Posted on May 12, 2012 by KBegun

Can Your Pet Remain “By Your Side”

Besides a pet owner’s death, the other time when our pets are at risk is if we become incapacitated. An owner should have a Durable Power of Attorney naming a caregiver and care instructions for the event of the owner’s incapacity.  But what if the owner’s incapacity allows him or her to remain in their residence. Or the owner must relocate to a new residence. What happens to our pet?

I recommend that there is language in the Durable Power of Attorney and/or Living Trust that memorializes the importance and desire to have our pets remain near us. Nowadays, many assisted living facilities (and especially board and care homes) allow pets (ok, probably not horses but most others).  But it is important to state this in your documents and direct your agents to find a residence for you that will allow you bring your pet.

And if you are lucky enough to be able to remain in your home, you might wish to include instructions to your agents to authorize them to hire and pay dog walkers or others to socialize and interact with your pet if you are confined to the house.

Posted in Durable Power of Attorney (DPA), Living Trusts | Leave a comment
Posted on April 16, 2012 by KBegun

A Durable Power of Attorney Can Protect Your Pet

Your pets are an integral part of your estate plan, much like children and loved ones—and sometimes even more so. You will want to consider the care of your pets at two distinct events: (1) your incapacity and (2) your death.

Because incapacity may be limited in time (e.g. hopefully you will regain your capacity), the pet caretaker’s role will also be limited. You will want to consider providing for your pet if you are incapacitated in a Durable Power of Attorney (“DPA”) and/or your living trust. Not everyone has a living trust but everyone should have a DPA. This blog post will be limited to discussing the DPA.

Unfortunately, our California Probate Code does not provide default language specific for our pets nor does the Uniform Statutory Power of Attorney (Probate Code Sec 4400) provide pet-friendly language. So you will want to customize your DPA to protect your pet.

You will want to name a pet caregiver in your DPA  and a back-up caregiver if your first choice is unable or unavailable to care for your pet.

Then, you may want to consider giving your Agent in your DPA the power to pay your pet caregiver for your pet’s veterinary costs, food, grooming and other reasonable expenses. You can put a dollar limit on this or leave this to the discretion of your DPA Agent.

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Posted on March 16, 2012 by KBegun

Options to Provide Funds for Your Pet

Ok, so we all agree on the importance of planning for our pets in event of  our death, what are some of the options?

  1. Leave the pet and some money to a designated person. This is probably the easiest, the problem is the person might blow the funds on the craps table or on his/her hydroponic pot farm. If your pet dies soon, there could be a windfall to the guardian.
  2. Leave your pet to one person and the money to another with instructions that the money person provide regular funds to the guardian. It places some administrative hassles on the people and the money person and the guardian could disagree on the amount of regular funds needed.
  3. Employ a “pet trust” that provides the money and the pet be held in a trust and authorizes the trustee to spend funds necessary for the pet. This is authorized in CA (Prob. Code 15212) but not all states. Also, there’s a cost and process to create the legal instrument.
  4. Leave the pet to an animal care organization. Usually you have to pre-enroll  and “qualify” the pet with the organization. Typically a financial donation or pledge is the required consideration. I will provide links to animal care organizations in a later post.

Whatever you decide, your desires should be expressed in written form in your power of attorney, will, or living trust.

Posted in Funding a Pet Trust | Leave a comment
Posted on February 1, 2012 by KBegun

Pet Care & Veterinary Costs Soar

Veterinary costs rise 64% over 4 years

A recent Wall Street Journal article states what us pet owners already know:  Veterinary costs are expensive and continually rising. This is an excellent article and discusses that the average pet owning household spends  $655 on routine veterinary treatment and procedures. Throw in an emergency surgery and/or some laboratory or radiology tests and you are well above the average. We just spent a fortune on a veterinary dermatologist for our collie Willy’s skin condition.

This average household cost is important to your estate planning. As I’ve mentioned in past posts, many persons provide for their pets by leaving their loved pet to a family member, friend or caring recipient along with a stipend or cash gift for the pet’s care. Often the amount left for the pet is a multiplier of annual care, maintenance and veterinary costs for the pet. So, knowing an average figure of $655 for basic  veterinary care (and that it is rising) could help come up with an amount to leave for the pet that is realistic and will provide ample protection for the pet.

Here is the link to the article. It is well written and research and recommended to you.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204394804577011824160591082.html

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Posted on January 8, 2012 by KBegun

Life Insurance for Your Pet After Your Death

It’s a sad truism: Many people live hand-to-mouth and month-to-month. So what do you do to provide funds for your pet’s care and needs after you die if you have no assets or money?

Think about life insurance.  That is, a life insurance policy on your life. Sure, there’s a cost  and you will pay a monthly or annual premium but the cost is often very minor—especially considering the peace-of-mind you will get knowing that there is money to care for your pet.

On your death, the policy will promptly pay-off to your designated beneficiary (not your pet but a well-thought beneficiary which may be a person, animal care organization or pet trust as more fully discussed in other posts) providing the funds needed for your pet’s continued care and needs.

Consider this: Online quotes are easily available and many insurance companies advertise $250,000 for $14/month.  Most times $250,000 is far more than you would need for your pet. Say you wanted to leave $10,000 for your pet’s lifetime care, a $10,000 policy should be affordable. There are numerous online services to obtain quotes, or to  find a local insurance broker.

For Quotes:

To find a local insurance broker:

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Posted on December 16, 2011 by KBegun

No Kill Language

Originally I was outraged when I saw language in some of the legal drafting books that instruct a person’s executor (estate administrator) to euthanize an animal when the owner dies.  I’ve always drafted documents that say if there’s no pet caregiver or guardian to assume care and ownership of a pet, then under no circumstances are they to be euthanized and the administrator will use all efforts to find a no-kill adopting agency. I still believe in this and include this language in my documents.

But recently I had a client who was very upset with this language. She loved her pet as much as anyone would love children. But her pet had diabetes and other serious medical complications that required insulin shots and constant medical attention and she believed no one would be able to give her pet the attention and loving care and medical attention as her and, to her, euthanasia of her pet on her own death was the most merciful and loving thing she could do. I don’t know if a veterinarian would carry out her euthanasia desires or not.  But her love for her pet was without question and it certainly gives one pause and made me think long and hard at a very difficult issue.

Posted in Trust Documents | 6 Comments