love their their siblings,
but they don't necessarily want them involved with their financial
or health care decisions if something were to happen to
them and their spouse. So they wanted to potentially talk
about redoing their plan a little bit. So we talked
about redoing a power of attorney and health care proxy
and some of the other documents that we typically do

(17:46):
when we do a plan. And then we started talking
about doing a trust because again some of their wishes
have changed. And one of the things that I think
really resonated with them was, you know, as much as
they don't want to think about what happens when they
are both gone, there, they're you know, they're becoming more concerned,
I think, as they get older and their son gets older,
of what life will look like for their son, since

(18:08):
he's the only one and he's their sole beneficiary right now,
and he may get married, he may have children, he
may have may have multiple children. I mean, who knows,
right his whole life is in front of him. But
the idea of them working so hard for so many
years and then just having it all dumped to him
and then having it be at risk potentially for him

(18:30):
to do divorce, health issues, bankruptcy, creditors, you know.

Speaker 3 (18:35):
You name it.

Speaker 1 (18:37):
They're worried about that now a lot more so than
they were five six years ago when they originally came in.
So luckily, we talked about updating their plan, updating their documents,
and then one of the other things we started talking about,
was well, the inheritance and how do we do something
for your son, And the way we typically do that
is we do some trust planning. We do some additional

(18:57):
trust planning in a lot of sense where we leave
a trust for the son in this sense, or we could, right,
we could design a trust where the son can get
his inheritance, he could have everything flow to him, he
can have access to it, he can use it for
essentially whatever he needs or wants. He can take all
the money if he wants it, but it's protected from
all those bad things from creditors, from bankruptcy, from a divorce,

(19:21):
from medicaid, if God forbid, he needs care as he
gets older. So that was a really big selling point
to them on our part from the attorneys, But I
think the biggest thing for them was I could tell
immediately once we kind of got through the conversation of
like just how much better they felt about the whole
situation just knowing that, like, yeah, if and when the
time comes when we're not here, our son is going

(19:43):
to be protected as best as he can be.

Speaker 4 (19:47):
Absolutely, I'm glad you mentioned that because I had a
similar situation too, and honestly, this happens a lot of
the times. So most of the people look listening in
this radio at the moment, you might be thinking about, well, oh,
you know, I have concerns about myself about acid protection.
What happens when we get older if I need long
term care planning? And everyone's concerned with acid protection for yourselves.

(20:10):
Now think about what you're going through to try and
acquire that protection for yourself. The biggest gift that you
can give to your loved ones you pass on to them,
is that they don't have to worry about it if
you put it in this trust that Frank's mentioning now.
In our office, we call them beneficiary controlled trusts. They
inherit it in an asset protected manner. So as Frank

(20:32):
was saying, whether it's judgments, lawsuits, divorce which is a
big one for a lot of families, bankruptcies, or even
if they one day need some type of government based needs,
anything that's in that trust is going to be protected
for them. So that is that is an invaluable tool.
And I had a client too who you know, unfortunate

(20:54):
cancer diagnosis and right now the future is a bit
uncertain for them. But she came into the meeting extremely
racked because her daughter is also in college. She's like, well,
I just want to make sure that she has what
she needs if anything should happen her. You know, her
father passed away when she was young. He's not in
the picture. And when same thing, Frank, the peace of

(21:14):
mind that she had by the time we got out
of the meeting and I said what we were able
to do, how we were able to do it, and
how it would benefit them, I could literally see it
in her face, like how relieved she was to just
be like, Okay, at least that's one less thing that
I need to worry about. And I said, this is
not something that you should worry about. And the whole
purpose of coming to us, right is to take things

(21:36):
off of your plate, especially when you.

Speaker 2 (21:38):
Have a loved one who's in a situation.

Speaker 4 (21:40):
Right, even if you're in a crisis, somebody's in a
nursing home, everybody is in chaos at that moment. Your
brain is not functioning the same way when it's under stress.

Speaker 2 (21:47):
And we're talking.

