Mid Year Planning Check In! Did You Reach Your New Year’s Goals to Protect Yourself and Your Family?

We are more than half way through the year! What an exciting time for us here in Florida as we see not only the continuing growth of our state as we come back from the pandemic but anticipate the approach of cooler weather. As we get past the midway point in the year, however, it reminds us to check in on our New Year’s goals since there are less than six months to accomplish them.

Specifically, we are thinking about your plans to protect yourself and your family. If this was one of your goals at the start of the year, as it was for so many of our clients, what progress have you made toward it? Have you been able to create a Florida estate plan for yourself and your family that is able to:

• Protect your autonomy to make your own health care decisions
• Memorialize your wishes if you are in a persistent vegetative state
• Give legal authority to another to make pay your bills if you cannot
• Care for your pets and support your caregiver with financial resources
• Allow your family to protect your assets if you need long-term care
• Leave your assets to those you want to provide for at your passing
• Create a legacy that can outlive you

We know these can be difficult questions to think about and are here to help you answer them. To get started and make sure you are ready to cross this resolution off your list, let us share a few tips and questions to get you started:

• Begin with identifying why you wanted to create an estate plan at the start of the year
• Think about who should act for you in a crisis, are they readily available?
• Would you want a different person for your health care decisions versus your financial choices?
• If you named your spouse, consider what you would do if your spouse was also not available?
• Who should be second, or third, in command?

Maybe you had a different goal at the start of the year because you already have an estate plan. If that was the case, was your goal to update it? This is a critical step all of us should undertake periodically to ensure that our estate plan always reflects what we want, memorializes changes to the family structure if there are any, and gives the legal authority to your decision makers to act in a crisis.

We know this article may raise more questions than it answers, and we hope it gets you thinking about how to complete the goals you set at the start of the year. Do not wait to contact our law practice to learn more today. We encourage you to contact us and schedule a meeting. To learn more about Meloro Law and how we can help you when you need legal representation for estate planning or elder law issues do not wait to call us today.