West Newsmagazine 2/10/16

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WESTNEWSMAGAZINE.COM
February 10, 2016
WEST NEWSMAGAZINE
I 7
Did You Forget Something?
Law Matters
I got a call
from one of
my clients.
She's in her
80s and is
worrying
about whether
everything is
in proper
order. Her estate
plan had been prepared by another
attorney over 25 years ago. The
laws have changed a lot in that time,
but not in ways that really affected
her plan, so no major re-drafting
was required.
I wanted to make sure that all of
her assets were retitled in her name
as trustee (I covered that in an earlier
column), so we looked over her
accounts. It looked as if all of her
assets were in her name as trustee,
which is the way you title things into
a trust.
I asked about her IRAs. Back in
1999 the IRS said that you can have
IRA proceeds flow through trusts.
Then in 2014 the US Supreme Court
ruled that inherited IRAs were not
protected in bankruptcy. An employee's
IRA is protected, but not
inherited IRAs.
She brought out her certificates,
and we looked for the beneficiary
designations. After a little searching,
we discovered that there was not a
beneficiary designation. My client's
son and daughter-in-law agreed to
take care of that.
I didn't see a financial power of
attorney in the folder with her estate
planning documents, and her son
handed me another folder. The
power of attorney in it was clearly
different from the other estate planning
documents. When I asked
about it, the son told me that he had
gotten it off the Internet because
they didn't have one before. The
bank accepted it, so they were fine.
So then I asked about her medical
directive. I got blank stares. I
asked about a health care power of
attorney. More stares. When I
asked about a living will, they said
they had heard of that but didn't
have one. It looked as if these
documents had not been prepared.
Although a medical power of
attorney and a living will can be two
separate documents, it is common
for them both to be included in a
single document called a "Medical
Directive" or "Health Care Directive."
The medical power of attorney
states that if you are unable to make
medical decisions, you authorize
someone else to make those
decisions.
A living will provides that if you
are in a persistent vegetative state
with no reasonable expectation of
recovery, no extraordinary means
(which you define) are to be taken to
sustain your life. Both of these are
important documents that should
not be overlooked.
For more information on health
care planning, please see my article
"Health Care Planning" on my blog
at www.law-matters.net. To
schedule an appointment, please call
(636) 537-7884 or email me at
fvilbig@shandselbert.com.
Fred L. Vilbig is an attorney with over 30
years of experience in the areas of wills
and trusts, small businesses, and real
estate. This column is for informational
purposes only. Nothing herein should be
treated as legal advice or as creating an
attorney-client relationship. The choice
of a lawyer is an important decision
and should not be based solely upon
advertisements.
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2/2/16 10:09 AM
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