Speaker 3 (21:49):
Yeah, no, I couldn't agree more. And that's exactly why
we want to have these conversations when you can, when
you're help hopefully when you get out in front of it.

Speaker 1 (21:58):
So Tommy, I'm gonna I'm gonna have you again and
hang on the line or come up to the news.
So we are going to break for the news in
just a few seconds. When we come back, we're into
talking more about avoiding stress and doing some things to
help maybe make you feel a little bit more at easy.
That about all this stuff, and then we have some
of the seminars that I want to talk to you about.

Speaker 3 (22:14):
So come right back after the news.

Speaker 1 (22:16):
All right, guys, welcome back, Thanks for sticking through the
news again. Welcome to the second half of Life Happens Radio.
I'm still Frank Hemming and Tommy, you're still there hanging
on from from.

Speaker 2 (22:27):
I'm still here, perfect love it.

Speaker 1 (22:29):
I would I would feel very bad for our listeners
if they had to listen to just me talk for.

Speaker 3 (22:34):
The twenty seven cut it out.

Speaker 1 (22:37):
So, so again, thanks everybody for listening in on this
not very nice Saturday morning. But we're very glad that
you're here, and we're hoping that that you're taking away
some some tips here from from the conversations that we've
had thus far. So before we get back into kind
of the topic of the show, Tommy, I have some
some things I want to plug both, you know, firm

(23:00):
events coming up here. So the first one is in
our firm, we do a monthly Medicaid webinar series. We
call it Medicaid Monday because as the title suggests, we
do it on a Monday and we talk about Medicaid.
So our next one is on May twelfth, So that
is our next Medicaid Monday. If you happen to have

(23:23):
been joining us for those, that's the next one. If
you've never seen them before, then obviously we invite you
to come and do that with us. They're free. We
typically do them from noon to twelve thirty. Sometimes we
have a longer program and we go to one o'clock,
but they're usually a half hour. And this month we're
going to talk about the Elder Law Forum, which is

(23:44):
it's one of our biggest events of the year, so
we're going to be so it's going to be myself
and then our other partners, Lou Pierro and Aaron Connor,
and we're going to talk about kind of the hot
topics and the things that we're going to discuss at
our Elder Law Forum, and for those who don't are
not aware of that. Our program for the Elder Law
Forum is going to be on May fifteen, sous the
following Thursday. It's here at the Albany Desmond Hotel, so

(24:08):
it's not far from our from our office here in Latham,
and where I'm sitting in the studio. Uh, it's our
I think it's we've done it for I believe it's
twenty years.

Speaker 3 (24:18):
It's a great event.

Speaker 1 (24:19):
It's it's always staggering to see the amount of people
that we get, the amount of support that we get,
and the information that's shared. So obviously, if if you
haven't joined us for one of those and you're in
the industry, if you're in any of the industries that
that go to long term care, elder law things like that,

(24:40):
we invite you to come join us at the Elder
Law Forum. And then the other event that we have
is kind of tied to the to the radio program here,
so we're doing a joint program with a dinner seminar
with Dave Kopek. That event is going to be on Tuesday,
May twentieth. Again, it's going to be at the Crown

(25:01):
Plaza Desmond in Albany, So same place as the Elder
Law Forum, and it's going to be the following Tuesday,
so we have Medicaid Monday on that Monday Forum on
Thursday the fifteenth, and then the following Tuesday, on the twentieth,
we're doing our dinner seminar with Dave. So if you
want to come out and see Lou and Aaron from
our office and Dave Kopek talk about retirement techniques and

(25:23):
planning strategies and things, then by all means you can
sign up to go to that event. Seating is limited, however,
so we do want to make that clear that if
this is something that interests you, please go and sign
up for that, and you can do that by going
to the website that's that's been set up for that,
so it's wgy Seminar dot com or you can call

(25:45):
into five one eight seven six seven seven seven seven
four and the event starts at five thirty, So again
that's five thirty on May twentieth, which is a Tuesday
at Crown Plaza, Albany to see Lou, Aaron and Dave.

