Navigating Death Related Responsibilities

This is the Whole Care Network. Music Helping you tell your story one podcast at a time. Content presented in the following podcast is for information purposes only. Views and opinions expressed in this podcast are solely those of the host and guest and may not represent the views and opinions of the Whole Care Network. Always consult with your physician for any medical advice and always consult with your attorney for any legal advice. And thank you for listening to the Whole Care Network. Music Do you know what you need to do immediately after your loved one passes? I did it. Today we're talking about the laundry list of administrative, financial, and legal tasks that need to be performed. In this episode, we're providing guidance on death-related responsibilities from the immediate to the longer term. Music Welcome. We are Sue Ryan and Nancy Treister. This podcast brings our years of experience in a variety of family caregiving roles to prepare you to navigate your caregiving journey. We're sharing our personal experiences, not medical advice. And because it's our passion to support you on your journey, we believe no topic is on limits. Let's get started. Music Listeners, in our podcast, we talk about giving practical tips and candid conversations. In this episode, we're giving a lot of practical tips. Yes, we are. We support that. We support that. One of the things that we're doing is we create a matching blog post for every one of our podcast episodes. So there will be a blog post that has all of the details in it. We're also putting all of the outline of the information and any links that we refer to in the show notes for this podcast episode. So we recognize there's a lot. However, we're doing this because it's what we wish we had known about in our caregiving journeys. Exactly. So if you're following along with the navigating dementia caregiving roadmap, this falls into step 20. Okay. When your care receiver dies, no matter how prepared you think you are, what you need to do next can be, and we've learned, can be overwhelming and an often confusing process. This is not what we do all day every day. It's reasonable we don't know. Many people find themselves unprepared for the many financial, legal, and administrative tasks that must be handled during this already emotional time in our lives. No kidding. It's a lot. Wait till you get to the end of this podcast. You're going to realize it's a lot. We've split it up here, though, into what you need to do immediately, what you need to do within the first few days, what to focus on within the first few weeks and months, and so on. So we've tried to split it up so that you don't have to be overwhelmed by everything we're going to talk about at one time. And we want to make sure nothing falls through the cracks. There's a lot to learn here. Yeah. There is. And one of the things that we talk about in podcast episode 30, we talked about a lot of the things that you can do ahead of time. So if you haven't listened to that episode, we highly encourage you to do that because as many things as you can do ahead of time keeps them from being things you need to focus on now at a time when you already have a lot of things going on and especially emotionally. So let's start with tip one. Tip one is what we want you to prioritize immediately after someone passes away. First, you need a legal pronouncement of death. If your loved one is under hospice care, if hospice is not in the room when they pass away, call hospice, let them know your loved one has passed away. They will send someone and they will create the legal pronouncement. If your care receiver passes away at home and they're not under hospice, call 9 if you're in the US call 911, but you call emergency services, they will send someone who will come to your house and pronounce this person is officially dead. If your loved one is in a care community, the care community will do the pronouncement and if they're in the hospital, the hospital will do the pronouncement. Whoever pronounces death will contact the right people to pick up your loved one's body. If they're under hospice care, care community or a hospital, they will call the funeral home to pick up your loved one's body. If they die at home without hospice, 911 will call the corner and they will decide who picks up the body and when it's released to the funeral home. But in the end, the funeral home is the one who will have your loved one's body. Also, at this point, you're going to want to notify family, friends. You may have prearranged care for dependents or pets. If your loved one has responsibility that need to be prearranged for you've probably already got people you need to call them and let them know. Or anyone else that you think belongs on this top immediate notification list. If you listen to episode 30, you may have already created a notification tree. That's what we recommend, which says that you only have to contact a few handful of people immediately after they pass away. And that those people are responsible for contacting the next layer of people so that doesn't all fall on your back as a responsibility. If your care receiver lives alone, you also might want to at this point ensure their home and their belongings are secure. You may even consider changing locks and taking valuables and putting them somewhere safe. Also, at this point, we suggest you get a piece of paper out and start that list of who you're