Additional Resources Mentioned
- Moran Wealth Management https://moranwm.com/
- Disclaimer:This podcast is for educational and informational purposes only and does not constitute investment, legal, or tax advice. The views expressed are those of the participants as of the date recorded and may change without notice. Nothing discussed should be considered a recommendation or solicitation to buy or sell any security or to engage in any particular investment strategy. Listeners should consult their own financial, legal, or tax professionals before making any financial decisions. Moran Wealth Management is an SEC-registered investment adviser. Registration does not imply a certain level of skill or training.
- Support the nonprofit The Caregiver’s Journey: https://give.cornerstone.cc/thecaregiversjourney
Takeaways
- Get the Financial Conversation Started
- Use these 8 steps to guide the conversation
- Understand the different stages of financial considerations
- Understand The Financial Position of Your Loved One
- Consider Leveraging a Financial Planning Expert
Read More in This Blog
https://medium.com/@sueryansolutions/financial-planning-for-dementia-caregiving-five-essential-tips-edf00b98be82
Full Episode Transcript
Nancy Treaster
Money is often the last conversation as caregivers we want to have, but it’s inevitable. We have to have it. Today, Sue and I are joined by Devon Banning, Senior Financial Consultant from Moran Wealth Management about how to have the financial conversation and what things you need to know to have that conversation. We’re sharing five tips.
Sue Ryan
This episode supports step three of the navigating dementia caregiving roadmap, understand the financial situation. If you’ve been putting this conversation off because it feels uncomfortable or overwhelming, you’re definitely not alone.
This is an area many of us as caregivers hesitate to step into, and I know that. It’s deeply personal, it can feel intimidating, especially if we wish we’d addressed it sooner. It’ll be much easier for us to have this conversation though when we respect our loved ones’ dignity, independence, and their wishes throughout all of our conversations. Today is about helping you learn options for you to take your next step, options that are gonna make you feel more manageable without having you feel like you need to have all the answers at one time. We’re so fortunate to be joined today by Devon Banning, who is a certified financial planner with Moran Wealth Management. Devon’s got more than 15 years experience across a range of roles in the financial industry.
I’ve known Devon and respected his work for many years based on his depth of experience with dementia family caregiving. Devon, welcome and please share more about your experience with our listeners.
Devon Banning
Thank you both. I appreciate the opportunity. I’m currently with Moran. I now provide holistic financial planning and investment management to individuals. But I spent the majority of my career managing financial lives for individuals and families. Many of those families were suddenly thrust into the caregiving role due to dementia. So a long background of kind of working side by side as they walk through their caregiving journey in the different stages.
So I understand that dementia is not just a medical journey, but it’s a financial and emotional one. A lot of times difficult to get the conversation started. People don’t know where to start. So one thing I like to do is start small, ask questions, find out what’s most concerning to them and their loved one and what’s important.
Nancy Treaster
Wonderful. You know, a lot of our listeners also ask us how do they even start this conversation? Because as Sue said, it’s awkward. It can be emotional. It’s difficult, especially to have this conversation if it’s with your parents or somebody that you don’t typically talk to about finances. So that leads us to tip one, which is getting the financial conversation started. And here, we’re suggesting that you don’t start by directly talking to them about their financial situation, but by opening the door softly. Talk about another family member or a friend of yours who just recently moved their grandmother into a care community and they had to figure out how they’re gonna pay for it. Or a friend who’s helping their parents find in-home care. Or maybe talk about your own financial planning situation. You just met with your financial planner and you went through exactly where you stood with things and who you would put in charge of your finances if you were not able to handle it. But those are good soft entries into starting the financial planning conversation with your loved one.
Sue Ryan
And Nancy, you raise a really good point. It’s better to start kind of from us. For example, let’s start by using I statements. Here’s an example. Instead of saying, you need to make a plan now, consider saying something like, when I think about the future, I wanna make sure you’re getting the help you need. And this leads us up to tip two. Use these eight steps to guide the conversation. We’re bringing you eight different steps you can use in this order to start getting the conversation going.