Speaker 3 (26:02):
So all right, enough plugs, enough about that.

Speaker 4 (26:05):
I'm excited I'm going to be coming up for the
Alder Law Forum again and I'm excited.

Speaker 2 (26:09):
It's always yeah, formative.

Speaker 1 (26:11):
While I was getting ready to come down, obviously, I
knew that you were going to be joining me on
the show today, and I think the first time that
we really spend any time together was last year's Old
Law Forum because you had just joined the firm right
before that. So you're you have to either have hit
your one year anniversary with us or you have to
be very very close.

Speaker 2 (26:28):
It's in three days. I was in the bo I'm
not counting, right.

Speaker 1 (26:33):
That's great, So it'll be great to see you and
the other attendees for the forum. But yeah, so happy
three days early one year anniversary with the firm.

Speaker 4 (26:42):
Time.

Speaker 2 (26:43):
Thank you very much. Happy to be here.

Speaker 1 (26:44):
Yeah, So let's get back to the topic that we
were talking about. So I have a news article here
that they gave me because they like to make me
try to sound smart on the radio, which I appreciate,
and they so this new story is talking about again, yes,
and why a little planning might be able to go
some way of helping you feel less stress about things.

(27:07):
So they say. A twenty twenty fourth survey found that
nearly half of Americans report feeling stress, and I wasn't
quite sure what to think of that. Only I guess
in some ways, I was like, wow, only half.

Speaker 4 (27:19):
Yeah, I was actually I was thinking the same thing
myself and like, that's actually pretty good. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (27:23):
I was like, so if one out of two one
of us is stressed, the other one isn't. Like, I
don't know if that's that bad or not. I have
no idea. But then, but then the second part of
this says it's a sixteen point increase over the last
two decades. So that then does make it sound quite
a bit worse. If we were only about a third
of us we're feeling stressed, and now it's half of
us feel stressed. So okay, so maybe not as good.

(27:44):
According to this, also due to stress that leads to
sleep deprivation, which is also on the rise. So I
certainly can can speak to to probably having sleep deprivation
in my life. I don't sleep much as it is,
but depending on what's going on, I sleep less. And
then they asked people why they felt stress, and the
number one, you know, single factor, if you had to

(28:07):
put one, if you had to narrow it down to
one factor, the single most prominent factor was financial strain,
and it was reported that eighty two percent of people
aged eighteen to thirty four had this stress due to finances.
Seventy seven percent of thirty five to forty four year olds,
sixty three percent of forty five to sixty four year olds,
and forty seven percent of those who are sixty five

(28:30):
and up had financial stress. So it seems like it's
the most common one for all age groups. But it
tends to slightly decrease as you get older, But it
doesn't seem like it's really declining, you know, as much
as maybe we would like. And again, I'm I don't
know if I'm surprised by this, Tommy, do you have

(28:50):
do you have any quick thoughts about like these, all
these wonderful statistics that I'm thrown at you.

Speaker 4 (28:55):
I mean, honestly, if you think about current economy, current
you know, just climate, I think that it makes a
lot of sense. I think a lot of people are
living under means, you know, especially depending on where you
are or other outside factors that make us lose control,
you know, whether you have to care for a family

(29:16):
member because some people didn't take the right planning steps.

Speaker 2 (29:19):
And now that's putting the financial strain or other stress
on a caretaker.

Speaker 4 (29:24):
So I mean to me, I mean, especially in our
line of business, Frank, that doesn't surprise me at all.

Speaker 3 (29:28):
Yeah. Yeah, just kind of going hand in hand with this.

Speaker 1 (29:32):
It's saying that other things that affect stress for people
is you know, difficulties with healthcare in their personal relationships,
and then the other one, which again I don't think
it's necessarily surprising. It's just I think maybe it's it's
place in the hierarchy here might be changing, and that's

(29:52):
current events. Right. So it seems like between financial stress,
healthcare stress, personal relationships stress, and current events stress, that's
those are the biggest factors leading to to stress for.

