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There's a terrific post at Bankrate.com on a subject most folks don't think about when creating their estate plan — who will know what your passwords are so they can access your accounts? There is now a service called Legacy Locker which will store them on-line for $30 per year. Whether that serv...

When was the last time you actually LOOKED at your Will? That's right — the one stuck in the back of your filing cabinet, along with the receipts for stuff you bought in 1991. Are the kids who were then in kindergarten now out of the house and have babies of their own? Does it still name your bro...

A fiduciary is someone you've placed in a position of trust to act on your behalf. In estate planning, the fiduciaries are the executor (or personal representative) of your will, the trustee of your trust, the attorney-in-fact for your power of attorney, and your health care agent for your health...

Credit — Tim Takcas, TN elder law attorney extraordinaire http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/series/sr_13/sr13_167.pdf Data Highlights include: In 2004, there were 1.7 million nursing home beds in the U.S. compared with 1.9 million beds in 1999. The number of nursing home residents decreased from 1.6...

OK, you've finally seen a lawyer. You signed your will, durable power of attorney, health care proxy, and maybe a trust. What did you forget — or what did the lawyer forget to talk with you about? How about checking that beneficiaries on your life insurance, retirement accounts, and other assets ...

It's been nearly a year since I've posted anything — much too long. I hope that the revived blog will be of use to my readers.

Rep. McDermott (D-WA) has introduced HR 2705, which would provide a tax credit of 30% of qualified costs of legal work up to a maximum of $500 for preparation of advanced directives. Given current pressures on federal revenues, I'm not holding my breath waiting for this measure to pass, and I que...

According to a 2007 survey by the National Alliance for Caregiving, a broad-based coalition of organizations and corporations, family caregivers spent $5,500 of their own money caring for elders, not counting lost wages. Yet MassHealth has taken the position that family caregivers shouldn't be co...

By a veto-proof majority, Congress has just passed an amendment to Patient Self-Determination Act of 1991 which would include counseling concerning advanced directives as part of the “initial preventive physical examination” (IPPE), a once-in-a-lifetime benefit given to all new Medicare beneficia...

In 2001, Congress passed legislation which was intended to phase out the federal estate tax — sort of. Over the past six years, the threshold for federal estate taxation increased to its current level of $2 Million this year and $3.5 million in 2009 — and then disappear altogether for 2010 and co...