Estate Planning, Medicaid And Elder Law Planning And Probate

Attorneys Ready To Help With All Estate Planning And Probate Needs

At Cohen & Lombardo, P.C., our New York attorneys have decades of experience handling a wide array of estate-related legal concerns. From planning for your retirement years, to ensuring that your property will be distributed as you wish, to appointing a trusted family member to make decisions in your stead, we are here to help.


Our office in Elmwood Village, just outside downtown Buffalo, make us ideally situated to serve clients throughout the area. We can assist you with the following matters, among others:

  • Wills and trusts — We are adept at creating both simple and complex wills and trusts that are customized to meet our clients’ unique needs.
  • Long-term care concerns — We are very familiar with asset protection strategies related to Medicaid planning and disability planning.
  • Power of attorney/health care proxy — Our firm can help ensure that in the event of incapacitation, our clients’ affairs are handled by the people of their own choosing.

 

  • Article 81 guardianships — Our attorneys represent those who need to be appointed guardians of a loved one’s person or finances.
  • Probate proceedings — Our goal is to take the stress away by handling all the details of the probate or estate administration process for our clients.
  • Medicaid  — It can be daunting and intimidating to look at the cost of long-term care in New York. When you calculate in nursing home expenses, doctors’ visits, prescription medications, potential surgeries and other common costs, you may despair of ever being able to care for yourself or your aging family members. 

Attorneys who practice in this area of law include:



 

Feel free to schedule a consultation with any one of our estate planning and probate lawyers. Call Cohen & Lombardo, P.C., today at 716-881-3010 or contact us via email. Flexible meeting arrangements are available by special request.

Top 4 Tips For Why You Need A Will Now

Here are some of the best reasons why you need to make a Will NOW and not wait any longer….

FIRST

It is important to take the first step towards creating an estate plan by making your Will now. Do not procrastinate. It will not become any easier if you wait a month or a year or five years! Making your will NOW will let you check off one more item on that never-ending TO DO list. It will allow you to feel better about your future because now you have addressed what will happen when you are no longer here.

SECOND

Do not downplay your assets and the issues that will arise in passing them on to your beneficiaries. You will be surprised by what you already have saved. I cannot tell you how many times I have heard the excuse that “I don’t have anything so I don’t need a Will”. You are so wrong. A review of your finances will alert you to when you have named the wrong beneficiaries on accounts – or to the need to name guardians and/or trustees for monies or accounts which will pass to minor beneficiaries or disabled beneficiaries. Talk to me about the ways to do this. You may need to set up trusts in your Will for these beneficiaries. Remember that you do not need to have thousands and thousands of dollars to make a trust work to protect these people who are important to you. You may need a trust for a disabled beneficiary in order to protect the benefits he or she is receiving as a result of their disability. You may need a trust for beneficiaries who are under 18 in order to provide for them while they are young or to provide for them if they go to college.

THIRD

You need to consider whether there are conflicts and hard feelings between certain beneficiaries, and appoint an executor or guardian or trustee who will not be sucked into the drama that seems to develop whenever money is involved. I can tell you what characteristics and skills are important for each of those jobs so that you can pick the right person to handle it. I can help you identify possible conflicts that may come up to give you time to try to deal with them now.

FOURTH

You can only be sure that your wishes are followed if you have them written up in a Will. How will anyone know if there are charities that you wish to make gifts to? How will anyone know who you want to raise your children, especially if it isn’t your family? How will anyone know about that one particular book or piece of jewelry or painting that holds special meaning to you, which you wish to give to a particular person or organization? How will anyone know if you wish to be cremated or what your funeral or memorial service will look like? Or if you want to donate your body for research? Or not have a funeral at all? A Will and other estate planning documents will allow you to do this.

Give me a call to discuss these and other matters concerning your estate plan.