Rumors, fears, and casual conversations about Medicaid often lead to false and erroneous beliefs that deter a family from seeking help paying for home care, or nursing home care. One common belief is “the state will take everything”. In fact the state does not take anything. What it does do is make people spend their assets in accordance with the Medicaid rules until they are eligible. For example, a person living at home could pay off a mortgage, could buy furniture or a lift chair, could do prepaid funerals and could make improvements to their home. These are only a few examples of what the rules allow for a spenddown.

If you are taking a long road trip to a place you have never been, you probably are going to look at a road map to help make decisions on the route to choose. But nowadays, the GPS on phones or cars has provided a new method of guidance from start to finish. If you then deviate from the route, it recalculates and tells you a new route or routes to follow.

You worked hard to earn a living, take care of your family and like most people, want to pass on something to your family. What do you really have to worry about, and what are the possible solutions? Here are some thoughts.

Memory loss can creep up over time or be a sudden devastating hit with a stroke. Let’s face it, it’s something we would prefer not to think about. But we must, because the Journal of the American Medical Association has reported that managing personal finances is one of the first life activities to decline with cognitive impairment and early stages of memory loss. What should be done to protect your financial plan if your memory fails?

That old adage expresses the feeling of a great many people. For those of advanced age, the home can also become a risk for injury if certain precautions aren’t taken. There is no way to insure 100% safety, but here are some ideas.

There are many children who have sacrificed greatly to give care to an elderly parent so that the parent can stay in the family home. Some have even given up their jobs to give that care. Besides that being a tremendous devotion to a loved parent, the federal and state law recognizes that keeping the elder parent at home may very well have saved the state and federal governments tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars because the parent did not have to enter a nursing home during that time.