Caregiver Clients and Estate Planning: How Advisors Can Help

The clearest sign a client has become a caregiver is a shift in their own financial priorities, and the easiest way to confirm it is simply to ask.

Al Faber starts that conversation with a story about his own mom. He helps her with her bills, which in real life means logging into her account, waiting for the verification code to hit her phone, and texting her to ask for it. He tells clients that story on purpose, because the next question gets so easy: does anything like that happen with them and their parents?

Al, a CFP®, ChFC®, CLU® and Founder of DIWY Financial Planning, has basically become his mom's two-factor authentication. Plenty of your clients have taken the same job, caring for aging parents while running their own lives. November is National Family Caregivers Month, and Caregiver Action Network counts more than 63 million family caregivers in the U.S. This year's theme is "Care Connects Us." Some of them are sitting across the desk from you. They just haven't mentioned it, probably because they were busy texting Mom for a verification code.

I asked the Trust & Will Financial Advisor Contributor Panel, real advisors who use Trust & Will with their own clients, how they notice a client who has become a caregiver and what they help put in place. Their answers kept landing in the same spot. Spot one caregiver, and you may end up helping with two estate plans.

Signs and Questions to Borrow

Signs a client may be a caregiver

• Bob Chitrathorn: rescheduled meetings, less focus on their own retirement goals, or a sudden need for cash to help a parent.

• Ryan L. Goldschmitt: a client already pays a parent's bills or checks their accounts, with no authority on paper.

• Matthew Veland: a client who brings it up first (aka your favorite client).

Questions to ask

• Bob Chitrathorn: Are you taking on more financial or personal responsibility for someone in your family?

• Matt Koppelman: Do you expect to become a caregiver soon, or are you already dealing with it?

• Chitra Patel: Where do your parents keep their accounts? (Balances optional.)

The stories behind each one are below, along with what to put in place for both the parent and the caregiver.

It Shows Up Sideways

Bob Chitrathorn, CPFA®, Co-Founder and CFO of Simplified Wealth Management, almost never gets an announcement. He notices the drift: meetings that get rescheduled more often, less interest in the client's own retirement goals, or a sudden need for cash to help a parent or loved one. When a client suddenly cares a lot about liquidity and not at all about their own retirement, there's usually a parent somewhere in the story.

Bob asks whether the client is taking on more financial or personal responsibility for someone in the family. In his experience, that one simple question tends to open up a much bigger conversation.

Matthew Veland, Financial Planner with Prudential Advisors, gets the direct version. Clients come to him and say they've kind of become the caregiver, and he figures he might just be lucky.

One client referred his sister, and the two of them brought their dad, who's in his late 70s, in to meet Matthew. The siblings had decided they couldn't do this alone and that Dad needed to get his affairs in order, starting with the estate plan. They were already planning to take him through Trust & Will within two weeks with Matthew. Dad's plan is on the calendar because his caregivers asked for it.

Go First

Matt Koppelman, CFP®, WMCP®, Co-Founder of Precision Wealth Planners, makes it easier for the clients who don't say it. He tells his own story first.

He's open about his own family experiences and what it was like growing up, and he's found that the more he shares, the more clients share back. Then he asks whether they expect to become a caregiver soon, or whether they're already dealing with some of what he's been through.

It's the same move Al makes with the verification codes. The advisor goes first, and the client gets permission to say it out loud.

Once a client says yes, they're doing all of that for Mom, the next question writes itself: does Mom have a plan?

Documents That Help a Caregiver Act for a Parent

Ryan L. Goldschmitt, WMCP®, Founder and Managing Director of Geminus Wealth Partners, believes most caregivers are already doing the job without the authority to match. Many don't realize what authority they need, like looking at a parent's bank accounts or paying their bills.

Then there's the doctor's office. A caregiver drives Dad to the appointment, finds parking, sits through the waiting room, and then, as Ryan puts it, gets told to "step outside." Nothing like getting sent to the hallway after doing all the work.

