What Does Pure Friendship for the AARP Set Look Like?

According to Maryland law, a will is not legally enforceable unless it bears the signature of the testator and the signatures of two witnesses.  The testator and both witnesses must all be in each other’s presence when they sign the will.  This is all the reason you need to invite two friends to your house for a will signing party.  For triple the fun, the witnesses can also bring their own wills for you to sign.

From a legal standpoint, any adult can act as a witness to your will, from a close family member to a complete stranger.  The best choice, though, is people you trust and who have no ulterior motives, whose only wish in the matter is for your will to be legally valid.  Maryland law does not prohibit beneficiaries of the will from signing it as witnesses.  While it is a good idea to tell the beneficiaries of your will about its contents, if you choose to, it is not a good idea to have them sign it as witnesses.  When the beneficiaries witness the will, there is too much room for speculation about undue influence, especially if the testator has disinherited other close family members who did not sign the will as witnesses.

Contact Tobin O’Connor Ewing About Formalizing a Legally Enforceable Will

A Washington, D.C. estate planning attorney can help you draft your will so that you and two of your closest friends can sign it in style.  Contact Tobin, O’Connor, and Ewing in Washington, D.C. or call 202-362-5900.

Sources:

registers.maryland.gov/main/publications/wills.html

registers.maryland.gov/main/region/howard/The%20Last%20Will%20and%20Testament%20Brochure.pdf

Being Disinherited by a Family Member That You Thought Forgave You Hurts Twice as Much

Negative emotions tend to motivate people to rewrite their wills more quickly than positive emotions do.  It’s easy to fire up your computer and rewrite your will to disinherit a relative after an argument, or even after the relative makes an insensitive comment on social media, and if you’re still mad by the time you have printed your will and assembled two witnesses, your inconsiderate relative’s inheritance is gone.

You would be surprised how easy it is to procrastinate rewriting your will when things are going well.  If your kids get along with each other for an entire road trip, you don’t think, “I should rewrite my will to reflect that I now have two children, so that they can continue to get along with each other after I die.”  When you get remarried, you don’t think, “I should rewrite my will so that my spouse does not go through an ugly probate battle with my children from my first marriage.”  In both of these cases, you should update your will, but it is easy to procrastinate when you are not feeling acute discomfort.

Likewise, reconciling with a previously estranged relative is beautiful.  If you have a troubled history, then reconnecting with your relative may be a relief to both of you, but you may have lingering doubts about whether all is really forgiven.  The best way to make your reconciliation absolute is to rewrite your will to include the relative with which you have reconciled.  Otherwise, your estate plan will feel like another rejection.

Contact Tobin O’Connor Ewing About Formalizing Your Reconciliation With a Family Member

A Washington, D.C. estate planning attorney can help you write a new version of your will if you have reconciled with a formerly estranged relative.  Contact Tobin, O’Connor, and Ewing in Washington, D.C. or call 202-362-5900.

Source:

people.com/tv/david-cassidy-will-estate-son-inheritance/

Anyone Who Has Ever Coughed Up a Furball on the Carpet Should Not Be a Beneficiary of Your Will

Probate courts do not usually directly contradict the provisions of a legally valid will, but a probate court recently ordered the removal of seven pampered Persian cats from the McMansion they had inherited.  The cats belonged to a woman who died at age 84 and left a will saying that her estate was not to sell her house until after the last of her seven cats had died.  The will stipulated that the cats should live out their days in her house, where they had lived since they were kittens.  She set aside a separate amount of money for each cat’s care.

While the decedent was meticulous in specifying that the estate should sell the house after the last of the cats died and in calculating each animal’s expenses, the probate court was not satisfied.  The Humane Society determined that it was not safe for the cats to live together in the house without a human roommate, even though someone came to the house several times per day to feed the cats and clean the litter box.  The probate court ordered the personal representative to find new homes for the cats, while making every effort to honor the decedent’s wishes to keep the cats together.

