Hartford estate planning lawyers can provide you with assistance in creating a power of attorney and can help you to use other tools to plan ahead in case of incapacity. It is vitally important to talk with an estate planning lawyer while you are healthy so you can plan ahead and be prepared in case illness or injury strikes. If you do not make advanced plans, the consequences can be dire for you and your loved ones. 
Nirenstein, Horowitz & Associates will work with you to create a legally valid power of attorney that provides protection for you and your assets and that makes life much easier for family members in case of a serious illness or injury that leaves you unable to manage your own affairs. You should talk with our legal team to get plans in place before something happens to you and it is too late.
Why Create a Power of Attorney?
When you create a power of attorney, you can give someone authority to act as your agent or attorney in fact. You can specify what your agent is allowed to do on your behalf. Generally, when creating a power of attorney as a part of an incapacity plan, you’ll create a general power of attorney and give the agent broad authority to act for you so that person can make decisions on your behalf when you no longer can.
You can also create a healthcare power of attorney and name someone who has the authority to make healthcare choices for you.
You want to create a power of attorney so you have the authority to decide who is going to act on your behalf if something happens to you and illness or injury leaves you unable to make or communicate decisions.
What Happens if it is Too Late to Create a Power of Attorney?
If it is too late to create a power of attorney, then your family will still need to take action to get control over assets and authority over your healthcare choices when something happens to you.
Your loved ones will need to initiate guardianship proceedings in court. They will need to prove you are incapacitated and have the court declare that you are a ward. The court will then appoint someone to act as guardian and to take over on making your decisions and managing your affairs.
Guardianship proceedings can be financially costly and can be complicated, putting families into an uncomfortable and stressful situation when they are dealing with a serious medical emergency that has left a loved one incapacitated. During the time when the proceedings are taking place, there is also uncertainty over who is making decisions and how assets are managed. This can result in a decline in the value of assets due to a period of uncertainty and neglect since no one has authority to take action.
When the court appoints a guardian, the court remains involved in overseeing what the guardian does. This can be burdensome and intrusive as the court has involvement in a family’s most private matters. The guardian may also not have any idea what the ward would have wished, as far as the decisions being made. This can create stress for the guardian.
Of course, all of this is also bad for the incapacitated person as well. If you haven’t created a power of attorney and the court names a guardian, that guardian could be someone different than the person you would have chosen. You could end up with decisions being made that you would not have approved of at all. It is far better for you to make plans in advance and determine who will act for you, then to just leave this up to the court.
Getting Help from Hartford Estate Planning Lawyers
Nirenstein, Horowitz & Associates can provide you with help creating a power of attorney and putting a comprehensive incapacity plan in place before it is too late for you to take control over your own future. Our legal team knows how difficult it is for families forced to make difficult decisions and for loved ones forced into complicated court action at the time of a medical emergency. We can help you to ensure that doesn’t happen to people who you care about.
To learn more about how Hartford estate planning lawyers can help you to prepare for incapacity, download our free estate planning worksheet. You can also give us a call at 860-548-1000 or contact us online to get personalized advice on the creation of your incapacity plan. Call today, before something happens and you can no longer act to protect your own interests and the interests of your family in the future.
Mr. Nirenstein is licensed to practice before the courts of the State of Connecticut and the United States District Court. He is a member of the Connecticut and Hartford County Bar Associations, and the Estate and Probate, Elder Law, Business Law and Real Estate Sections of the Connecticut Bar Association.
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