With this revolutionary new APP, you can be rest assured that the family and friends involved in any given life event or tragedy can carry on, and continue a life or in some cases, finish one. With the help of Your Backup Plan Mobile APP, all the precious and valuable information that makes up one persons life is contained in a secure easy and user-friendly app. www.yourbackupplan.ca
Now available on iTunes Store and Google Play Store!
YOUR BACKUP PLAN
The Key to Security for your Family
Showing posts with label health planning. Show all posts
Showing posts with label health planning. Show all posts
This Backup
Plan technology takes on one of the world’s biggest problems.
Let’s take
some time to talk about something taboo in our culture: death, sickness or a
disability. With so many disasters coming your way how can you possibly recover
from them every time everywhere.
Chances are
if you’re reading this, you know someone either distant or close to you that
has experienced one of these. You read this, you make dinner, or lunches for
the kids, and you forget about it. So the concept of an innovative system that
provides you and your family peace of mind may not appeal to some of you
because it will never happen to you; but it’s a simple technological innovation
that could help millions of lives around the world.
The facts
are that it will happen, because we don’t get up in the morning to plan for a
tragedy, or a disaster. They just happen.
Whether
you are single or have a partner, everyone’s Life puzzle is complicated and
unique. Your family or friends may not know all the details of your puzzle but
when tragedy hits your life – your family or friends will need a very quick
recovery to that valuable information!
That’s
when Your Backup Plan enables you and your family to put your life’s puzzle
back together.
Where are all your Medical records? Only the nurses in our BC Medical system realize that our hospitals in most cases don't share YOUR MEDICAL records with any other hospital. So, I'll give you an example. You have a blood clot appear all of a sudden in your leg and you get rushed to one of the hospitals in Abbotsford or Chilliwack or the Okanagan. They are asking for your medical records to see if you are allergic to anything, or what medications that you've had, or what you have you a reaction to etc. No one will know the information about your blood type, your last test results, or even what would be the best treatment advice considering your own records. Without any difficulties you can get a family member to pull out your medical records and get them to you. With no effort all of your documents and information is kept all in one place! Let's Expect the Unexpected and get prepared with YOUR BACKUP PLAN!
Facebook is only one newer Social Media contact that we have in our lives today!
And if our family or friends don't know our Facebook password then if something happened to us, with living or not, they would not be able to change the page or delete the page without many years of effort.
Let's Expect the Unexpected and get prepared with YOUR BACKUP PLAN!
So you finished school and went out into the world to work your butt off and create health ,wealth and happiness for yourself. The american dream …get a job start a career and a family.Buy a house and a car or two and start putting money away for the future.Well fast forward a couple of decades and maybe things aren’t where you thought they would be.Maybe it just isn’t looking like you saw it in your head.
Here is where we are today people are trying to retire and worked the last 30 plus years to put away enough to enjoy the( golden years ) They keep telling you about.Now this could be for a lot of reasons layoffs ,cutbacks,divorce,health issues or an accident.Maybe your investments went bust or your house values crashed. Sound familiar?
So what are you going to do ? maybe you see the writing on the wall down the line a few years for your self and you are looking to course correct now . Sorry if I come off all doom and gloomy but there is an alternative.
Plan B the back up plan .The what if the SHTF ( shit hits the fan) sorry if that offends anyone it is a broad and encompassing phrase that covers a multitude of scenarios from the minor lost my job to the end of the world and every thing in between.So what if? Well you need a fallback plan something that you can count on come what may.
What is that ? What does that look like ? How does that work? I’m glad you asked.;) It looks like a way to live without needing a bunch of money and infrastructure and still keep a standard of living you can be happy with no matter what happens .Some thing you can put in place now so you have the peace of mind that your covered for the future.
What does that take ?well I see the big costs of living today Housing is number one.How much money do you need to live if housing is no longer an issue? the second seems to be transportation gas prices are not going down that is for sure.Then food and healthcare.
Well lets solve the big one housing .Having a micro house built and setting in the back yard is a major piece of insurance in my opinion .It’s the fall back the escape pod the backup plan for the SHTF possibility of the unknown future .What if the power fails or there’s an earthquake or hurricane a blizzard and so on and basic services are interrupted wouldn’t it be nice to go over and get inside your micro house and fire up the heat and lights and be able to cook a meal and not just survive but thrive .
