How can an Elder Law Attorney Help Plan for Disability?
By Barry Zimmer on September 19th, 2017 in Elder Law
An elder law attorney can provide assistance in making a plan in case you become disabled. Our legal team can also provide assistance in helping you to create a plan if someone you love is disabled and you want to ensure his care or make a financial gift.
Understanding the laws that affect people with disabilities is very important, in part because the chances of disability are not that remote. The Council for Disability Awareness indicates more than one in four of today’s 20-year-olds will become disabled before their retirement years, and some will become severely disabled. It makes good sense to work with Zimmer Law Firm to ensure you have the right plans in place in case disability affects you.
Give us a call to find out more about how an elder law attorney provides assistance with disability planning or read on to discover some of the ways in which we can assist you in preparing in case of your own disability or providing for someone you care about who has special needs.
How an Elder Law Attorney Helps You Make a Disability Plan
If you have a disabled loved one, your disability plan will vary depending upon whether you simply want to make a financial gift or whether you are in charge of the disabled person’s care. If you want to make a financial gift, you will need to structure the gift so you don’t cause a loss of access to means-tested benefits like Medicaid. You can use a special needs trust so assets can be used to enhance quality of life for a disabled loved one without counting as financial resources that cause a loss of needs-based benefits.
If you are providing care for a disabled loved one, you’ll need to name a guardian to take over your role once you can no longer fulfill it and will need to make sure that the person you are caring for has a safe living environment that is affordable. Purchasing life insurance to provide funds to pay for care in an institutional environment or to pay for caregivers after you are gone can be an important part of your disability plans in this situation.
If you wish to plan ahead for your own disability, the services an elder law attorney will provide will be different. Our legal team can help you to make sure you can afford nursing home care if your disability necessitates it, by making sure you can qualify for Medicaid coverage without losing all of your assets first.
Medicaid is typically the only source of payment for custodial care, or routine nursing home care required because you need help with things like showering and eating. When many people become physically or mentally disabled due to injury, illness, or old age, it is custodial care that they end up needing— and Medicare, private insurance, Medigap, and other similar policies are typically not going to pay anything at all for custodial care.
We can assist you in using advanced directives for healthcare to express your preferences on the kinds of care you want to receive or wish to decline in case you ever develop a disability that makes it impossible for you to communicate your wishes on care in an emergency situation. And, we can help you to make sure a legacy plan is in order because you never know when something could happen to you. An illness or injury could cause you to develop a disabling condition that makes it impossible for you to express your preferences for what should happen to your assets if you pass away.
There are a wide variety of legal tools you can use to keep your assets safe, protect your autonomy and provide for your family in case you become disabled and we will help you to make effective use of those tools as appropriate for your situation.
Getting Help from an Elder Law Attorney
An elder law attorney at Zimmer Law Firm will carefully evaluate your situation, whether you are concerned about your own disability or working to protect and provide for a disabled person you care about. We can advise you on the steps you should take to put appropriate plans in place, whether those plans include a special needs trust, an incapacity plan, or the use of other types of legal tools specific to your situation.
To find out more about the services our legal team provides in connection with disability planning, join us for a free seminar. You can also give us a call at 513.721.1513 to get personalized advice.