going to eventually write thank you notes for. Because there's no way you're going to remember them all. No, and you know what? It kind of catches you by surprise. Some flowers shows up, somebody shows up with food. The word gets around pretty quickly. And I probably had three or four things before I realized, oh my goodness, I better start a list. Because I'm not realizing that this is the list of what I'm going to need to send thank you notes for. So get that piece of paper out, write thank you notes on the top of it, and then you can start listing that and not miss that part like I did. I'm glad I caught it when I did. Eventually, you will have to contact the funeral home yourself. The body will, if it's taken immediately to the funeral home, they've got that. You will have to have chosen a funeral home. Once again, if you did that in pre-planning, that's great, because they will ask you which funeral home you want the body taken to. So you will have chosen a funeral home. Hopefully at this point already met with the funeral home once. But there are some things that you have to put into motion after your loved one passes with the funeral home. So you will have to call them and let them know that you're ready to put those things into motion. Look at the end of life in addition to listening to the podcast or reading the blog for episode 30. There's also an end of life worksheet that's in the guides, which goes through a lot of things that you could have predetermined with the funeral home. A lot of paperwork could have been pre-filled out, but there are some things you'll have to do actually at the time of, right after the time of passing as well. And we'll put a link to the guides in our show notes. Exactly. Some of this is things like ordering death certificates. They'll suggest five to ten. Sue and I both agreed we didn't need more than five. We didn't. I think there have been enough changes that it's really down to, I didn't even, I think I needed four. Yes. Because you don't always need the original. And it wasn't expensive like five dollars each, but you can always order them after the fact if you run out. Right. So I'd say start with five. I mean, that's what Sue and I agreed to. Let's just start with five. I think you're good. You may end up using copies of the death certificate. So it's not always an original that somebody needs. You can't get copies of the death certificate immediately. However, it takes a week to as much as three weeks. And that's if there's no investigation into the death. So the death certificates are delayed. So some of the things that require death certificates, there's just nothing you can do about it anyway. So don't worry about that right now. There's plenty of things to focus on instead. We do encourage you to prearrange things. Like we've said, some of it is around creating and posting the obituary. Hopefully you have already created some baseline for the obituary. Yes. Hopefully you have. And if you haven't, now's the time to write the obituary. Yeah. And at a minimum, you will want to post it. The funeral home will help you do that. They'll post it on their website. Usually you may want to post it on social media and they'll help you if you want to put it into a paper of some sort. So Sue did not prewrite one of the obituaries and found it was a challenge. It was not my most positive experience. I had never written an obituary before. I hadn't really thought about what needed to be in it. I'm sitting there and all of a sudden I'm told, okay, I need the obituary. And I wrote an obituary. Unfortunately, I left several family members out of it. And at a time when you've already got a lot of things going on, I felt so bad about that. So please frame the obituary first and have family members, especially if you have a blended family, have family members look at it so that you're not saying anybody's name incorrectly of like how they're related or you're not. Leaving them out completely. Oh, that was not my best thing. Yeah. And the funeral home will help you do that. So once again, best to have done that all as much of that upfront as possible. You will need to finalize it at this point, obviously, because there's dates involved. Right. Things like does your loved one want to be cremated or buried? Do you want a military funeral? All those things can be predetermined, but if they aren't, you'll need to work with the funeral home and get all that taken care of at this point. Once again, links all that. We'll make sure you have links to the worksheet, which is on our guides and worksheets page. And it is also part of episode 30. So in tip one, we talked about what to do immediately. Immediately to like the first day after your loved one passes. In tip two, we're talking about things to do in the next several days and weeks following their death. And if you haven't already, make sure that you have all of their essential documents together in one place. Here are some of the ones that you'll want to include. Will's trust documents, insurance policies, financial accounts and statements. You'll need to have their social security number. The social security number is very important because while the funeral home will notify social security, you're going to need their social security number for other accounts. So another point about this, which I wasn't aware of is it's really important to understand that you may have to pay money back to social security. Social security pays at the