Speaker 2 (30:05):
For a Frank.

Speaker 4 (30:06):
And if you don't mind, if not to interrupt you,
but I think what really causes the stress. And I
think if if you look at all of those, the
common thread amongst all of it is uncertainty. It's because
when we are uncertain, that's why we're stressed, because we
feel lack of control.

Speaker 3 (30:25):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (30:26):
And and I don't know, like I don't know if
this is if this is good or bad? Right, I
know that I I think I'm pretty open with with
people in my life and people professionally and stuff like, Like,
I definitely have some anxiety in my life. I think
of myself kind of as an anxious person, but I've

(30:47):
worked very hard for a long time to kind of
harness that where it doesn't impact my daily life in
a negative way, right in some ways, like me being
an anxious person, I think in some ways makes me
actually really good at my job because at least active
or at least certain parts of my job.

Speaker 3 (31:04):
Right.

Speaker 1 (31:04):
So it's not always that these things necessarily or has
been always negative, but sometimes, like I find comfort in
the ability in the thought that it truly is something
that is out of my control. Right, It's it's I think,
just to kind of dig into the to some of
your points. Having control, I think, or the lack of control,

(31:27):
I think, is certainly stressful. But to me, I think,
I personally think that there's a difference between whether I
could have the control and don't have it, or whether
it's something I never.

Speaker 2 (31:38):
That's exactly exactly right.

Speaker 4 (31:41):
And and there's you know, you hear all those adages, right,
there's no use of you know, worrying about things that
you can't control. But I think what happens is people
think or could say, I know, I could do more,
but sometimes people are just scared because they don't know
where to start, and they're like, I'm just the thought
of starting is anxiety and doing so I'd rather avoid it.

(32:01):
And that's what a lot of people I find think
about estate planning. It's not something let's be real, frank,
it's not really something that's pleasant.

Speaker 2 (32:09):
Right. We don't really want to.

Speaker 4 (32:10):
Think about, well, what happens if I get hurt, what
happens if something health some health crisis, or what happens
if I die? Like, nobody really wants to think of
these things and they don't want to tackle them. But
the problem is is that your non unwillingness to even
think about that is going to cause heartache and more
trouble for the people and your loved ones who are

(32:30):
gonna have to step into care for you. And before
we took the break when what our job is is
not just tell you this is what you do. No,
our job is to take that off of your plate.

Speaker 2 (32:40):
We give you We're.

Speaker 4 (32:41):
Gonna give you the roadmap because when you're operating in chaos,
think about it. If you're anxious now because you don't
know where to start. What do you think is going
to happen when that event actually happens, and now you
have to deal with trying to figure it out after
the fact, and now you have all these other circumstances
and everything else weighing on you. I've had clients come
to the office bring me a garbage bag full of

(33:03):
unopened mail because they had no idea what this person had,
where it was, how much it was, And we literally
had to go through and open up statements to just
try and figure that out. That is not how we
want to handle things. So the purpose of what we
do is to make sure that we put that plan
in place for you. So that's one lest thing you

(33:24):
need to stress about.

Speaker 1 (33:25):
Yeah, and not to be I don't know, like a
Debbie Downer here about this. But the other stark reality
is you can worry about things. You cannot worry about things.
But at the end of the day, what I think
some other points of anxiety for sometimes people even starting

(33:46):
is that they don't they feel like if they start
talking about it, they're going to speak the bad things
into existence. Right If they just don't acknowledge it or
they don't think about it, they don't talk about it,
then maybe just those things will not happen all right,
and that just is not how life works. At some point,
something's going to happen to all of us. Yeah, hopefully

(34:10):
it's a long time from now. Hopefully it's you know,
you've made a plan or that you have things set
up to go as you want, But just not talking
about it doesn't stop the inevitable from eventually happening. As
as sad as and as depressing as maybe that sounds,
but that is the reality. And obviously, if you're working

(34:31):
with people hopefully like us, we can hopefully make that
a little bit easier for you. Because at the end
of the day, Tommy, I think you're right, nobody really
likes talking about this stuff except people like us, right, Like,
we like talking about it because it's it's what I
feel like, how the best, how I best can help people. Yes,

(34:51):
And that's it's why I do this job, is why
I think a lot of us do this job.