A way to avoid this problem is to set up a trust to manage the care of your pets after you die.  It should include a salary for a full-time caregiver, preferably on a live-in basis, who may or may not be the same as the trustee.

Contact Tobin O’Connor Ewing About Estate Planning for Animal Lovers

A Washington, D.C. estate planning attorney can help you write an estate plan that provides for the care of your pets.  Contact Tobin, O’Connor, and Ewing in Washington, D.C. or call 202-362-5900.

Source:

usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2023/06/20/nancy-sauer-tampa-cats-inheritance/70337455007/

What the Data Say About Planning to Work Past Age 65

Your anticipated age of retirement is a wish, not a known quantity.  If you ask a group of 50-year-olds at what age they plan to retire, most of them will end up retiring several years earlier than that.  Greg Iacurci of CNBC personal finance has even deduced a mathematical formula for this phenomenon.  Take the age at which you want to retire and subtract 69.  Say you want to retire at age 69; 69 minus 61 is eight.  Now divide eight by two, so you get four.  Now add four to 61, so you get 65.  Iacurci says that you will most likely retire at age 65.  Therefore, you should base all your financial plans on making it halfway from your 61^st birthday to your anticipated retirement date.

Not all early retirements are alike.  Only one third of people who retire earlier than their originally anticipated retirement age do so because they were able to build up more savings than they expected, making an earlier retirement financially feasible.  Another third retire earlier because of health issues, and the last third do so because of job layoffs.  The worse news is that only 10 percent of the gray-haired bearers of pink slips are able to find jobs that pay as much as their previous jobs.  Most of them stay in the workforce part time; the lucky few who are able to find new full-time jobs find jobs that pay less than their former employers paid.  Age discrimination stinks, and you have the right to sue if your employer fires you because of your age.  Meanwhile, you should also make financial plans based on the assumption that how long you stay in the workforce is not entirely within your control.

Contact Tobin O’Connor Ewing About Estate Planning for Industrious Seniors

A Washington, D.C. estate planning attorney can help you if you must retire sooner than you had hoped.  Contact Tobin, O’Connor, and Ewing in Washington, D.C. or call 202-362-5900.

Source:

cnbc.com/2023/10/31/why-working-longer-is-not-a-good-retirement-plan.html

Are You Ready to Move Across the Border to West Virginia?

Bankrate’s rankings of the most and least expensive rates to retire are in for this year, and much to the surprise of no one who lives in the D.C. area, Maryland is one of the most expensive states for retirees.  In fact, in terms of the cost of living for retirees, Maryland ranks fifth, behind New York, California, Massachusetts, and Washington.  Meanwhile, the least expensive state to retire is West Virginia. In fact, Bankrate considers West Virginia the third best state to retire when you take into account non-financial factors as well as financial ones.  West Virginia’s low crime rate and relatively mild winters also make it an attractive destination for retirees.

Florida, the focus of so many retirement daydreams during cold Maryland winters and Beltway traffic jams that you are getting too old to sit through, has long since lost its place among the top ten most affordable places to spend one’s retirement.  In 2022, Florida ranked as the 18^th most affordable state to retire, but in 2023, it ranks 35^th.  This is another way of saying that it is only ten states more affordable than Maryland.  This is partly attributable to the large numbers of people who have moved to Florida since the beginning of the pandemic, making for a very competitive housing market.  Furthermore, the cost of homeowners’ insurance in Florida is prohibitively expensive because destructive hurricanes make landfall in Florida so frequently; some insurance companies refuse to issue homeowners’ insurance policies at all.

Contact Tobin O’Connor Ewing About Planning for Housing Expenses in Retirement

A Washington, D.C. estate planning attorney can help you use the proceeds of the sale of your empty nest toward an affordable lifestyle in retirement, whether in Maryland or in another state.  Contact Tobin, O’Connor, and Ewing in Washington, D.C. or call 202-362-5900.