beginning of the month. If your loved one passes away during the month, then social security will take back the prorated amount from the time of their death until the end of the month. So please anticipate that that's one of the things that may happen. Caught me by surprise as well. Make sure you also have their Medicare number. So while social security will inform Medicare, you'll need that for other identification, documents, deeds and titles. And then one of the other things to make sure you do is notify your key advisors. Your attorney, your tax advisor, your financial planner, your life insurance agent and any other professionals. This is something I created a list for ahead of time because I knew there was absolutely no way I would remember to notify all of them. And I forgot the tax advisor until fortunately my husband passed away in December. So it wasn't a long delay because I started working with the tax advisor in January or February, but I was like, oh, by the way, my husband passed away. Should have done that before. Yeah. At any rate, it's important to have that list. One of the things that Nancy talked about is immediately following death. You let their employer, if your loved one is still working, you let them know of your loved one's death. Now you want to reach back out to them because there may be some benefits or other things involved that would need to be going into process now. But that wasn't part of what you needed to be doing immediately following the death. Here are several things to do if your care receiver's home is vacant. First of all, let the police know that your care receiver has passed away. Let your neighbors know that they have. If you don't already have them, you can get programmable light timers that you can put on the light so that it looks like there is someone home and then make sure any alarm systems you may have are active. Now, this may be sounding like a lot and it is. Yes, we know. And this just as a reminder, this is why we're bringing it all to you and giving you all the details of all of the notes and everything so that you'll have it. And that is if you're going to have a funeral. If you're going to have a funeral, make sure again that the police know when the funeral is and if you've got anyone who could be at home during the funeral, make sure there's someone there that shows a presence that someone's actually in the home. Because some people track funeral announcements and use that as a chance to rob homes. They do. Unfortunately, contact the post office to stop or forward any of their mail. Consider which utilities to stop and which things to continue. For example, yard service, pest control, cleaning services, trash. It's important for you to ensure timely payment of ongoing expenses, mortgage, utilities, property insurance. And we've heard some people question whether after someone dies, they need to still be making some of these things and paying their bills. Mostly you still do. You still have the obligation. The estate has the obligation for those. So if you're unsure, this is one of the things you talk about with your financial advisor. Watch all the expenses that come in and cancel subscriptions like magazines, gym membership, streaming services, cable, phone, games, anything else. You know, I have to forget that you all have to one passed away. I have to do this on my American Express bill every month anyway. I have because you cancel a subscription to something. I found something the other day. I canceled subscription and then I bought something else from them and that immediately restarted my subscription. I'm like, what is happening? So it's good hygiene anyway, but you're probably doing it for yourself. You need to do it for your lover and his past away. And especially if it's an annual subscription, you may not keep an eye out and they may not have let you know. They may not have needed to have told you that they had it. So you really want to keep track of those expenses. Another one is whether you're going to have some kind of a memorial marker, a headstone or a footstone. These take a period of time to actually have installed. You've probably identified what it is you're going to have and what you want to do, but you want to go ahead and activate the order for that. Finally, you've been making that detailed list of all of the people who have been helping bringing food, flowers, anything else. Now is the time to begin writing those thank you notes to them. One of the things that's really helpful to know is you don't need to write all of them yourself. Exactly. And our family, when my father passed away, we were able to split up the thank you notes between my mother, my sister and myself. And it makes it a less daunting task. It's a less daunting task and it's also something where family members, where they have a personal relationship with someone, want to share a note of special thanks. Maybe even more appropriate for them to write it. Right. Okay. So we've talked about what you need to do immediately after someone passes away, what you need to do in the first days and weeks. Now we're moving on to what you need to do in the first weeks and months. Mostly this is about managing the estate itself. And this is a good reminder that we are putting all the details in the show notes because we're going to be talking about a lot of different kinds of links and things in this tip. Right. And the blog will have all this written in detail as well. So you don't