People talk about the indignities of old age. Needing help with simple tasks like eating, bathing, and toileting. Not being able to drive. Not being able to get around. Ending up in a nursing home. The losses pile up. Maybe you’ve seen it happen to your parents. Their retirement plan, with its focus on accumulating … Read more
Financial planners tell you to begin saving for retirement when you’re still in your 20s. Start as early as possible and save as much as you can, they advise. Estate planning attorneys tell you to create your first will, power of attorney, and advance directive when you’re in your 20s. Update those documents as your … Read more
Ask someone who has been there, and they’ll tell you that caring for an aging parent in decline is one of the hardest things they’ll ever have to do. In this eye-opening article in US News, a son describes the incredible challenges he faced as he assumed control over his mother’s affairs during her severe … Read more
The list of celebrities whose poor estate planning has created nightmares for their family is long and growing. We’ve read about Casey Casem, Tim Conway, Aretha Franklin, and Prince. Now we need to add the late Bob Ross – the PBS painter who coined the phrase “happy little accidents” and whose personality has created almost … Read more
Traditional retirement planning advice says that if you have enough money, everything will be okay. Money gives you the means to solve any problem, right? This sounds good in theory, but it often fails in practice. The tragic stories of people like American Top 40 DJ Casey Kasem, singer Glen Campbell, and actor/comedian Tim Conway … Read more
Spring is here, that season when a young man’s (or young woman’s) fancy turns to thoughts of – financial planning? That’s true, if you subscribe to the advice we found in this very recent column on the Motley Fool website. Financial columnist Michael Aloi says right now is the ideal time to decide on the … Read more
We’re always a bit skeptical here at AgingOptions when we encounter an article – especially in a financial website like MarketWatch – with a title like, “Everything You Need to Do Before You Retire.” Nine times out of ten, it’s an article about saving more, spending less, adjusting your portfolio, and so on. In other … Read more
None of us has a crystal ball, so when we look ahead to our retirement years we have to make some educated assumptions about all sorts of things – where our money will come from, how healthy we’ll be, and how much our kids will be involved in our lives, just to name a few. … Read more
The so-called modern view of retirement is pretty straightforward. You start your work life with a series of jobs in your late teens and early twenties. Eventually you settle into your “life’s work” and follow that journey for four decades or so, saving money along the way. Sometime in your late sixties, certainly by age … Read more
When most of us plan for our retirement, we typically concentrate on how we want to live. However, at some point it’s important that we also plan how – and where – we would prefer to die. Surveys shown a very large majority of Americans want to take their last breath at home, in their … Read more
