Getting to Know You The Crossings At Eastchase

A BOOM! FEATURE Getting To Know You The Crossings At Eastchase Luxury Senior Living Community

We want to welcome you to The Crossings at Eastchase, where you live matters! This is a brand new, full-service, luxury senior living community offering residents a rich, engaging lifestyle. Spend your carefree days the way you want to at our fresh and inviting senior living community. We offer a full continuum of care that includes 90 independent living apartments, 73 assisted living apartments and 32 memory care apartments.

The Crossings offers views of verdant green spaces combined with unbeatable access to the Shoppes at Eastchase. At this prime location in East Montgomery, you will find an abundance of top-rated shopping and dining, coffee shops, entertainment, and so much more. Our community is pet-friendly too, super social, and our chef-prepared meals are not to be missed!

The Crossings at Eastchase is like an exclusive social club, complete with a brand-new, full-sized movie theater, salon, on-site healthcare services, fullservice fitness club with senior-centric offerings and a plethora of game and activity rooms with cards, chess, and billiards. Our vibrant community also features a full-service pub serving wine, beer, cocktails, and appetizers as well as dining opportunities in our bistros or fine dining options in our restaurant-style dining rooms.

way, they can stay productive and engaged much longer. Our approach to senior living combines elements of the Masterpiece Living approach and our signature hospitality and care services. By providing our residents with physical, mental, social, and spiritual elements that have been shown to promote overall health and wellness, we offer each and every resident the individualized support they need. The Crossings at Eastchase enables residents to live longer, healthier, more fulfilled lives.

It is an honor and privilege to serve you. Call or stop by today to schedule your personalized discovery and learn more about all of the exclusive benefits afforded to our Charter Members, we can’t wait to meet you!

Semper Fidelis! Joel A. Burdette, LtCol, USMC (ret) Executive Director The Crossings at Eastchase 2551 Eastchase Lane, Montgomery, AL 36117 phone 334.322.5985 www.crossingsateastchase.com like us on Facebook too!

Call Today, for Your Personalized Discovery 334.322.5985

Joel A. Burdette Executive Director The Crossings

Don’t let outdated ideas about age limit your ability to live a full, rich life. At The Crossings at Eastchase, we believe when residents age the right

(Julie Hall, who calls herself “The Estate Lady” has helped thousands of people with the challenging process of managing their deceased loved one’s possessions. In this excerpt from her new book, Inheriting Clutter: How to Calm the Chaos Your Parents Leave Behind, Hall offers recommendations for a few ways to keep your late parent’s memory alive.)

Ideas to Keep a Parent’s Memory Alive

Distribute cuttings. Sally loved her African violets and took great pride in caring for them in their colorful pots on the ledge of the big bay window in her living room. After she passed away, one of her daughters pulled off several dozen cuttings from the plants and started them in a bowl of water. Once the cuttings developed roots, the daughter planted each in a little clay pot with Mom or Grandma handpainted on the side and gave them to all her siblings and their children. Share favorite recipes. Another creative daughter went through her mother’s recipe box and picked out about a dozen signature recipes her mom was known for, made a small recipe book and gave it to everyone in the family. Keep the fishing trip alive. Harold used to take his two sons on a fishing trip in remote Ontario every spring. The spring after his death, those sons planned a fishing trip with their own sons and daughters and spent at least one evening around the campfire, telling fish stories about their dad. Create a memory book. Select several dozen pictures of late parents scan them onto the computer and put together a lovely memory book that gets circulated among his siblings. Give a lifelong gift. Many families contribute to charities and causes in memory of their parents. And you don’t have to be extremely wealthy, one family pays for a scholarship for one underprivileged child to be able to go to a YMCA day camp in their city — with the name of the parent attached to the scholarship. Recreate your parents’ presence. There are a lot of ways to do this. One daughter remembered that every time she was around her dad, she loved the smell of his Old Spice aftershave lotion. So, she kept a bottle of Old Spice around, and every now and then, it would remind her of her father.