Sources:

nationalmortgageprofessional.com/news/florida-battles-riptide-closing-problems

cnbc.com/2023/08/31/cheapest-us-states-to-retire-in-2023.html

Not Quite a Hospital, but Not a Nursing Home

When a patient is hospitalized for a serious illness or injury, then being stable enough to leave the hospital does not always equal being healthy enough to go home and go on with your life as it was before the hospitalization.  Sometimes patients require additional rehabilitation and physical therapy before they are ready to go home.  Therefore, the patients go to a skilled nursing facility to continue their recovery.

At a skilled nursing facility, patients meet with physical therapists or occupational therapists several times per day.  Nurses on staff also help the patients with activities of daily living, such as eating, bathing, and getting dressed, much like in a nursing home.  Patients stay in skilled nursing facilities for anywhere from a few weeks to a few months, and the level of care that the patient receives steps down as the patient makes progress toward engaging in activities of daily living without assistance.  Doctors evaluate patients at skilled nursing facilities periodically and determine when a patient has reached maximum medical improvement, in other words, the new normal.  The ideal scenario is that maximum medical improvement means being as healthy as you were before your hospitalization, or at least being able to live at home with only as much help as you can get from your family or from a home health aide.  In some cases, though, patients must move from the skilled nursing facility to a nursing home, where the nursing staff will provide as much help as the patient needs with the tasks of daily living.  Put another way, you go to a skilled nursing facility to get better, but you go to a nursing home to maintain the status quo.

How Affordable Are Skilled Nursing Facilities?

Medicare pays for up to 100 days in a skilled nursing facility for patients aged 65 and older.  If you are younger than 65, Medicaid, long-term care insurance, or hybrid life insurance will cover some or all of the cost.

Contact Tobin O’Connor Ewing About Planning for Medical Care in Retirement

A Washington, D.C. estate planning attorney can help you plan to afford the various types of long-term care that you may need in the future.  Contact Tobin, O’Connor, and Ewing in Washington, D.C. or call 202-362-5900.

Sources:

uhc.com/news-articles/medicare-articles/whats-the-difference-between-a-skilled-nursing-facility-and-a-nursing-home

aarp.org/caregiving/health/info-2021/when-to-apply-for-medicaid.html?intcmp=AE-CAR-BB

Beware of Utopian Estate Planning

The purpose of your most important estate planning documents is to prevent ambiguity and disputes about what should happen to your property when you die and what your wishes are about your finances, medical treatment, and long-term care in the event that you become seriously ill.  If all of the people that you put in charge of your property and decisions are still alive and well when you grow old and die, then your estate plan will go off without a hitch.  Stuff happens, though, and not everyone to whom you have assigned roles in your estate plan may be available to fulfill their designated functions.  Just as theater directors cast understudies to play each role if the original actor is ill or on jury duty on the day of a performance, you should indicate successors in each of your estate planning documents.

For example, your will should list a personal representative, plus a successor personal representative who will take on the role if the first personal representative predeceases you.  It is easier to do this than to scramble to formalize a new version of your will after the first personal representative dies.  You should also list successors for the beneficiaries.  If you have minor children, your will should indicate a guardian for them, as well as a successor guardian.

Contact Tobin O’Connor Ewing About Gifts as an Estate Planning Strategy

A Washington, D.C. estate planning attorney can help you draft your estate planning documents such that they include successors, thus reducing the need for later revisions.  Contact Tobin, O’Connor, and Ewing in Washington, D.C. or call 202-362-5900.

Source:

leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&URL=0700-0799/0736/Sections/0736.1106.html

The Crab Cake State Is No Place for Octogenarians, Unless They Were Multimillionaires at Age 65

“How much does it cost to retire in Maryland?” is such a vague question as to be unanswerable.  Most people retire not because they have met a specific financial goal that they set years earlier.  Instead, they retire either because their health no longer permits them to work, or else because they have reached an age where the bother of work outweighs the financial benefit they could derive from it.  According to Maryland law, you only need $90 per month, as long as your nursing home care is paid for; $90 is the amount of spending money that Medicaid nursing home receives.  They do not even get their own Social Security checks; those go straight to Medicaid to offset the cost of nursing home care.