Speaker 2 (34:55):
That's exactly why we do it because we.

Speaker 1 (34:56):
Want to help people, right And and I love being
able to tell people that I get to help people
every day when I come to the office.

Speaker 4 (35:06):
Yeah, that's my biggest the biggest gratification I get is
it's usually after the fact, some time has gone by,
but a family member.

Speaker 2 (35:15):
Frank, yeah, I got you, drop that, I said.

Speaker 4 (35:18):
The biggest gratification I get is I get contacted, you know,
usually some time afterward by a family member of someone
I helped, and they say, Tommy, all I want to
do is thank you because all the planning you're able
to do. Really you really saved us. You really helped
us in one way or another, and they're extremely grateful,
and that, to me is the biggest takeaway from the strip.

Speaker 3 (35:39):
That's great. So all right, why don't we do this.

Speaker 1 (35:41):
We're going to take our last break before the end
of the show, so why don't we do that? So
please again stick with us for the last portion of
Life Happens Radio. We're going to come back right after
this break. Welcome back, guys. There we go. Now, I
can hear me, Tommy, you're still there with me.

Speaker 2 (35:58):
I'm here, can you hear me?

Speaker 3 (35:59):
Yes? We are all all right. There we go perfect.

Speaker 1 (36:01):
Thank you again, guys, sticking through the last break here
before our final or for our final segment of Life
Happens Radio.

Speaker 3 (36:07):
Again.

Speaker 1 (36:07):
I'm Frank Hemming of Pierre O'Connor and Strauss, joined by
mister Tommy Morasco, one of our associate attorneys. Uh, still
still hanging with us from one So again, Tommy, I
know I keep thanking you, but again, thanks for taking
your Saturday.

Speaker 3 (36:21):
And wanting to be here with us.

Speaker 2 (36:22):
Thank you for having me.

Speaker 1 (36:23):
Yeah, of course. So we're in our last segment. So
I have some other articles that I found here, So
I was thinking of maybe just going through these relatively quickly,
seeing what you know, other people have put out there
of how to deal with stress and making sure your
plan goes. And one of the articles that I found,
which I thought was a different way of looking at

(36:43):
at this topic is the so the question that was
posed for the person writing the article is, you know it,
can my estate plan fail? And I was like, well,
that's an interesting way of viewing this because I think
we always talk about it like we want to set
you up for success, right, and we want it to
go every way or the best way that it can

(37:04):
for however it is that you want things to go,
but we don't.

Speaker 3 (37:07):
Usually I think look at it from that negative.

Speaker 1 (37:09):
Context, So of course your plan can fail. And then
I think once we kind of make that concession of like, sure,
you can have a plan, and unfortunately, there's no guaranteed
it goes one hundred percent the way that you want,
looking into the ways that maybe it could fail, and
they've got a list of factors here, So why don't

(37:31):
we go down these and see what we think about
some of these. So one is that your trustee your
executor may not be alive or willing to serve right
and depending on kind of like what you were looking
to do. I don't know if that necessarily would mean
that your plan failed, but I think it would certainly
put a wrinkle into your plan, because one part of

(37:53):
a of a comprehensive plan is having contingencies built into
it where if maybe the first or even second person
that you've named to fill a particular role, if they're
not going to be there, that you've planned for that
with a backup or a set of people to back
them up.

Speaker 4 (38:11):
Absolutely and even I mean, and that's a way for
you to make sure that you stay in control as
far as who it is that.

Speaker 2 (38:20):
You would want to be in that position.

Speaker 4 (38:23):
But also the way that we craft our documents, we
still have procedure of way of structuring that even in
the absence of a designation and default of designation, Right,
let's just talk about worst case scenario. Let's just say,
even if all the backup sort of fail, we still
have ways to build into account for and to be
able to put somebody in that position.