How To Keep Your Retirement On Track... in a World of Low Returns

As a retiree, are you at risk for outliving your income? A serious question for serious times. Recently, several key assumptions traditionally used in retirement income planning are being challenged by leading financial industry experts. Are retirees who made those traditional assumptions still okay?

Financial Thoughts with Susan Moore

City, AL. Susan serves over $170 million (as of 7.31.2020) in brokerage and advisory assets through Kestra Financial and has been a financial planner for over 37 years. Contact Susan at 334.270.1672. Email contact is susan@moorewealthmanagement. com.

For example, lately several famous market observers, including John Bogle¹, the founder of the Vanguard Group, have warned that investors should reduce their expectations for their stock market investment returns to 4% a year. Ray Dalio², founder of one of the largest and most successful hedge funds in the world, also recently warned that “investment returns will be very low going forward.”

In addition, several leading studies have challenged the validity of the traditional “4% rule.” Developed back in the 1990’s when interest rates were higher for CDs and bonds, the rule stated that if a retiree kept their withdrawals limited to 4% of their initial retirement portfolio balance, that it should provide a sustained income for thirty years of retirement. However, Wade Pfau³, a professor of retirement income at the American College of Financial Services and Michael Finke of Texas Tech University, found that given the sustained current level of low interest rates that the level of acceptable initial withdrawals needed to be limited to 2.85% to provide an income for thirty years of retirement.

The Stanford Center on Longevity recently published a study that recommended that retirees should focus on sources that were not exposed to stock market risk to cover essential expenses, i.e., Social Security

By Susan Clayton Moore, J.D. Principal of Moore Wealth Management, Inc.

or an annuity of one type or another. It found that if income to cover essential expenses was exposed to stock market risk that the emotional cost of worrying about meeting expenses during a stock market downturn would prompt many investors to make illadvised investment decisions.

On Wednesday, September 30, Susan Moore of Moore Wealth Management, Inc. will be conducting a complimentary webinar on methods of how to not outlive your retirement

income. The workshop covers a number of issues including factoring in the above-mentioned changes to traditional assumptions, key risks (i.e., sequence rate of return and inflation), and various approaches to mitigating the risks of outliving your income.

If you would like to be included in the webinar, please contact Sarah at 256.234.2761 or sarah@ moorewealthmanagement.com.

Susan Clayton Moore, J.D., is a financial advisor and wealth manage of Moore Wealth Management, Inc.., with offices in Auburn, Montgomery, and Alexander The opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and may not necessarily reflect those held by Kestra Investment Services, LLC or Kestra Advisory Services, LLC. This is for general information only and is not intended to provide specific investment advice or recommendations for any individual. It is suggested that you consult your financial professional, attorney or tax advisor with regard to your individual situation.

Securities offered through Kestra Investment Services, LLC (Kestra IS), member FINRA/ SIPC. Investment Advisory Services offered through Kestra Advisory Services, LLC (Kestra AS) an affiliate of Kestra IS. Kestra IS or Kestra AS are not affiliated with Moore Wealth Management.

¹https://www.financial-planning.com/opinion/

jack-bogle-forecasts-lower-stock-and-bond-returns

²https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-10-

11/investment-returns-will-be-very-low-goingforward-ray-dalio-says-gold-could-prove-pr

³https://www.onefpa.org/journal/Pages/The%20

4%20Percent%20Rule%20Is%20Not%20Safe%20 in%20a%20Low-Yield%20World.aspx

Will You Outlive Your Retirement? Sign Up Today for Complimentary Webinar! How Not To OUTLIVE Your Retirement Call Sarah at 256.234.2761 sarah@moorewealthmanagement.com

AUM OLLI Has Plans for Fall 2020

The administration of Auburn University at Montgomery, in conjunction with the staff of AUM OLLI, has decided that only online classes for Fall 2020 will be the best policy for maintaining the health and safety of OLLI members. Thanks to the creativity and flexibility of our dedicated instructors, AUM OLLI will offer opportunities for the members to continue learning new things and challenging themselves.