have to take notes. It's important to be hearing it and it's important to be aware of it, but you don't have to remember it. We're giving it all to you. Right. So it may, you may be panicking about now. All right. We, first we're going to meet with the care receiver's accountant, tax preparer to understand any tax implications of the estate itself. And if you don't have an account or a tax preparer, you need to start researching tax implications for the estate because there will be some, you've got to close the estate out effectively. Even if you're married to the person, I'm, I'm still this year, I have to close my husband's estate out. So you have at least in Georgia, we have a year to do that. Notify financial institutions like banks, credit unions, mortgage companies, investment companies, health auto, homeowners insurance, et cetera. At this point, we want you to explore what options you have if you're a surviving spouse or a descendant and understand the process. If you're on those accounts with them or they're on the accounts with you of removing their name, you don't necessarily, you actually might not even be able to at this point, necessarily remove their name from those accounts, but you need to know which ones are going to require what. We'll talk more about that in the next step. Because you will ultimately need to, but now you may not be able to until the estate gets settled. Exactly. Also understand what's required in terms of transferring titles for homes or cars, if those titles are going to get transferred and things aren't just going to get sold. So this is about gathering your, your knowledge so that you can execute at the appropriate time. If you have life insurance or long-term care insurance or something like a pension that's going to pay out in a claim, you want to notify those folks as well at this point that your loved one has passed away. Some of this you have to wait until you actually get the death certificates before you can execute. So, you know, it will literally be weeks, probably one to three weeks before you have a death certificate. So some of these you cannot execute until you have the death certificate with you. One of the things that did surprise me when my husband passed away is some of these companies are notified. They already know about it. Before I had the opportunity to notify the company that my husband had a pension with, they sent a letter and I actually reached out to the president of the company. I was so offended by it. They sent out a letter that was almost accusatory and about making sure you're required by law to get this and da da da da da. So don't be surprised like I was. If you receive a letter before you had an opportunity to send something in that is declaring you need to do this, they may have been notified before you or I don't know how they got notified before I did. Probably through the Social Security. So that actually goes to the funeral home will notify Social Security for you. You don't need to do that. We had that on our list to do and found out pretty quickly. Last year, my father died in January. My father in law died in October and my husband passed in December. So we were learning on the fly fairly quickly amongst each and every one of these. So we were very surprised to find out that we didn't have to notify Social Security. It was on our list. The funeral home notified Social Security, but how Social Security took care of things automatically was different. And so it was interesting to learn. If you are the spouse of someone who passes away, this is in the U.S. of course, if you're the spouse of someone who passes away and you are also taking security Social Security, Social Security will make the adjustment. For example, if you make less in Social Security than your spouse did, they will adjust you up to the appropriate amount automatically. So that happened for my mother and my mother-in-law. If you are the spouse and you're not taking Social Security already, which I was not, you have to call Social Security and apply for the Social Security benefits. So I have done that. But that's something that was interesting to work through and we want to make sure you have the information. There also are potentially Social Security death benefits for other people, for divorce spouses, for children's and other dependents. So please investigate what death benefits you might get from Social Security if you're in one of those roles and not actually just the spouse. If your care receiver has a will, this is also a bit complicated. It's really not complicated, but it's complicated to explain. If your care receiver has a will or even if they don't have a will, whether they go through probate, and I'll talk about what probate is in just a minute, whether the will goes through probate to assign an executor officially or an administrator, which is what gets assigned if they don't have a will, those requirements are state-specific. So it does help to have, if someone drew up the will, that's an estate attorney. It's helpful to have their input into what you need to do to get the will, or do you even need to put the will through probate to have those things assigned because that's unique to your state. So first contact a state attorney if you have one and just figure it out that way. If not, you can investigate it in your state through the city or the county probate office. Let's talk, let me read you the definition of probate so you know what it is. Probate