Lets talk about location.Micro houses can be placed in locations that would otherwise be prohibitive to live in either by price or the inability to build in an environment .So you can put it in a backyard or beach front on a lake river ocean pond ect… but the view or amenities are to die for.Who can afford a (million dollar view ) but you can barrow it for little or nothing .
You could live in walking distance or biking distance of all your shopping and business needs minimising or eliminating the need for a car.if you park your micro house in an area that has space for a garden then you can produce some of your own food cutting expenses further.
Lastly your health is very important and I want to touch on or bring full circle the backup plan living more simply and deliberately gives you time.Time to prepare your own food from scratch .Time to walk or bike to where you want to go .Time to be outside in the garden working in the fresh air and sunshine.Time to spend with family and a great place to live for a fraction of the cost of traditional lifestyle we have now .All we have is time health and family all we need is food shelter and clothing .If we have these we have more than the majority of the people on the planet . After that everything else is excess and luxury. This lifestyle by design If you choose it
This article is from the USA, but interesting read on getting better prepared with aging parents!
How to Discuss Estate Planning with Aging Parents over the Holidays
by Matthew Karr, Esq. on December 1, 2011
The holiday season is here and now may be a good time to start conversations with loved ones about the future and their estate planning needs. As difficult as it may seem, having conversations early can help families work together and avoid crises down the road.
It’s very common for family members, especially those who live far apart, to notice changes in a loved one’s cognitive or physical capabilities when they get together for the holidays. The realization that Mom or Dad or Aunt Sally may need more help than they used to can cause a growing concern for the well-being of your aging parents or loved ones.
But what can you do? Where should you start? Here are a few pointers than can help start the conversation.
■ Begin by having short, informal conversations with your family members to explore what their concerns are.
■ Gather information about what help might be needed and contact an elder law attorney to learn about the available options.
■ Consider holding a family meeting to talk about the present and the future. Work with your family members to create a list of topics to discuss with your attorney, and get Mom and Dad – or Aunt Sally – involved, too. Once you figure out what’s important to everyone (for example, protecting the home or avoiding probate), set up a free consultation to have your concerns addressed.
Seem impossible or overwhelming? Seek some expert help. Below are some things to consider and questions to ask:
1. Not sure where to start? The best place is usually the basics: Do they have any estate planning documents? Where are they located? When was the last time they were reviewed? Estate planning documents should be reviewed bi-annually to ensure they are effective.
2. Are the seniors in your family prepared in case they or their spouse need long-term care? At $10,000 per month, long-term care costs can devastate a family’s resources if not planned for well ahead of time.
3. Has a healthcare proxy and durable power of attorney been named for each senior? This can be extremely important should an emergency require a family member to make important health and financial decisions for another.
4. If you have an estate plan, is it set up to maximize benefits and reduce or eliminate liabilities for your family? Avoiding the time and cost of probate, reducing or eliminating estate taxes, and ensuring a swift and orderly distribution to heirs can all be accomplished with an effective estate plan.
5. Dreading the conversation? What if family members disagree about next steps? Or maybe they don’t think anything needs to be done? Download one of our free reports to help guide the conversation. You could also invite an elder law attorney into the conversation to help mediate conflicting ideas. The main goal is to protect your family and once that is clear, other details can usually be ironed out once everyone is well informed.
The bottom line is – as difficult as it may seem, starting the conversation before a crisis will help everyone in the long run. Call the Heritage Law Center and let us help you start the new year on the right foot.
Thank you to :
by Matthew Karr, Esq. on December 1, 2011, Mass health and Planning Elder law
Check out this blog by US News Money, Alpha Consumer, about a new book out on Estate planning for the stars! Probate Wars of the Rich and Famous, by estate lawyer Russell Fishkind
Some tips: Complicated family situations, guardians, not updating your estate, see it all from the Celebrities!
It is the kind of estate-planning drama that regularly plays out in the office of lawyer Barry Fish: A mother has two grown children. The daughter is her “good child” while the son is insulting, uncaring and estranged.
Despite the son’s black-sheep status, the mother wants to make peace and won’t cut him out of her will. She agonizes, and eventually decides to leave 95 per cent of the estate to her “good” daughter, whom she makes executor, and the remaining 5 per cent to her “bad” son.