AUM OLLI will offer a rich variety of courses in the fall, all via ZOOM. The reading discussion classes include: studies of short stories, the cost of food, art (thanks to the Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts), and World War II. Additional offerings include appearances (online) of authors talking about their new books (courtesy of NewSouth Books), Brain Bowl, gardening, a writing workshop, and a cooking class concentrating on spicing up your food. The Tai Chi for Pain Relief is also being repeated as an online course. Bonus opportunities include two book discussion groups and lunch presentations, with the schedule for more sessions still developing.

To benefit OLLI members statewide, Auburn University, the University of Alabama, and the University of Alabama – Huntsville have created OLLI SHARES, a collaborative initiative in which each of the three schools offers three courses that are open to OLLI members throughout Alabama. A listing of these courses is available on the AUM OLLI website along with a detailed schedule and course descriptions of the offerings through AUM OLLI.

Visit our website at www.aum.edu/ OLLI to join the organization and register for classes. Take advantage of the “safer-at-home” policy to learn some new things and meet new people.

JOIN TODAY! Tell your friends!

Your Guide to Aging in Place

Have your parents let you know that they want to stay in their own home, no matter what? That wouldn't be surprising. According to AARP, 87% of adults over the age of 65 want to stay in their current home and community as they age. Older adults are most at risk of falling, burning themselves, or poisoning.

This can be difficult as an adult child because you want to make sure that your parent is safe at home. Many adult children fear that their aging parent will be at high risk for loneliness and isolation. Other frequent concerns are falls and not being able to drive as they age. Recent events may also have you thinking about whether staying in their own home is safer for your parent.

This list can help you and your care team support your loved ones in staying where they love the most, right at home.

1. Learn how to talk to your parent about

aging in place. It is never too early to have this often-difficult conversation with your parents! Start talking to them as soon as possible about planning for care as they age in place. Together you can put a plan in place that makes sure that your parent is safe at home.

Ask your parents about what is important to them. Listen carefully to the answers. Your parent needs to feel heard and that their wishes have value. They may state they want their privacy respected, or that they feel worried about keeping up with the outside maintenance of their home. The laundry may be overwhelming them, or they may hate the thought of eating alone every day. Your parent might let you know that they don’t feel safe driving, or you may even see signs that your parent shouldn’t be driving. Knowing what your parent worries about and what they want will help you plan for their care. Together you can then make up a plan to address your parent’s safety and independence at the same time.

2. Address safety concerns. You will want to look at these three basic safety needs for your parent when they are aging in place. Part of your discussion with your parent will be how to adapt the home to prevent these risks. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shows that people over the age of 65 are at high risk for falls. Falls are the number one cause of fatal and non-fatal injuries for seniors in the United States. There are simple and effective ways to prevent falls. Review with your parent fire safety and make sure that a phone is easy to access. Check that appliances, electric cords, and outlets are in good working condition. Install a smoke detector and check the batteries twice a year.

Poisonings are often related to carbon monoxide, improper medication use, and cleaning products. Tips for safety include: installing a carbon monoxide detector, talking to your pharmacist about having medications labeled, requesting medications blister packed.

3. Prepare for emergencies. The events of 2020 have taught us that there are many unexpected turns in life. To successfully age at home, you and your parent need to have a plan in place for emergencies. During an emergency, you will want to know that your parent’s basic needs are going to be met. Ask yourself the difficult “what if” questions. What if Dad falls and can’t get to the phone? What if Mom is unable to get in to see her doctor for a prescription renewal? What if something prevents me from bringing in groceries? Talk about these scenarios and what ideas you have to be able to deal with them. Put together a kit of emergency supplies that include: clean drinking water, 3 days’ worth of non-perishable food, flashlight and batteries, first aid kit, personal protective equipment such as a mask and gloves, extra medications. Talk to your parent about where important documents are kept and how you will get in touch with them during an emergency.

4. Have a plan to accommodate changes

to their daily routine. To help your parent age in place, you will need to look at their regular activities of daily living and how their abilities may change. Activities of daily living include: eating, bathing, dressing, the ability to keep moving.

