Legacy Benefits Planning Protects Your Assets
As our loved ones age, our instinct is to spend more time celebrating their lived experiences. Thinking about the complexities of Legacy Benefits Planning often feels overwhelming, but the Elder Law practice at Marc Whitehead & Associates is an essential service that can help your family organize your legal rights and protect your family’s assets in the face of an untimely crisis. There are 2 levels of preparedness Marc Whitehead & Associates offers to assist in managing and protectinge your family’s assets: Legacy Benefits Planning, and Crisis Planning. Our goal is to help you and your family protect your assets and ultimately, avoid Probate.
- Legacy Benefits Planning is proactive: you prepare for a crisis before it happens.
- Crisis Planning is reactive: you need to retain your ability to qualify for Medicaid in an emergency situation.
- Probate leaves your estate in the hands of the state and the court system. This is the most complicated and inconvenient option.
Let’s break down what each means and why planning ahead matters.
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Legacy Benefits Planning: Proactive Protection
Legacy Benefits Planning is about preparing before a crisis happens. It’s a proactive approach that ensures your wishes are honored and your loved ones are protected. Legacy Benefits Planning is a compilation of Estate Planning and Long Term Care Planning. The documents used usually include, but are not limited to:
- Wills and Trusts – These tools help you decide who inherits your assets. Certain trusts can help protect you and your spouse’s future eligibility for Medicaid.
- Powers of Attorney – This assures you have appointed someone you trust to make financial and medical decisions on your behalf should you lose your ability to do so.
- Advanced Healthcare Directives – This document outlines your preferences for your own medical care.
Legacy Benefits Planning gives you control over your assets and safeguards you and your spouse’s eligibility for Medicaid benefits when the time is right. Best of all, your family can avoid the stress and expense of the probate process.
Crisis Planning: Reactive Measures
Crisis planning happens when you enter into an urgent scenario for which Medicaid support will be crucial. We can work quickly to prevent your family from dealing with the legal stress that often accompanies these situations.
- Families scramble to protect assets.
- Decisions may be rushed and emotionally charged.
- Your surviving spouse can lose eligibility for Medicaid coverage in the face of a crisis.
Fortunately, the team at Marc Whitehead & Associates specializes in crisis planning and we jump into action after a single phone call. We can draft the most critical planning documents needed to help you qualify for Medicaid reimbursement for your care and protect your assets in the face of a crisis. We can help you, and your spouse, retain your ability to qualify for Medicaid support. Our compassionate team of case managers are there when you need them.
Probate: The Last Resort
Probate is the court-supervised process of distributing assets when there’s no clear plan. It often involves:
- Lengthy delays,
- High legal fees,
- Public disclosure of your estate.
Avoiding probate is one of the biggest benefits of Legacy Benefits Planning. While each state’s probate process varies, it often involves limited access to assets while probate is ongoing, and once probate is settled, the remaining estate can be subject to preventable taxes. When probate is entered, this can also limit your surviving spouse’s ability to qualify for Medicaid when they need it, which can lead to incremental expenses for your family.
Our Legacy Benefits Planning Team Is Ready to Help
Estate Planning seems like a large and expensive undertaking designed for those with extensive assets. It is almost always less costly to proactively protect your assets and benefits than to allow the state to make these decisions on your behalf. Legacy Benefits Planning is one of the most important steps you can take to protect your loved ones and your legacy. Without a proper estate plan, your assets could be tied up in probate, subject to unnecessary taxes, or distributed in ways you never intended.
Our Legacy Benefits Planning team can help you create a plan that ensures your wishes are followed and your family’s future is protected. At Marc Whitehead & Associates, we have been helping our clients secure their futures for over 30 years.
Don’t leave your future to chance – call us today for more information about our Legacy Benefits Planning Services.