When an Elderly Parent Refuses to Make a Will

An elderly parent may need your encouragement to get an estate plan.
An elderly parent may need your encouragement to get an estate plan.

This is a tough scenario. It happens more often than you’d think. Your elderly parent or other family member owns a home, investment accounts and a retirement account, but doesn’t want to have an estate plan. They know they need to do something, but keep putting it off—until they die, and the family is left with an expensive and stressful mess. A recent article titled “How to Get a Loved One to Visit an Estate Planning Attorney Before It’s Too Late” from Kiplinger, suggests ways to talk to a family member about the need for an estate plan.

Most people put off seeing an estate planning attorney, because they are afraid of death. They may also be overwhelmed by the thought of how much work is involved. They are also worried about what it all might cost. However, if there is no estate plan, the costs will be far higher for the family.

How do you get your elderly parent or other family member to understand that they need to move forward?

Talk with the financial professionals your elderly parent or family member already uses and trusts, like a CPA or financial advisor. Ask them for a referral to an estate planning attorney they think would be a good fit with your family member who doesn’t have an estate plan. It may be easier to hear this message from a CPA, than from an adult child.

Work with that professional to help your older family member get comfortable with the idea of talking about their wishes and values with the estate planning attorney. Offer to attend the meeting, or to facilitate the video conference, to make your loved one feel more comfortable.

An experienced estate planning attorney will have worked with reluctant people before. They’ll know how to put the older person at ease and explore their concerns. When the conversation is pleasant and productive, the person may understand that the process will not be as challenging as they had thought and that there will be a lot of help along the way.

If there is no trusted team of professionals, then offer to be a part of any conversations with the estate planning attorney to make the introductory discussion easier. Share your own experience in estate planning with your older family member and mention the reasons that prompted you to create an estate plan. Those reasons could include the peace of mind knowing that your family will not be faced with the time consuming and expensive task of trying to straighten out your affairs after you are gone.

Sometimes the best way to initiate a conversation with your elderly parents about estate planning is to mention that you are planning to do your own estate plan and ask their advice on what issues your should be considering. That may make it easier to ask your family member what they have done regarding their own estate plan.

Trying to force a person to engage in estate planning with a heavy hand, almost always ends up in a stubborn refusal. A gentle approach will always be more successful. Explaining how an estate plan includes not only distributing assets at death, but planning for medical decisions while the person is living, may motivate an otherwise reluctant family member to take that first step.

Describing what the family members will need to go through if there is no will, may or may not have an impact. Some people don’t care, and may simply shrug and say, “It’ll be their problem, not mine.” Consider what or who matters to the person. What if they could leave a gift to a favorite charity or create a fund for their grandchildren to go to college? That might be more motivating.

Another thing to consider: what if your elderly parent or family member has an estate plan and it is out of date? That may be just as bad as not having an estate plan at all, especially if tax laws have changed since the estate plan was made. Also, what if, instead of naming their children as agents to make medical decisions for them, an old health care directive names an undesirable person, such as a former brother-in-law to make medical decisions?

Most people really want to have an estate plan in place, but just never get around to doing it. You could provide a great service to your elderly parent or other family member by giving them the encouragement and assistance to move forward so they can cross this task off their list of things they need to take care of.

You may also be interested in https://galligan-law.com/caring-for-an-elderly-parent-without-ruining-your-relationship/.

Reference: Kiplinger (May 11, 2020) “How to Get a Loved One to Visit an Estate Planning Attorney Before It’s Too Late”

 

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Funeral Planning: Not a Festive Thought, But A Kind One

Funeral planning as part of your estate plan provides clear, final wishes, names a person to execute them and helps your family cope at a difficult time.

No one wants to do funeral planning, but leaving instructions for your funeral and burial wishes relieves loved ones of the burden of making decisions and hoping they are following your wishes. In addition, says the article “Important to provide instructions for preferred funeral, burial wishes” from The Leader, it also prevents arguments between relatives and friends who have their own opinions about what they think you may have wanted.