Talk to your parents about options for meals. You might consider grocery delivery. You can have meals delivered through a program like Meals on Wheels, or you can hire an in-home caregiver to assist with meal preparation. Often your parent’s home will need changes to make bathing, dressing, and mobility easier. These are renovations that should be done as soon as possible. A bathroom can be a dangerous place for falls. You can help keep your parent safe by: having handrails professionally installed, making sure that your parent has non-skid bath mats, using a shower chair with a handheld shower-head, installing a raised toilet seat or frame. By making some home design changes, you can improve your parent’s quality of life and level of independence. Re-modeling their home can make it easier to bathe, dress, and move around the house.

5. Meet the need for companionship.

If your parent is living alone, they are at risk for loneliness and the health consequences

that follow. Senior loneliness and isolation can often cause: lower brain function, inflammation, chronic illness. Talk to your parent about a plan to make sure that they stay connected with others. Arrange to see them on a regular basis. If you are long distance caregiving for your parent or unable to visit, then set up regular phone or Skype conversations. An in-home caregiver can help your parent utilize technology to help them stay connected. You might need to enlist the help of family members, friends, and community members. Ask them to stop in and visit with your parent on a regular basis. Companionship is necessary for the relationship but also provides another safety measure. When you have somebody seeing your parent every day it is reassuring.

6. Support your parent in staying active.

Staying physically fit and mobile is your parent’s greatest strategy for aging in place. Regular exercise helps older adults maintain the strength of their bones, joints, and muscles. Exercise can reduce the risk of falls and improves recovery time when ill or injured. Physical activity also helps to: reduce memory problems, treat depression, prevent dementia and mental decline. Help them to think outside of the box by suggesting at-home activities such as: online exercise classes, Youtube dance videos, connecting with grandchildren via video chat for a game of Simon Says.

7. Know the Options for Care. The best approach when talking with your parent is to ask what they feel is their biggest concern. Many seniors will be comfortable with the idea of hiring a cleaner to come in for housekeeping once a week or having meals delivered. Discuss with your parent about talking to a reliable home care provider. The care provider can set up a client care manager who will discuss what care options are available.

8. Talk about what it will cost. Many people assume that aging at home will be less expensive than moving into a facility. Depending on your parent’s needs this may or may not be true. Talk to a trusted home care provider about what costs you can anticipate now. This could include home renovations and safety modifications. Next, take a realistic look at how long your parent could be living at home and how their care needs may change. Discuss the possibility of needing 24/7 care or hospice care. Make 9. Avoid scams. Seniors are often the targets of financial scams. These scams will often prey on a senior’s fears and insecurities. Talk to your parent about being aware of these types of scams: Medicare/ health insurance scams, false health claims, funeral and cemetery scams, anti-aging products, telemarketing or phone scams, internet fraud, investment schemes, homeowner and reverse mortgage scams, lottery scams, a loved one needing help scam. Remind your loved one to never give out personal information to a person who calls you or in response to an email. Talk about keeping information private such as: Social Security number or bank or credit card numbers. Your parent may also be worried about paying bills when they can’t get to a bank, or about filling out the vast amount of health forms.

10. Access your community support.

Successful aging at home involves setting up a support system. This can include family, friends, and neighbors, as well as local community and government resources. Home care programs can help to fill in the blanks in your support system.

I started the Master Gardener class in February 2020. Many of my friends and contacts have asked me “so allknowing master gardener intern, what do I do about my this or that problem in my vegetable garden.” My reply: “Well, I don’t know much about that. I am not into growing vegetables much. I’ll look into it and get back to you.” Their reply back to me is usually something along the lines of “What??? I thought you said you were taking classes about gardening. What do you mean you are not into growing vegetables?” When talking about “gardening,” the majority of the people I encounter automatically default to gardening = growing vegetables. While growing vegetables is, definitely gardening, there are many other areas in gardening or related fields the Master Gardener course covers.

