Posts by Miles Hurley
Complete Estate Planning: Trusts
Setting up a complete estate plan involves addressing what will happen to your assets and your stuff after you die. This means you may be executing a will, possibly establishing and funding a trust, and updating all of your beneficiary designations. You have to create a plan for who gets your stuff after…
Read MoreComplete Estate Planning: Advance Directives for People with Dementia
In November of last year, the Washington Post ran an opinion piece by an ER doctor titled “Doctors are torturing dementia patients at the end of their life”. Read the article here The doctor’s experience and perspective are not unusual. As Jane Brody of the New York Times summarized “Advanced dementia, including Alzheimer’s disease, is the…
Read MoreElder Law QuickFacts for 2020: Updated Medicaid and VA Numbers
At the beginning of each year, there are changes in the eligibility requirements for Medicaid and benefit amounts for VA Aid and Attendance. This is because these numbers change with each Social Security change, and Social Security changes go into effect on January 1st of each year. This year, we have a 1.6% increase…
Read MoreComplete Estate Planning: Advance Directives
No estate plan is complete without an advance directive. The Georgia Advance Directive for Healthcare replaces the old living will and power of attorney for healthcare. It was adopted by the Georgia legislature and put in place by the Department of Human Resources Division of Aging Services on July 1, 2007. It requires…
Read MoreMake Estate Planning a Part of Your New Year’s Resolutions
It’s unbelievable, but 2019 is almost over. As we approach the new year, it’s time to start thinking about new year’s resolutions. This year it’s time to make estate planning a part of your new year’s resolutions. Like most people, you’ve probably been putting off your estate planning. It can seem too confusing, too expensive,…
Read MoreKeeping Your Parents Safe from Financial Exploitation
One major concern for vulnerable older adults is financial exploitation. Almost daily, we hear stories of older adults being taken advantage of or falling for a financial scheme. Financial exploitation of older adults is pervasive, expensive, and difficult to detect. As NPR reported, “as we get older, we become more vulnerable to fraud in so…
Read MoreGive Yourself the Gift of Grace: A reminder to be patient with yourself during the holiday season.
Sometimes the best you can do is just not very good. Caring for an ill or elderly loved one, running a household, working full or part-time, and keeping yourself together can be very stressful. You wake early in the morning, your to-do list is already overflowing, and you just remembered the things you forgot to…
Read MoreHow to Get Your Parents to Talk and Plan
Many adult children saw their parents last week for Thanksgiving. And many of those adult children had not seen their parents in months or even in almost a year. Work and family obligations paired with substantial distance makes it difficult for all of us to get together as often as we’d like. Did you see…
Read MoreThanksgiving Plans: The Five Most Important Things to Ask Your Parents This Week
The holiday season is a busy time for those of us in the senior care industry. Many families only get together during this one time of the year, and this rare visit to aging parents usually brings up some undeniably critical issues. The holidays bring families together, and many adult children become painfully aware of…
Read MoreVA Aid and Attendance Benefits: How to Apply for VA Benefits
Our last blog discussed the pitfalls of qualifying for VA benefits. If you meet all the criteria for a special pension from the VA, you still have to go through a rigorous application process. The VA pension application makes the Medicaid application look simple. . Once the actual application is completed and filed with the VA,…
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