Helpful Ways To Assist Your Elderly Relatives With Their Finances

As your parents, grandparents or other close relatives grow older, they might need your assistance. Many people become carers for their elderly family members. As old age sets in, a lot of help is needed with health care and often even daily tasks. Your relatives may become unable to handle these things by themselves or might need extra help.

One of the most helpful ways you can assist your senior relatives is to start managing their finances. There are many significant financial concerns associated with older age. Make sure your parents know what they need to know and help them with their decisions. You don’t need to take over their finances – just assist them in making the right choices.

There are many things involved with helping financially. Here are some of the important considerations to make regarding the money of your elderly loved ones.

Make Sure They Have A Durable Power Of Attorney
A Durable Power of Attorney allows individuals to name an agent to manage their finances. It’s helpful in many ways. If your relative names you as their representative, you can take responsibility for their financial matters. If your loved one becomes too sick to manage their money, they’ll need someone to take control of their money. It’s important to have a POA in place for situations like this.

They can also appoint someone to manage their healthcare. It means that the person they name can make important healthcare decisions for them when they’re unable to. It’s crucial for when your relatives become incapable of handling these decisions themselves. It’s especially important in cases where your loved one develops problems like dementia.

Consider Life Insurance
If your loved one hasn’t taken out life insurance already, now is the best time to consider it. Even for retirees, life insurance has benefits.

One of the main reasons seniors need to consider life insurance is because it helps their family with funeral costs. Funerals can end up costing a lot, and families will naturally want to give their loved ones a proper send-off.

It can also give out death benefits to loved ones. It’s especially helpful for seniors who have debts they still have to deal with. Seniors can get flexible life insurance plans that only cover what they find necessary. Services such as lifeinsuranceforseniorsover80.com specialize in senior life insurance.

It may be a grim thing to consider, but it’s worth considering early.

Work Out Their Expenses
One of the best ways to help an elderly relative is to manage their regular expenses. Looking at their monthly bills and weekly necessities can help you figure out how to keep costs low. Retirees may not have the retirement funds to keep spending the same amount of money. Make sure that the amount they’re using is sustainable.

You may want to cut down on their food bill. You can also reassess their insurance policies and find out how to make them cheaper. In some cases, you might want to help them with some of their most pressing costs.

It’ll give your relative peace of mind and make it easier for them to sustain themselves financially.

Assess Living Options
Sometimes, it becomes unrealistic for seniors to live in their home. The costs may become too much. In some cases, they may be doing well financially but need extra care. In situations like this, you need to consider the most practical living option for them.

You may want to consider retirement or nursing homes. These can give your relatives the daily care they need while also being a cheaper living option. But be wary – many of these homes have bad reputations. Make sure you look up reviews on sites like health.usnews.com/best-nursing-homes.

If they want to retain their independence, then it’s worth getting home care. There are a lot of services offering senior home care which can help your loved one. Of course, you can also become their designated care helper. But if you have work commitments, this may be difficult.

You could also help them move into a retirement community. These communities still give seniors their own place. But they’ll be surrounded by fellow retirees and often have close access to the care they need. It often works out cheaper, so it’s worth consideration.

Check What Financial Help They Have With Health Care
Your elderly relative may have Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security payments. These can help a lot when it comes to healthcare costs. But they don’t cover everything, and you might need to chip in some of their money or some of your own.

In some cases, you may also be able to get government assistance for health care. Benefits.gov can tell you which benefits your relative is eligible for. Taking care of their health can be costly, so make sure you know what’s available.