So step number one is start with the purpose, not the details. This helps us reduce the fear our loved one might have that we’re trying to take over. So for example, perhaps say something like, I’m not trying to change anything, I just wanna understand so I can support you the way you want.
Step two, ask permission before asking the questions. This is another way to help preserve their dignity. For example, ask, would it be okay if we talked a little bit about this?
Nancy Treaster
Step three is to frame it that we’re planning together. Something like, I wanna make sure we’re both prepared for whatever comes next.
Step four, this is awkward, you know it is, so name the awkwardness out loud. Say something like, I know this feels uncomfortable, but it also feels important.
Step five is start small. One category, one question. Ease your way into the conversation. Who normally helps you with your taxes? Where do you keep your important papers? Do you have someone that you trust with financial decisions? Do you have a financial plan or a financial analyst that you work with? Start small and just begin the conversation with maybe things that are not so daunting.
Devon Banning
And step six is use timing strategically. Good moments to start conversations, I think have natural segues or maybe after a medical appointment, after doing taxes, kind of naturally broaching a topic that will lead to some of these conversations a little more naturally. Or maybe when a third party is involved. I like the idea, it kind of lets the defense mechanism down that a lot of us have anyway. Maybe a doctor, advisor, attorney, but a good way to kind of segue the conversation.
Step seven is normalize revisiting the conversation. There’s a lot to cover when talking about financials and financial planning. We don’t have to cover everything at once. You can definitely frame it as an ongoing discussion. We don’t need to cover everything today or this can be an ongoing conversation. Which kind of expands on the last tip, number eight, accept that not now doesn’t mean never.
Resistance is natural, especially when we feel overwhelmed. So a little bit of pushback is not to be unexpected. And bringing it up at all is a step in the right direction and its progress. So it’s definitely okay to pause and take a step back and revisit it at a later date. Things like we don’t have to do this today or we can revisit when it feels more manageable.
Nancy Treaster
And you know, really important is that you broke the ice already, right? Just by starting this conversation, you broke the ice and that’ll give you an opportunity to have either the rest of the conversation at another time or maybe have the whole conversation at another time, but at least you broke the ice that this is something you wanna talk about. So great job just getting that far. All right, so tip three is for us to really understand the different stages of financial considerations. Devon, tell us a little bit about that.
Devon Banning
I break down the steps in almost three stages. Conversations and also cost goes into this. Stage one, I look at as most important conversations that we need to have is the proper documentation in place. We really need to make sure we have powers of attorney for healthcare and financial and living will, things that you can act on your loved one’s behalf. Those are important.
Clarifying family roles and expectations. I’ve had clients in the past that have named someone and they may be terrible at handling finances or they may want nothing to do with the healthcare. They may not be willing, they may not be close. So I think just getting clear defined roles and expectations within the family also helps. It definitely reduces stress later on when things come about.
Stage two, more about ongoing assistance. What does it look like? Is it in home? Is it in a care community? What are your loved one’s wishes? Obviously involve them if they can be. And maybe what is feasible financially for us to be able to tackle?
And stage three is long-term care. What does that look like? It’s the largest financial drain. Duration is really unknown. It can last a lot longer than we think. My wife’s great grandmother had dementia. She lived with us for a very long time until we could no longer take care of her. Two facilities later, we were sure that it was only going to last a couple years. Fast forward 10 years, she almost lived to 100 years old. So it’s really an unknown at that last stage. Which brings me kind of to the stages of finances. In the beginning, it’ll be minimal, but as everybody probably knows, the cost of healthcare is just outrageous and continues to rise, especially when you’re dealing with something like dementia. So from a financial standpoint, as a planner, we like to figure out kind of what stage that we are now, what we think costs are gonna be. We know it’s a lot of assumptions and things change, but where do we expect to be in a couple years, two to five years? Where do we expect to be long-term? Just so we can kind of help plan and use whatever resources we have most efficiently.
