In an effort to handle intra-family disputes over elder law issues, people are increasingly turning to mediation. Mediation has long been a staple in family law cases. In many states courts will not hear custody disputes, for example, until after the parents attempt to resolve their differences through mediation. The belief is that the process [...]
For years attorneys have been trying to chip away at nursing home arbitration clauses. They are meeting with more and more success. Nursing home arbitration clauses have been in the news a lot lately. In state after state, courts have refused to enforce them in some cases. This is a big change from previous years [...]
The IRS has again extended the deadline for executors to file the basis for property distributed from an estate as required by Section 6035 of the tax code. When President Obama signed the Surface Transportation and Veteran’s Health Care Choice Improvement Act of 2015 into law last July it contained a provision completely unrelated to [...]
If you are under any delusions that estate planning for blended families is easy, a story from St. Louis will give you second thoughts. When Mary Lee and Robert Hermann Sr. were married in 1980, they were both already millionaires and they both had children from previous marriages. The two signed a prenuptial agreement to [...]
In a surprising move the IRS increased the amount of long-term-care insurance premiums that you can deduct from your taxes in 2016. The long-term-care insurance industry has come under fire recently as some people have questioned the sustainability of the insurance and wondered whether people who sign up for the insurance lose coverage after missing [...]
If you have a Medicare Part D prescription drug plan, every year you receive a booklet that lists all of the prescription drugs that your plan covers. What happens if the medication you take is no longer covered? Every year Medicare prescription plans change which drugs they will cover. Notice of any changes usually comes [...]
Payable-on-death accounts offer a popular and easy way to avoid probate and transfer assets, but they are not without their problems. Payable-on-Death accounts, sometimes called Pay-on-Death or Transfer-on-Death, are increasingly popular with banks and brokerage firms. They offer an easy way to transfer assets after an account owner passes away. The money in the account [...]
Arbitration clauses in nursing home contracts are increasingly common and problematic. Fortunately, many courts are looking at them skeptically. A court in California is the latest one to refuse to enforce such a clause. An elderly California woman, Marjorie Fitzpatrick, was signed into a nursing home by her daughter in 2012. The next year Marjorie [...]
When you are ready to meet with an attorney and get an estate plan there are a few things that you can do before the meeting to make it more productive. It is possible to be totally unprepared when you meet with an estate planning attorney for the first time. Under such a scenario, you [...]
It is a natural instinct to designate an adult child as your power of attorney should you ever need one. However, you need to be certain that your children are capable of the job. When creating an estate plan be sure to plan for incapacity, in addition to death. Who would you want to handle [...]