ASSET PROTECTION PLANNING

Default Rules

If long-term care is needed, our government requires us to deplete just about everything we have ever worked for, and only then will they step in and provide us with assistance for paying for the long-term care - as long as we have used our funds on ourselves within the past five years and not made gifts to other family members or friends.  In that default plan, we leave our often largest assets, our home and the equity we spent years building, exposed to be recovered by the state's Medicaid Recovery Program when we pass away.  You may have heard a friend or family member reference someone "lost their house to the nursing home."  Typically, it is the State, rather than the nursing home, that recovers the house when a person has received Medicaid benefits.

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Proactive Approach

Asset protection planning is a proactive approach designed to provide you with a plan to preserve the assets you want to protect from potential long-term care costs. With Asset Protection Planning, we understand the government's position and make sure to follow their rulebook. Taking a proactive approach, we begin the planning process at least five years before we think someone will need long-term care, which is in compliance with the 5-year lookback period.  This involves taking some of your assets, usually things that have not been driving your retirement or are not being used on a regular basis, and transferring them into a trust designed to protect them from exposure to your long-term care expenses.  After five years, those assets not in your name are no longer subject to being spent on long-term care expenses.

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Impossible Question

The question most families struggle with answering is "how are we supposed to know when we will need long-term care in the future?"  If you are approaching or already in retirement, and have concerns about the possibility of long-term care in the future for you or a loved one, it is time for us to sit down and explore this proactive plan before the need for care exists. 

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Do It For Your Family

If you want to create a plan to avoid leaving 100% of your life's savings to the risk of long-term care expenses or learn more about how this strategy is implemented, give our office a call and schedule a complimentary consultation.