“The glitch is that the bad son, once he finds out that he has a piece of the action, drives the good daughter crazy,” says Mr. Fish, who has been practising estate law for 38 years in Thornhill, Ont.. “He demands a full accounting of the whole estate, challenges everything, and creates no end of difficulty for her.”
Mr. Fish says the mother would have been better off writing the son a cheque for $10,000 and leaving the estate to her daughter. The son “is not going to get far challenging that in court,” he says.
Estate planning is an emotionally charged process, but having a black sheep in the family makes it vastly more complicated.
With more money at stake, and a growing focus on proper estate planning, what was once only an issue for the well-off has extended to older Canadians of all financial backgrounds. A huge transfer of wealth is soon to occur in Canada, with one estimate projecting that baby boomers will inherit $1-trillion over the next 20 years.
“Think about 10 families you know, and there will most likely be at least one black-sheep child in one of these families,” says Mark Goodfield, a tax partner at Cunningham LLP in Toronto and author of the Blunt Bean Counter blog.
Some fall under the classic definition of black sheep – a son or daughter who has embraced values the parents don’t approve of. But for the purposes of estate planning, Mr. Goodfield says, there are other kinds: the person who is financially irresponsible; the drug or alcohol addict; the person who has a partner the parents strongly dislike.
“A black-sheep child can be one that just spends crazily so parents have to deal with them separately in their will,” he says.
When there’s a family business, a son or daughter who doesn’t work for it may be considered the odd one out.
There are a myriad of issues parents struggle with: Do they reward the “good” child with a bigger inheritance? Or do they leave more money to the “bad” child, since they will need it more? What if he or she is married to someone they don’t trust? Sometimes, the parents disagree between themselves.
Of course, there is no rule that parents have to include all or any of their children in their wills. In the case of estrangement, some parents choose to cut a child out completely.
(In that case, it is important to “bullet-proof” the will by officially verifying the parent’s medical capacity, Mr. Fish says. To avoid a challenge based on undue influence, the favoured child should not be present when the lawyer and parent are working on the will.)
“From what I have seen, people are emotional powder kegs,” Mr. Fish says.
In most situations, parents would like to be even-handed.
“As a starting point, most parents want to treat their children equally,” says Elaine Blades, director of fiduciary services at Scotia Private Client Group. “At the very least, they want to be fair. I tell clients that fair and equal are not always the same thing.”
The more marriages and children you throw into the picture, the more complicated it gets, she says.
One solution is to create a testamentary trust, which will ensure the black-sheep child will receive an inheritance once the parent dies. By placing specific conditions on the trust, parents can control how and when the money is spent.
“There are trusts that you can set up where the money can only be used to pay for education,” Ms. Blades says. “Or you can make sure that if the child files for bankruptcy, you will not end up paying the creditors.”
Sometimes parents choose to take into account that they have spent more on one child during their lifetime – as in the case of a professional student – and leave an unequal distribution at the time of death to make up for that.
Although parents have no obligation to treat their children equally, many feel guilty if they do not, says Ms. Blades. Some worry about the optics of giving one child their share outright while putting another’s in a trust.
One way around that is to put both children’s inheritance in a trust but place more stringent conditions on the black-sheep child’s access to the money.
“Parents don’t want to make it look like they love one child more than the other,” Ms. Blades says. “So this is a satisfying solution. At first glance the distribution looks equal, but the money in one child’s can in effect be a lot harder to get at.”
Some parents feel responsible for how their black-sheep child turned out. “There can be tremendous guilt from the parents. Sometimes they feel obliged to put something in the will saying why they included or excluded them,” Ms. Blades says.
Mr. Fish says parents can unknowingly create problems for the “good” child by favouring him or her in their will. “The biggest challenge is to create peace for the favoured child: to come away knowing you have made their position as free from conflict as possible.”
Making one child the trustee of the other’s inheritance, or the sole executor of the will, often ruins relations between brothers and sisters, he says.
“I have seen children beg their parents not to be harsh because they have to have a relationship with their sibling.”
One solution is for parents to “thin out” their estate, basically giving children some of their inheritance while still alive, Mr. Fish says.
Although minimizing the tax hit is a key consideration when estate planning, Mr. Fish cautions against emphasizing that alone. .
“Do not create a situation which is going to create turmoil for those who follow you by giving them a tax advantage,” he says. “The prevailing consideration should be how life will be for those you leave behind. I have seen people’s whole lives altered by a failure to address that.”
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