Financial Consideration for Special Needs Planning and for Guardianship/Conservatorship

Your children are special. They all need to be cared for after you’re gone, but your children with special needs may need more care than others. Thanks to the creation of the Special Needs Trust, parents can breathe easier knowing that their sweet ones can be provided for in the event the parent passes.

The purpose of a Special Needs Trust is to provide supplemental and extra care for a child with special needs. The trust can protect the child with special needs assets while maintaining the child's eligibility to receive governmental financial or care support.

A Special Needs Trust can take effect any time during the child’s life up until the 65th birthday, at which time other resources become available.  Rather than have assets from an inheritance or insurance settlement be passed to the child, they are passed to the trust ensuring a steady flow of funds to the child to support his or her needs. Under the terms of the trust, you may stipulate that the trustee may not be permitted to make payments or distributions that might interfere with government benefit eligibility, which in many states is $2,000 per month. Of course, you may choose to allot more than that to your child if financially able, which our team can help clarify and plan for.

A Special Needs Trust has notable challenges. Distributions cannot be made directly to the child. Also, tax issues are complicated depending on the type of Trust and how the funds will be used. Even the types of goods that can be bought with funds are restricted. For these reasons, the both the proper creation of the Trust as well as the selection of the trustee are crucial to your child’s future wellbeing.  

At EverVest, our experienced professionals will sit with you to determine the appropriate options for your special needs child. We want to help you have confidence that you've planned for your child's future. Therefore, we will work alongside you and your attorney as you create the Trust that will give them all that you do now and more. We will even be available to assist the trustee should complications or questions arise in the future.

*This information is not intended to be a substitute for specific individualized tax or legal advice. We suggest that you discuss your specific situation with a qualified tax or legal advisor. LPL Financial Representatives offer access to Trust Services through The Private Trust Company N.A., an affiliate of LPL Financial.