is the court supervised process of proving a will is valid and distributing a deceased person's assets. When someone dies, their estate, which is their property and money, may need to go through probate. This process involves validating the will, appointing a personal representative like an executor or an administrator who will pay the debts and taxes from the estate and distribute the remaining assets to the beneficiaries. If you don't have an estate attorney, either contact an attorney or take the will to the appropriate city or county probate office and get more advice on where, how things need to go at that point. After the probate hearing and some mandatory waiting time, which once again is different by state, the executor of the state or the administrator will get the papers that allow them to do this next step. Now, neither see nor I had to do this next step. We were spouses. But the next step is about opening a bank account on behalf of the estate so you can deposit checks in to the estate if they come in through life insurance or things like that, or you can pay bills out of the estate. Now, in my case, my husband had long term care insurance, which also paid out as a life insurance policy at the end. And they paid me directly as the beneficiary. But in my father's case, that was paid out to the estate. And so my sister had to open an account with the bank in the name of the estate. You have to have a tax ID number, which is also called an EIN. You get that in the U.S. from the IRS. It's an easy process to do that online. We'll provide the links in the show notes. Once you get that tax ID number or that EIN number, you can take that with you to the bank and open a bank account. So tip three was talking about what things to do as you're managing the estate. In our final tip, tip four, we're talking about things to do once the estate has been closed. In tip three, we learned about things to do as we're managing the estate. And now tip four, our final tip talks about things to be doing once the estate has been closed. When we were talking in step three about financial institutions, we learned that they each have different requirements. So we want to make sure that we get our care receivers name removed from any of their financial accounts. We need to get all of their titles updated. And one of the reasons for this is that we want to do everything we can to prevent identity theft. We're going to have another tip on that coming up, but identity theft can be very common in these areas. So when we talk about learning what each institution requires, we said some are going to need the original copy of the death certificate. Well, especially when you're only going to order five, some of them only require a copy. So make sure when you get the death certificate, you make some copies so that you could use that. Some are going to require that the estate has already been closed. They're not all going to require that, but some also need to have you have proof that you are the legal executor of the estate. The official proof that you are a legal representative, either an executor or administrator, is a legal document. In the United States, if you're the executor, this is called Letters of Testamentary. And if you're the administrator, it's called Letters of Administration. These documents are issued by the probate court and grant you the authority to act on behalf of the deceased person's estate. Something else that's extremely important to do to prevent identity theft is notifying the credit reporting agencies. In the United States, these are Equifax, Experian and TransUnion. We're putting the links to those in the show notes for you. Next, the surviving family should also update their wills, their trusts. And if you've inherited anything, you need to talk to your financial advisor about potential tax implications. You also need to make sure your insurance is up to date if you've inherited a piece of property or something else like that. Finally, you need to file the tax return of your deceased loved one. Yes. All right. We know this is a lot. This is a lot. We're writing it all down for you. But we wanted to make sure you had this information. Yes. So let's summarize. Okay. In this episode, we talked about navigating death-related responsibilities from the immediate to the long-term. We shared four tips. Tip one was what to prioritize immediately after death. Tip two, what to put on your list to handle in the first few days and weeks. Tip three was over the next few weeks and months, mostly about managing the estate. And tip four is prioritizing these things after the estate is closed. If you have tips about this topic, please share them on our Facebook page or our Instagram page. The links are in the show notes. I think we've mentioned a hundred times, but I'll say it again. For every podcast, there's a blog. And for this one, it's really important. Yes. So find the podcast number, look in the blogs. You'll find the same blog number and you'll get effectively the notes from this podcast. If you're following along with the navigating dementia caregiving roadmap, the 20 steps, this is step in step 20. Yep. And the link for that guide is on the caregivers journey.org part of our site under guides. Take advantage of that. And we've also included that as a link in our show notes. Of course. And as we close this very important episode, this is one of the reasons why we say this at the close. We're all on this journey together.