I love trees. Have you ever just stood under a massive 80-foot tree and looked up at it? From a little seedling all the way to something you cannot even wrap your arms around…all from sunlight, dirt, and water. Of course, any Master Gardener intern will tell you there is more to it than just sunlight, dirt, and water. After all, you can’t forget air! Okay, okay…. there is still really a lot more to it than just sunlight, dirt, water, and air. But if you go out in the woods, the native trees are growing in the existing earth with no help from humans. These massive quiet living things that most people pass by with no thought of, give us so much. With all they give us,

TREES

they can also take or create unwanted problems. Ever see someone cutting down a beautiful magnolia because they just cannot deal with cleaning up another mess in their lawn? We have all seen pictures of fallen trees that have destroyed homes and cars. And yes, even falling

and killing people.

In the Master Gardener program, planning what kinds of trees to grow for the climate and soil type is part of the class. How does it handle droughts? Any insect issues? (Ever hear of these little guys called pine beetles?) Diseases? But also, why do you want to grow the tree…for example: aesthetics, fruit, shade? How big will it get? Will it eventually become a hazard to your home? These are just a few of the topics regarding trees.

If you are interested in learning more about “Trees,” Alabama Extension has webinars about trees. Below is a link to see what tree topics are coming up and how you can participate!

https://www.aces.edu/blog/topics/ landscaping/raising-trees-webinarseries/

While there is so much more to know about growing trees than can ever be addressed in the class, the point is that the Master Gardener program is not a one-size-fits all endeavor. For example, I have met people who are interested in ONLY lilies. What? Yes, that is it…only lilies? But google how many kinds of lilies there are and how you can even hybridize your own! All of a sudden, saying “only lilies” doesn’t seem so “only” anymore. Gardening has so many meanings to different people and within it, you can find your passion. The Master Gardener program will not make you an expert in any one field, but it will give you a great overview of many areas of gardening and teach you more than what you knew before starting. For me, I will continue to focus on trees, and leave the vegetable growing to the pros. You will find me at the farmers market or in the produce section of the grocery store for my vegetables.

Karen Cochran, an intern in the 2020 Master Garden Class, lives in Pike Road. For more information on becoming a master gardener, visit www.capcitymga.org or email capcitymga@gmail.com.

Free Subscriptions www.riverregionboom.com

(Part 1) The Workout Drug

I am submitting an article that was given to me by a member at MetroFitness. It is packed full of info, so I give all credit to Bob Holmes for writing this. I am sharing with you because I could not write it any better. Enjoy Part 1 on the workout drug and next month we will have Part 2 on Exercise and Inflammation as part of the workout drug series.

Exercise is good for you. That’s hardly news: People who exercise tend to have longer, healthier lives. But until recently, researchers have tallied its benefits only in narrow slices: Exercise lowers your cholesterol and blood pressure; it keeps you from getting fat. Now it’s becoming clear that those known slices don’t add up to the full pie.

“When people totaled up those effects, they only account for about half the benefit,” says Michael Joyner, an exercise physiologist at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota.

To solve that mystery, researchers are now digging deeper into the mechanisms that underlie the benefits of physical activity. They are finding that exercise is both powerful and wide-reaching, affecting not just muscles and the to the brain, which could help prevent cardiovascular system, but almost every cognitive decline. For example, studies part of the body, from the immune have linked exercise to a reduced risk of system to the brain to the energy Alzheimer’s. systems within individual cells. And as medicine,” says Joyner. scientists understand more precisely Now researchers are making a more explicit connection between exercise and brain health. They are Fitness over Fifty discovering that the full benefit of exercise comes not from mere by Leigh Anne Richards physical movement but from actual physical fitness, the body’s cardiovascular health. A longterm study of Norwegian military recruits, for example, found that which levers exercise pulls to improve highly predictive of their risk of dementia our health, clinicians are on the verge of in old age. And Swedish women who being able to change their practice. The were highly fit in middle age had an goal is to think of exercise as a medicine eight times lower risk of dementia over — a therapy that they can prescribe in the next 44 years than women of only specific doses for specific needs.“It’s moderate fitness, researchers reported like your own personal regenerative in 2018 in Neurology. their aerobic fitness at age 18 was Another recent study, led by K. Brain Gains Sreekumaran Nair, an endocrinologist Scientists have long known that some at the Mayo Clinic, found that after just of the benefits of exercise are a simple 12 weeks of a high-intensity exercise matter of plumbing. Exercise makes regimen, participants’ brains showed blood vessels bigger and keeps them increased glucose uptake and higher functioning smoothly, which makes them metabolic activity, particularly in regions less likely to plug up and cause a heart that usually show decline in Alzheimer’s attack or stroke. There have been hints disease. High-intensity exercise was that this may also mean more blood flow found to have a similar effect on the