Speaker 1 (38:41):
Yeah, yeah, So, I mean we have I would say
usually at least one to two backups on just about
every role, assuming that you have people available to fill
those successor roles obviously, right, Like, if you only have
one child and your spouse and there's literally no one
else you would ever trust in those roles, well, then

(39:01):
you're gonna have your spouse and your child and and
that might be the only the only layers of susection
that you have. But that doesn't mean that if you
did lose your spouse, or you did lose your child,
or or you know, you you lost touch with one
or both of them through through the happenings of life,
that there aren't then other ways to appoint new people. Right,
Whether you can find them is a different story. Whether

(39:23):
you can make those new relationships, that's a different that's
a different topic. But there typically are ways to substitute
people in. So again, I don't want a nitpick here,
but I don't know your plan would fail just because
you're missing somebody, but it might not go as you wanted.

Speaker 3 (39:37):
Here's a big one though.

Speaker 1 (39:38):
You could have gotten married or divorced, right That would
that would throw your your plan potentially into into a
tailspin if either you did not provide for now a
new spouse that you have, or you were providing for
a spouse thinking everything was going to go to them
and now you no longer have have them, right, that
could that could throw certainly a plan into a tailspin

(39:58):
because then you figure out, well, then who gets things
in the absence of the spouse or would you want
the spouse to get things and not other people? So
that is a huge change, thankfully, And Tommy, you can
certainly weigh in here with your experience. But people tend
to want to come talk to us if there's either
been a marriage or a divorce. That's not usually one

(40:20):
other people don't think about pretty pretty fast, right.

Speaker 4 (40:23):
But I encourage all of our clients, and I tell
this to every single one of my clients that are signing.
I said, don't think just because we're sitting here today
signing your documents that this is the last time you're
going to see me, I say, You're stuck with me
at this point, because the whole point is that we
need to make sure that we stay on top of
things because circumstances change, finances change, you acquire new assets,
you lose assets, you lose people, you gain people. So

(40:46):
the point is is that I always like to recommend
my clients to say, hey, even if it's a brief
check in once a year, just to say what's gone on,
anything's changed, anything notable. And sometimes, like you say, it's
not something that they might necessarily think of, oh, you know,
not much, but we just bought a house, and I'm like, well,
that's a pretty big deal, right, and that wasn't in
our original plan. Let's think about how what do we

(41:08):
need to tweak anything to address that. So that kind
of a circumstance, Frank, like you said, that's a major
life event that you would hope that one of the
first things they're going to say as well, wow, I
really need to go back and revisit this. But that
goes for really any kind of life event, and you
really should just be staying on top of and keeping
an open line of communication about changes in your life.

Speaker 1 (41:27):
Yeah, Well, to go back to one of the stories
I talked about earlier, when I had that nice couple
come in to see me just a few days ago,
right there, now in their fifties. They were in their
forties when they first did things. Well, husband on his
document's appointed wife first and then he put his father second,
because again, their son is young. He's too young to

(41:48):
serve in these roles for at least a little bit still.
And I said, well, you know, is dad still the
right person that if your wife couldn't do things for you?
Is Dad's still the right person to step in? Because
Dad is five years older himself than he was when
you thought this through last time? And he said, you
know what, I still think he is. I said, well

(42:08):
that's great. Then I think we leave Dad. And I
was like, but have you considered who could maybe step
in if maybe Dad had something happen to him between
now and the you know, the event that might lead
to somebody needing to use these for you. And he said,
you know, last time we did this, I wasn't really
worried about that, But I think now I really have

(42:29):
to sit down and think of who could fit in
behind Dad I wouldn't replace him yet, but I want
to make sure somebody else is sitting there because who knows, right,
he's in good health, he's doing well. I think he
would be in a good spot right now to help me.
But hopefully nothing happens to me for a long time,
and at that point Dad might not be the best person.

