Elder Law

This afternoon my husband and I, along with my MIL and her other son went for a free consultation with an elder care lawyer. All of us (except for MIL of course) researched the types of help we would need from them and what they can do for us. We had thought we had everything taken care of. In a mere 2 hours we learned how wrong we were.

From Wikipedia: "Elder law is a legal term coined to cover an area of legal practice that places an emphasis on those issues that affect the growing aging population."

Ok so what does that mean? Elder law refers to several areas of law and estate planning legal practices as they relate to the elderly. Because older people are faced with difficult, end-of-life decisions involving retirement, estate planning, and long-term care, elder law focuses on wills, trusts, tax issues, Social Security benefits, Medicare and Medicaid coverage, nursing-home care, in-home care, powers of attorney, medical directives, and other legal matters of particular concern to them such as elder abuse law, plus in our case, VA benefits for a WWII veteran.

Going about this by yourself is frustrating, time consuming, and unless you know and keep up with the changing tax laws, etc, you will find yourself in a government loophole. That is actually what had been happening to us with dealing with the VA and getting benefits for a Purple Heart WWII survivor. We basically have gotten the royal runaround. In the meantime, he isn't being helped as he should and he isn't getting the benefits he should have been getting for years now. There was an added problem with WWII veterans with the loss of a lot of their records in some fire at a facility. One has to bend over backwards and go throw mazes to only find you are back at the starting point. Thankfully when he was in the severe sundown syndrome this past 2 weeks he cited his dog tag numbers which was one thing we needed for the VA. The elder care lawyer will now handle the VA and their confusing paperwork which to me, seemed to be against veterans instead of helping them. I have to say that the VA system left me with a very nasty taste in my mouth working with them. Maybe that is what they want - to make it so very hard to disentangle the roadmap to benefits that most just give up. I don't know. I just know our experiences and no one there at the VA was helpful in any way shape or form.

When should one consult with one? The planning should begin a minimum of 10+ years before one plans on retiring. The elder care lawyer we spoke to today stated that one should actually begin planning as soon as they marry, or even if they never plan on marrying. Wills are not enough. Full financial planning with a trust set up is the only thing that protects your assets. My husband and I will be setting an appointment up with them within the next 3 months.

What does one find such a lawyer? Well, I found this lawyer by cross checking www*.*martingdale*.*com for competency of the lawyer, the area I wished to stay within, and then I made sure the elder care lawyer was certified in Elder Care Law (www*.*nelf*.*org/). As always, remove the *'s.