Sue Ryan
Devon, thank you so much. These are tremendously helpful and I benefited very much from the stages that you shared. So what we know is we need to have this conversation. It’s really important. Please don’t avoid it. Now we know some ways we can get it started. Even though it’s gonna be awkward in the beginning, it’s worth going ahead and getting started so that it becomes something that will be easier for us over time. This leads us to tip four, which is understand the financial position of your loved one.
Devon Banning
Tip four is extremely important. From a financial standpoint as a planner, someone that’s trying to assist the client, this is really where we want to take a full inventory of everything financial in your loved one’s life. So we want a full inventory of all assets that are out there, everything they own, could be real estate, could be accounts, any income sources. Social Security, pension, is there VA benefits? Also finding out what debts they have out there. Is there things out there that we don’t know about? In reviewing the accounts, we want to make sure that titling is okay, that may need to be changed, things that we have to work with your attorney on. Find out what types they are. Is it taxable, is it non-taxable, or are we dealing with retirement accounts?
Reviewing all insurance. If you’re lucky enough to have long-term care insurance, what do those policies look like? Had clients that come in and they’re very happy they have them, but it turns out the policy barely pays for anything. So now we’re shifting over in a different direction. Some of them are great, but knowing the ins and outs of those, we’d like to review them. Life insurance, is there a cash value? Is there a long-term care rider? Annuities, are we in a surrender stage or not?
So when we look at that full inventory, we’re looking at liquidity also. How accessible are they? And how long will the accounts last if we do need to start tapping them to pay for certain stages of care?
We’ll also review the total allocation. Maybe we were heavy one way. We were growth and a lot of stocks and other things at some point, and now we’re in conservation mode. We know we’ve got an undetermined amount of time to pay for, quite frankly, just rising costs. So we need to shift how things look from an investment standpoint and an allocation standpoint.
I would also say consolidation and simplifying things wherever possible is great. A lot of clients in the past, the idea of diversification is spreading accounts around in different financial institutions. So maybe there’s checking accounts over here and savings accounts and something else at a different firm. Whatever is going to make your life easier and more simple will really help. The organization will really help reduce stress, especially in a time where you have to start utilizing those. I think consolidating them under one roof so to speak or in one institution would really make things easier if possible. Less passwords, less paper, it’s also a benefit.
And clients do really well when they have one centralized file to kind of document everything. If you’re a computer person, I think it can be an online file. If you’re a paper person, then it may be a three ring binder, but some place to keep all these policies, if there are insurance policies, copies of the account titling and numbers, just all the information. So when and if you do need it, it’s organized in one place. It will help when the time comes.
Nancy Treaster
Well, you just for the listeners, you just heard Devon go through a laundry list of things. Once again, remember, there’s a blog for every podcast. So the blog number that matches this podcast number will have all this listed. But I will have to say that listening to him go through all that made me think, good thing we have tip five, which is consider leveraging a financial planning expert or advisor because they know a lot of stuff about this and do it all day every day. All right, tell us Devon about what a planning expert or advisor would do.
Devon Banning
I think if you could leverage one, whether it’s a planner or advisor, it’s definitely beneficial. Guidance and expertise just during these complex decisions and conversations, they’re going through it all the time. So they can point out things that you’re not thinking of because you’re so focused on the care in general, like the asset allocation, making sure we’re not taking on too much risk. We’re looking at preserving assets at this point for the long haul, making sure there’s money to pay for everything we need as the cost of care goes up.
Certain withdrawal strategies, making sure we’re taking money from the most tax-efficient accounts. We’re not pushing you in income brackets you don’t need to. We’re not incurring extra costs on your Medicare premiums. So just making sure we’re utilizing the funds in a sequence that makes the most sense.
Also consolidation, your advisor or planner, they can pull all those assets from different firms into one location. So you have only one person you’re working with that will help simplify things. And then they’ll work in tandem with all of the other members of your team, whether it’s attorney or a CPA, or I’ve had clients that bring in care placement specialists and anyone that you’re working with, the advisor definitely will work with them.
