Being at or close to retirement is a good time to have a legal check-up regarding the appropriateness of all of your legal documents and other retirement issues. Retirement is a significant change in your life and with all significant changes, your legal plan should be reviewed.
Retirement planning is so much more than calculating how much interest your investments can generate in your retirement years.
Proper retirement planning is a strategic plan that takes into consideration the many challenges you could face in this new chapter of your life.
You should have an elder law estate planning attorney review all of your financial, legal and retirement plans.
All estate plans should include, at a minimum, two important documents: a durable power of attorney and a will.The first is for managing your property during your life, in case you are ever unable to do so yourself.Even if you do not want any changes made to your power of attorney, and even if the power of attorney is supposed to be “durable,” many times our clients will find that banks will only accept a “recent” document and “recent” is defined differently by different banks. This is especially true since there was a major law change in 2011.
The second document, a will and/or trust, is for the management and distribution of your property after death.
There are some aspects of retirement planning that are often overlooked by financial planners; specifically, most often the long-term care planning component of your retirement.
You could have a properly drafted financial plan, but if you or your spouse are paying $17,000 per month to a nursing home, it can decimate the best laid plans.
There are also significant tax and income strategies that have legal ramifications to both you and your spouse. When you move from the earning years of your life to the income years of your life, significant planning must occur.
Feel free to contact our office to review your estate and retirement plan.