parts of the brain most affected by Parkinson’s disease, in research led by Marcas Bamman, an exercise physiologist at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

Benefits of Brawn

Exercise doesn’t just build bigger blood vessels; it also builds bigger muscles. That benefits health in a number of ways, from minimizing the risk of diabetes to enhancing the body’s immune response to ills such as cancer.

Muscle is the largest consumer of all the glucose that floods into the bloodstream after a meal. More muscle means quicker removal of this glucose surge, says Bamman — and therefore, less exposure to the harm caused by elevated blood sugar, a serious health issue for people prone to diabetes

Just getting the minimum recommended amount of exercise (7.5 metabolic equivalent (MET) hours per week) reduces mortality risk by 20 percent compared with no exercise at all. Exercising a little more than that minimum continues to reduce the risk, but such benefits taper off after about three times the recommended minimum. (MET is the ratio of a person's working metabolic rate relative to their resting metabolic rate, 1 MET is the rate of energy expenditure while at rest, walking at 3 to 4 miles-per-hour is considered to require 4 METs.)

The muscle-building aspects of exercise also help reverse a key change associated with aging: a decline in the function of mitochondria, our cells’ energy generators. This decline, often seen in sedentary individuals, can leave the mitochondria unable to completely burn the cellular fuel and that can lead cells to generate more oxidants, the oxygen-rich, reactive molecules that damage proteins and DNA.

Muscles are chock-full of mitochondria and exercise can help avoid this oxidative damage. Nair’s studies show that aerobic exercise, alone or in combination with strength training, improves people’s mitochondrial function, reduces the production of oxidants and forestalls oxidative damage. Highintensity aerobic exercise also encourages mitochondria to produce more of the proteins they use to burn fuel. Muscle has another important role: Its abundant proteins serve as reservoirs of amino acids for the rest of the body. Usually, when other organ systems need amino acids, says Bamman, “those are drawn from muscle.” That’s especially important when someone is sick because the immune system needs lots of amino acids to make antibodies that fight infection. (Very important during these COVID times).

The biggest benefit from building muscle, though, may come from the signaling molecules it pumps into the blood. Bente Klarlund Pedersen, an exercise physiologist at the University of Copenhagen, identified the most studied of these signaling molecules back in 2000, and later coined a term for them: myokines. Since then, she and other researchers have found hundreds more, many of which are activated by exercise. These molecules, which are released in response to muscular exertion, help regulate muscle growth, nutrient metabolism, inflammation and a host of other processes. “I think for most people it’s difficult to understand why muscle work can influence my liver or be good for my brain or bones,” she says. Myokines serve as the link between muscle activity and these other organs.

One of the most important myokines is interleukin-6. Released in response to muscular exertion, IL-6 has several effects, including suppressing hunger and enhancing the immune system’s response to cancer. Another signaling molecule, cathepsin B, triggers beneficial changes in the brain, including the production of new brain cells. Other signaling molecules can help moderate depression.

There is not a single organ in the body that is not affected by exercise. Next month we will continue Part 2 on the workout drug.