A recent report by Go Banking Rates says that Maryland is the sixth most expensive for retirees, behind a top five that includes some of the usual suspects, plus, more surprisingly, Alaska.  The only states where retirees’ annual expenses are higher than they are in Maryland are Hawaii, New York, California, Massachusetts, and Alaska.  Your total annual expenses as a retiree in Maryland are $64,706.98.  In other words, if you retire in Maryland at age 65 with $1 million in your bank account, you will be fine unless you live past age 80.

Contact Tobin O’Connor Ewing About an Affordable Retirement in Maryland

A Washington, D.C. estate planning attorney can help you afford to retire in Maryland, even if you are not a millionaire.  Contact Tobin, O’Connor, and Ewing in Washington, D.C. or call 202-362-5900.

Source:

gobankingrates.com/retirement/planning/how-long-million-last-retirement-state/

Strategies for Avoiding the Cold and Its Hazards

It only takes one bad winter to turn you from a healthy, active senior to someone who can no longer live independently without a lot of assistance.  Elderly people have a higher risk of suffering serious injuries if they slip and fall on icy or snowy ground, even if they were in excellent health before the accidental fall.  Likewise, social isolation is terrible for seniors, both because loneliness and depression can worsen cognitive decline, creating a vicious cycle, and because it is harder to get adequate food and heating when you are all by yourself, snowed in, and already in a vulnerable state of health.

In temperate climates like we have in southern Maryland, aging in place is about more than building a bench in your shower and moving into a bedroom on the main floor.  It also means having family members or professional caregivers with whom you are in frequent contact.  Every year, at least a few seniors die from hyperthermia in their own apartments, either because mobility impairments or lack of cold perception prevented them from adjusting the thermostat or because they could not afford to pay for heating and had nowhere else to go and no one to call for help.  It is a major challenge to go grocery shopping in winter weather when you are elderly and alone.

Even if you have your mind made up to age in place, it pays to have long-term care insurance or a hybrid life insurance policy that pays for long-term care benefits.  This way, you will be able to afford to move to an assisted living facility if you decide that winter at home is too much for you.

Contact Tobin O’Connor Ewing About Estate Planning

A Washington, D.C. estate planning attorney can help you build a practical plan for aging in place.  Contact Tobin, O’Connor, and Ewing in Washington, D.C. or call 202-362-5900.

Source:

co.delaware.ny.us/departments/shrf/docs/wintersafety_tips.pdf

The Miser’s Estate Plan

Some people approach estate planning out of a desire to keep money and decision-making power out of the hands of other entities.  For example, they might set up trusts because they don’t want a probate court to have a say in how their designated representatives use their assets.  They might also include a provision in their trust, whether it is a revocable trust or a testamentary trust, that gives the beneficiaries little to no control over what they do with the money they receive from the trust.  Sometimes it is wise to do these things if you have a reasonable fear that your surviving family members will be impoverished if you don’t, but if you are just doing it so that you can be the one in control, you will eventually have to accept that it is impossible to micromanage from beyond the grave.

Thinking Beyond Money

A scarcity mindset is when you make decisions based on the assumption that resources are limited and you must apportion the resources you have.  By contrast, an abundance mindset is where you set goals first and find ways to pursue them with the resources you have second.  If the balance in your savings account when you retire is X, it makes sense to buy a hybrid life insurance policy, because whether it pays for your long-term care, a payout to a surviving relative, or both, it costs a lot less than if you had paid the sticker price for either of those things.  With an abundance mindset, you should also assume that your family does not need or want to inherit any money from you, and that they will just be relieved not to have to guess what your wishes are regarding your care and your estate.

Contact Tobin O’Connor Ewing About Estate Planning

A Washington, D.C. estate planning attorney can help you adopt an abundance mindset about your estate plan.  Contact Tobin, O’Connor, and Ewing in Washington, D.C. or call 202-362-5900.

Source:

rightasrain.uwmedicine.org/life/relationships/scarcity-mindset