Sue Ryan
Devon, thank you so very much for all of that. And I agree completely in the value of that. When my husband was diagnosed, we had no idea how long the journey would be. We had done very significant financial planning based on our lifestyle and where we were and what we were doing and how we saw the future. And all of a sudden that changes, changes in an instant. And when we worked with our financial advisor, they knew the answers to questions we had no idea how to even consider. And they introduced us to things that we wouldn’t have understood.
And the other thing that they did is I immediately was going to focus on everything for my husband. How do we make sure that we’ve got enough money for however much this is gonna cost? I was kind of fearful because I had no idea how long our journey was going to be. I had heard of people who the journey was they thought it would be like three or four years. Ours for example, typically they said it was four years and ours was nearly 12 years. So I had no idea what it was. And one of the things that was so valuable for me is here we are looking at all the things that Devon was talking about for our portfolio. But then they stopped and they said, now Sue, and my husband was right there with me. He’s sitting right there. His name is Jack. When Jack has passed, you’re still going to need money for you to live on. And so we want to make sure from the very beginning that we’re being intentional, both about supporting his care, but also putting you in the position when he’s gone, that you’ll be able to support your lifestyle as well. And that was very, very helpful for me. So I’m very, very grateful. And I’m glad that we’re bringing this episode to everyone else to be considering some of these things that we may not consider or even know to consider.
So in this episode so far, we’ve learned that financial planning for our loved one can be an emotionally charged experience. It definitely can. And this is an important reason for us to begin this process early. So Devon, thank you so very much for sharing all of these insights and giving help for people to be considering things to be doing. Before we close, is there anything else you’d like to add and share for our audience?
Devon Banning
Again, thank you for the opportunity. Just that they’re difficult conversations that are needed, that nobody really wants to have, but they are necessary. The earlier the better, the more involved your loved one can be, the better. Everyone’s situation looks a little different. Their situation is completely different, but talking to a professional and leveraging whatever help you can is the best way probably to go about it. And if you haven’t done it, now is the best time to get started. You’re not completely behind, but start small and start soon would be something that I would want to echo.
Sue Ryan
Well, thank you very much. Two things. One is how can listeners find out more about the work that you’re doing and your work with Moran Wealth Management? And I also know that as a financial planner, you’ve got a disclaimer you need to share with any guidance you give to anybody. So please be sure to share that information, which we will, of course, put in the show notes. But please share that as well.
Devon Banning
Sure, they can find us at moranwm.com. We’ve got a pretty hefty website. All our social media links are on there. YouTube, Instagram, everything social. And yes, just a disclaimer that it’s not financial advice and for informational purposes only and that’ll be on the website and the show notes as well.
Nancy Treaster
Well, thank you from me as well, Devon. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate having a financial planning expert on the episode versus Sue and I trying to pretend we know what we’re talking about here. It’s never a good plan.
Sue Ryan
What we do know is how important you are.
Devon Banning
You guys are doing great.
Nancy Treaster
What we know is what we don’t know. So let’s summarize because today we spoke with Devon about really how to get the conversation started as well as what the conversation needs to be about, at least eventually once you get rolling. We shared five tips. The first tip was just get the conversation started. That’s the most important thing.
Sue Ryan
Yes. And tip two is use these eight steps to guide the conversation.
Nancy Treaster
Tip three, understand the different stages of financial considerations.
Sue Ryan
And tip four is understand the financial position of your loved one.
Nancy Treaster
And that’s probably the hardest one to do all by yourself, but thank you, because that leads us to tip five, which is consider leveraging a financial planning expert or advisor. Now, if you have tips for how to get through the financial conversation or the types of things that someone should consider when they’re trying to understand the financial situation of their loved one, please share those on our Facebook page, our Instagram page. The links are in the show notes. As we said, this particular episode is related to step three in the navigating dementia caregiving roadmap guide, which you can find on our website under guides and worksheets. Also, we’ve already mentioned, but I want to reiterate for every podcast, there’s a matching blog. So take the number of this podcast. You can go on our website, find the blog with the exact same number, and we’ve effectively taken notes for you. So thank you for listening. We really appreciate it.
Sue Ryan
We’re all on this journey together.
Nancy Treaster
Yes, we are.
