In the financial world, there is a term that I’m sure you’ve heard. The term is compound interest. Say for example that you put your money in an investment fund. Over time, even with occasional losses, you’ll have earned interest and that interest will earn interest, until it’s many times your original investment—similar to the old Faberge shampoo ad. That’s the positive way to look at a mathematical concept. What I’m going to suggest is that it’s possible for that same formula to work in reverse. Here’s what I mean. If you’re young and you make a decision to move into a home that will one day be age-appropriate for a much older you, you’ll have that decision all ready taken care of by the time you become the much older you. You’ll have developed friendships, found favorite stores, discovered out of the way neighborhood gems, and figured out what works for you and what doesn’t work for you in the new home. If on the other hand, you wait until your children are forced to ask you which nursing home you’d like to enter, you’re likely to see some negative returns in the form of fewer options, higher costs, and a harder emotional toll. That’s the subject of an article by personal finance expert, Jane Bryant Quinn who likens the decision to put off the decision to making a decision that limits your ability to influence your future in any sort of positive way.
Should you choose a CCRC or an assisted living facility or will you stay in your current home? Will you hire a caregiver or will your adult child provide care? No answer is necessarily going to be wrong but making the appropriate decisions ahead of when they need to go into effect will not only allow you to prepare for that future day, it will also relieve your children of the burden of making a decision Mom or Dad may be unhappy with. Surely that’s worth a little of your time now. Why not start by attending a free LifePlanning Seminar? Then you’ll know what some of those future problems might be and you’ll have some answers as to how to prepare for them.