Speaker 4 (42:49):
So yeah, I want to I'm not saying I wanted
to tie one other thing in there, just because as
far as the planning goes, and something you mentioned with
with parents such as you and myself who have children
that are underage in their miners, you got to think about, well,
God forbid, something should happen to me and the other parent,

(43:09):
what happens with my children?

Speaker 2 (43:11):
Who's going to watch over my children?

Speaker 4 (43:12):
Designating guardians that in the event something should happen to you?

Speaker 2 (43:16):
That's a huge deal, right, who took care of your child?

Speaker 4 (43:19):
I mean, these are all things that, again not really pleasant,
not things that we want to think about, but something
you really need to consider because the whole purpose of
planning is to be prepared and to have contingency plans
in place. Like you're saying, now, something can fail that
could be even our own plans, right, not necessarily our
state plan, but our own plans. Things can go sideways,

(43:39):
and you just you have to be prepared for the
different contingency.

Speaker 1 (43:42):
Yeah, I mean, I don't mind speaking a little bit
about myself here, just to kind of throw the example
out there. Right after my wife and I got married,
one of the very first things we did was we
went on we got some life insurance because I was
very concerned that in the future something could happen to
me and that my new wife was going to be
not able to afford a house that we may have,

(44:04):
or but a child through college, or you know, pay
off the outstanding bills that we had or whatever, you know,
whatever would would be necessary at that time. And that
was the step that we decided to take for that.

Speaker 2 (44:17):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (44:17):
And then and then the other big life event that
then really spurred action was when my daughter was born.
Right up until that point, I hadn't done my documents.
I didn't have my I had I had a healthcare proxy,
and I had a power of attorney, but like I
didn't have a will and some other things. Because at
that point I had joint everything with my wife. She
was named as beneficiary. You know, I have a very

(44:38):
small family. I wasn't really worried about things going necessarily
where I'd want it to go if something happened, because
there's very limited people and intestacy. Dying without a will
would get it to those people in the same order
that I would have wanted anyway at.

Speaker 3 (44:50):
That point, right.

Speaker 1 (44:51):
But as soon as I had my daughter, we did
our plan for that, mainly because one we wanted to
structure how things are going to go to her, but
more importantly to your point, Tommy, we wanted to lay
out who would be able to essentially take control of
her and keep track of her, both her physical person

(45:12):
and will be, as well as the financial stuff that
would then flow to her if something happened to me
and or my wife. So so so that was that
was easily one of the biggest reasons that I can
personally say made us do a lot of soul searching about,
like who would be the right people for this?

Speaker 2 (45:29):
Yeah, agreed, same in my situation.

Speaker 3 (45:31):
Yeah, I'd say, not to speak for you, but I
imagine a lot of those.

Speaker 2 (45:34):
No, that's literally, but it was exactly the way you
said it. First thing when we got married was life insurance.

Speaker 4 (45:42):
Second thing, kids are born, same thing guardians. So nope,
that's the tracks perfectly.

Speaker 1 (45:48):
So we have only got about another minute or so.
So the other big thing on the list, just so
we kind of put a put a bow on this
is health events.

Speaker 3 (45:55):
Right.

Speaker 1 (45:56):
If you have a big health event, again, it could
be good, could be like a birth of a child
or or a grandchild, something like that. But obviously if
you have a bad diagnosis, or you have someone who
gets sick passes away, needs care, whether that's home care,
could be nursing home care, then obviously that's a big
change that Obviously a lot of people tend to think.

(46:17):
I hope that coming to talk to people like us
might be a good step to take, because I can't
tell you how many times people will walk in to
our office think that there's nothing they can do to
do acid protection to medicaid qualification or anything like that.
And usually not always, but usually there are things that
can be done or preserve assets.

Speaker 2 (46:38):
Yeah, and the time to act is always now.

Speaker 4 (46:41):
If you haven't acted yet, it's not too late, but
make sure you act now.

Speaker 1 (46:45):
Oh Tommy, thanks for being here so very much for
being here on this Saturday, So thank you again to
everybody listening if we are at the end of our show,
so with that, we actually gonna come back next week
for our next edition of Life Happens Radio.