Sources: Knowable Magazine Annual Reviews- Health and Disease, Bob Holmes, 12/18/2019

Leigh Anne Richards, MEd, Certified Personal Trainer, Group Exercise Instructor, General Manager- MetroFitness. For any questions or comments, contact Leigh Anne at LAMetrofit@aol.com

By: Raley L. Wiggins | Attorney at Law | Red Oak Legal, PC 4 Things You Don’t Know About Estate Planning

1. “Stale” Documents will names a guardian for your children, and become the property of the surviving coEvery adult age 19 or older should have those children are in their 30’s or 40’s, that’s owner at your death. a durable power of attorney. This is a probably a good sign that it’s time for an document that appoints another person update. The number one problem that will “break” (called your “Agent”) to manage your your estate plan is the failure to consider financial and business affairs on your how ownership behalf, particularly if you are no longer able to manage them yourself. The Attend Free Workshop of non-probate property will pass same is true of an Advance Directive, Estate Planning and Asset Protection Workshop after your death. which is essentially a Power of Wednesday, September 23: Hosted by Red Oak Legal, PC: Attorney for Healthcare that appoints an agent to make medical decisions for 1:30-3:30 pm at 322 Catoma Street downtown Montgomery. 4. You Don’t Know What You you if you are no longer able to make This educational workshop presented by local attorney Raley Don’t Know them for yourself. L. Wiggins covers wills, trusts, powers of attorney, advance When it comes to directives, living wills, probate administration, protecting assets estate planning, Most powers of attorney do not expire on a given date. Instead, they are usually effective until you either from creditors, bankruptcy, divorce and remarriage, nursing homes, long-term care and Medicaid qualification. Registration is don’t trust the advice you get down at the beauty shop or the revoke the document, or you die. required. Call 334-625-6774 today to reserve your seat or register coffee shop. The fact online at www.redoaklegalpc.com. is every situation is As a practical matter, however these different, and just documents are only useful if the bank, hospital, physician or other third party will accept it as valid proof of the agent’s Other reasons to update your estate plan may include marriage and divorce (of you or because something worked for one person doesn’t mean it will be the same for you. authority to act. For example, if you walk into a bank with a power of attorney that your mother gave you in 1981, the bank is your children), the birth of new children or grandchildren, or the death of a spouse or other family member. Likewise, acquiring I do estate planning work every day, and I’m always learning something new. more likely to scrutinize the document more carefully than they would if it were dated more wealth can be a reason to update your plan. Just recently I was surprised to learn that in most cases burial plots do not pass to 2012. In sum, estate planning is a process, not the beneficiaries under your last will and That’s what I call a “stale” document. Technically it’s as effective as the day it was signed. But practically you may run into some problems if it was typed on ancient, something you do once, put in a drawer and forget about it. It needs to be updated from time to time to reflect your current financial and family situation, and your current testament. Instead Alabama law says that the plots go to the people who would have inherited your property if you had died without a will (unless you specifically reference and make a gift of the burial plots yellowing paper thirty years ago. wishes. in your will).

2. It’s Not a One-Shot Deal

I often see clients who have previously drafted wills or other estate planning documents. But these documents are often seriously out of date.

Unlike the powers of attorney discussed above, your last will and testament doesn’t really get “stale.” It’s a document that is essentially meaningless until your death. The law says that a will only “speaks” at death. This is because you can revise or revoke your will at any time while you are alive, so long as you’re competent to do so.

I cannot tell you how often you should update your will, but I will say this: if your

3. Your Estate Plan Might Not Work

When I teach estate planning workshops to the public, I make a point to explain that your will may have very little to do with who actually inherits your property at death. In fact, it may have nothing at all to do with who gets what.

That is because some kinds of property passes “outside the will.” For example, life insurance will pay the beneficiary named in the policy, regardless of what your will says. If you have a retirement account like an IRA, you probably designated a beneficiary to receive the proceeds at your death. Similarly, many jointly owned bank accounts and pieces of real estate will automatically Most folks aren’t thinking about who will get the leftover cemetery plots after their deaths, and it’s commonly overlooked. But the lots can be valuable, and it can lead to a great deal of confusion over who gets to own them after you’re gone.

Remember, estate planning is something we do for our loved ones—after all they’re the ones who will have to pick up the pieces after we’re gone. So dust yours off from time to time and make sure it’s up to date.

Raley L. Wiggins Attorney at Law, Red Oak Legal, PC 334-239-3625 | info@redoaklegalpc.com 322 Catoma Street, Montgomery, AL 36104,

www.redoaklegalpc.com