For most people, it is their children but those who are childless are faced with creating their own support network to help them negotiate housing, social-service and health care options in addition to legal and financial considerations. One of the first steps is for “elder orphans” should take in creating their support system is to hire an elder law lawyer who can draw up documents that will protect them if they become incapacitated. For more advice about how to plan for your later years, follow our link to the NYT article.
Single? No Kids? Don’t Fret: How to Plan Care in Your Later Years
by Susan B. Garland at New York Times
Sarah Peveler lacks a support system that many older people count on: their adult children.
But Ms. Peveler, 71, who is divorced and childless, said she was determined not to let fear of an uncertain future get the best of her.
To help avoid the potential perils of a solitary old age, Ms. Peveler is carrying out a multipronged, go-it-alone plan. A key part of it was to find a small community where she could make friends and walk nearly everywhere, without worrying about the hazards of ice and snow.
A friend from North Carolina suggested that she look at Tarboro, in the eastern part of the state, about 75 miles from Raleigh. The city of 11,400 filled the bill, and she moved there several years before retiring in 2012 from her job as an executive at a Philadelphia-based nonprofit.
“At some point, I am not going to be able to drive,” she said. From her downtown home, “I can walk to Main Street, the library, the church, the drugstore and the Piggly Wiggly.”
Ms. Peveler paid $135,000 cash for a one-story house with longevity in mind. One of the three bedrooms, she said, can be converted into an apartment if she needs a caretaker to move in. She is thinking of checking out assisted-living facilities in case she ever needs more than home care. (There is a family history of dementia, she said.) Several mini-strokes caused some cognitive impairment, so her doctor monitors her regularly.
