How can an elderly person’s assets be legally removed out oftheir name?
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How can an elderly person’s assets be legally removed out oftheir name?
I have an uncle with $200,000 in bank and a house worth $100,000. His wife died recently and my brother and I are now his heirs. My brother is alsp POA. I want him to meet with a elder lawyer to see how we can move his money legally out of his name. My uncle wants this done also. My brother isn’t willing because he is afraid if our uncle goes into nursing home Medicaid will investigate. Uncle is 86 and very healthy. Are there legal ways to do this?
Asked on September 8, 2010 under Estate Planning, Ohio
Answers:
SJZ, Member, New York Bar / FreeAdvice Contributing Attorney
Answered 13 years ago | Contributor
DEFINITELY meet with an attorney before doing anything in this regard--a trusts and estates attorney. If your uncle simple wants to give you or your brother some of his assets, he can do so readily, though there are of course better and worse ways to do that for tax, etc. purposes. However, if you're looking to simply shelter his assets from creditors or from medicare--i.e. they'd still be "his," but not in his name--that would constitute fraud if done incorrectly. This is a very tricky area, so in terms of finding out what you can do, legally, to protect the uncle's assets, you need expert legal advice. There's no way to answer in the abstract, since this will depend so much on the exact situation, as well as being highly technical and complex
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