What often happens is that people make their funeral plan and final wishes part of their estate plan.  In some states, burial wishes are found in a will.  However, this often presents a problem as the will is usually not looked at until after the funeral. If your loved ones don’t know where your will is, then they certainly won’t know what your wishes were for the funeral.  Without clear written directions, spiritual practices or cultural traditions that are important to you, may not be followed.

An estate planning attorney can help you create a document that outlines your wishes and will have suggestions for how to discuss this with your family and where it should be located.  In Texas, much like in New York as referenced in the article, there is a form that allows you to name an agent who will be in charge of your remains.  In Texas it is called the Appointment for Disposition of Remains.  You can give your instructions to that person in the document which takes the mystery and a lot of the difficulty out of the process.

In Texas, if you don’t name a person to control the disposition of remains, there is an order of priority for decision makers, including spouses, a child, a parent and so on.  If you wouldn’t want those individuals making these decisions, an Appointment for Disposition of Remains is essential.

For funeral planning, one option is to go to the funeral home and arrange to pay for the funeral and go to the cemetery and purchase a plot. In Texas, a pre-need, pre-paid irrevocable burial plan may also be excluded from Medicaid for long-term care purposes.  See here for more on that topic.  https://galligan-law.com/elder-law-questions/

Some people wish to donate their organs, which can be done on a driver’s license or in another statement. This should also be authorized on you Medical Power of Attorney so that your agent has the authority to do so.  Donating your body for medical research or education will require researching medical schools or other institutions and may require an application and other paperwork that confirms your intent to donate your body. When you pass, your family member or whoever is in charge will need to contact the organization and arrange for transport of your remains.

A comprehensive estate plan does more than distribute assets at death. It also includes what a person’s wishes are for their funeral and burial wishes. Think of it as a gift to loved ones.

Reference: The Leader (December 7, 2019) “Important to provide instructions for preferred funeral, burial wishes”

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Power of Attorney: Why It Is Important

Don't wait to create a power of attorney.
Don’t wait to create a power of attorney.

Unfortunately, you never know when a power of attorney will be needed to allow someone else to make financial and medical decisions for you. An accident or sudden illness can occur without warning. A power of attorney is a necessary document if your are too ill, injured, or lack the mental capacity to make your own decisions. The article, “Why you’re never too young for a power of attorney” from Lancaster Online, explains what these documents are, and what purpose they serve.

There are two basic power of attorney documents or “POA’s”: one for making financial decisions and one for making medical decisions. A financial POA may be effective immediately or when a doctor certifies that you are unable to handle your financial affairs. A medical POA  becomes effective when you cannot communicate a medical decision. Until then, you are completely in charge of decisions related to your medical care.

If you don’t have a POA and you are unable to make financial and medical decisions for yourself, a guardian must be appointed in a court proceeding to make decisions for you. This is an expensive and time consuming process and the outcome may not be what you would have wanted.

Anyone over the age of 18 should have a financial and medical power of attorney. Many parents start realizing this when their children go off to college. Parents are often surprised and frustrated when they find out that, because their college age children are considered adults, the parents no longer have access to their children’s financial and medical information, not even in an emergency.

While it’s never too early for a person 18 years of age or older to have medical and financial powers of attorney in place, you could wait until it’s too late. If you become incapacitated, you cannot sign a POA. We often see this when children of aging parents contact us in a panic because their parents never executed powers of attorney. If the aging parent lacks capacity and cannot sign a POA, the family is faced with the need to pursue a guardianship.

You should work with an estate planning attorney to create the powers of attorney you need.  An estate planning attorney will be able to tailor your POA to your exact needs. They will also make sure to create a document that gives proper powers to the people you select.

Review your POA’s at least annually to be sure that the people you have selected are still the people you want taking care of your financial and medical matters, if the need should ever arise.

Most important of all, don’t wait to have powers of attorney created for you. They are even more important than a Will because the powers of attorney affect your care while you are alive.

Learn more about powers of attorney and other estate planning documents.

Reference: Lancaster Online (May 15, 2019) “Why you’re never too young for a power of attorney”

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