David Wright Jr., Managing Principal of WrightWay Legacy Services, sees it from the other side of the table. Many of his firm's conversations begin with the caregiver rather than the person making the estate plan. His team walks families through the documents that name who could handle the finances and who could talk with doctors if the parent can't. David is careful not to oversell it. These documents don't remove every challenge a caregiver faces, but when they're prepared and put in place properly, they can give clearer authority and direction at difficult moments.

A Will Plan from Trust & Will includes a Power of Attorney, an Advance Healthcare Directive, and a HIPAA Authorization that lets a chosen representative access medical records and talk with doctors. A Trust Plan includes those same documents. Exact documents can vary by state. Together, they can help a caregiver stay in the exam room. For help deciding who could hold each role, see our guide to choosing a family decision-maker.

Who Can Get Into a Parent's Accounts?

Julie Gawarecki of Prestige Wealth Advisors keeps running into the same assumption at her estate planning events: someone made a plan 15 years ago, so everything's fine. Right? She tests it with a question that has nothing to do with the documents. Who is your digital POA, her shorthand for the person who could get into your phone and online accounts?

Then she gets specific. Do you check your bank account on your smartphone? Which of your kids could get in if they had to? Flip those questions to a parent and you have the caregiver's version of the problem. The client who pays Mom's bills is already the one at the keyboard, and nothing on paper may say they're allowed to be.

In a Trust & Will plan, the Power of Attorney names the person who could manage financial affairs if the parent can't. A Legacy Contact can get read-only access to the Trust & Will account, and members can keep an Asset Inventory, also called a Schedule of Assets, that lists where the accounts live.

A Roadmap of Care

Chitra Patel, CFP®, CPWA®, MBA, Founder and CEO of WealthWorth, runs the same financial planning checklist with clients' parents that she runs with her clients. She asks where their accounts are, no balances required. Parents can keep the balances private. Where the accounts live is the part that really helps.

Chitra says these conversations are best had early, so everyone understands the road map of care and nobody is caught off guard or overwhelmed when things get hard.

What Advisors Can Do in Trust & Will

A lot of parents already have documents in a drawer somewhere. In the Advisor Portal, advisors can upload existing wills, trusts, and Power of Attorney documents and get an AI-generated estate plan summary they can edit and share as a client-ready PDF. It shows assets and named roles at a glance, so the whole family, siblings two and three included, can see who is named to do what.

From there, the built-in AI Estate Assistant can answer questions about the uploaded documents, and the Advisor Portal tracks plan creation and execution, including notarization, trust funding, and deed transfers. If a parent doesn't have a plan yet, advisors can share a personal referral link to get one started.

Then comes the part every caregiver family knows: the plan stalls. Everyone means to sign the documents, and then a doctor's appointment happens instead. The Advisor Portal shows the exact step each client is on and how long they've been there, with stalled plans in red. Advisors can send a check-in drafted from that client's progress in a few clicks, and replies go straight to their inbox.

Who Covers the Caregiver?

The caregiver is often the one with everybody's pharmacy number memorized and no plan of their own.

Bob has seen how easily retirement savings, career, and personal financial goals slide to the back burner when someone is focused on a person they love. He reminds clients that caring for someone else doesn't have to mean putting their own financial security at risk.

David puts it in estate planning terms: someone who spends that much time caring for another person may not have addressed who would step in for them.

Lisa White Burns, Founder and Financial Wellness Coach at Her Path, LLC, sees it most with the women she coaches. They're often juggling their own financial goals while managing the needs of kids, an aging parent, a spouse, or another loved one. For more on sandwich generation clients who care for aging parents and kids at the same time, see When You're the Bread and the Filling.

Once the parent's plan is moving, turn the chair around. The caregiver can build their own plan with Trust & Will the same way, including who would step in for them. Caregivers are busy, so if their plan stalls, a quick check-in from the Advisor Portal is an easy nudge.

Caregiver Clients and Estate Planning: Quick Answers

How can advisors tell a client has become a caregiver?

Look for drift, not announcements. Bob Chitrathorn watches for rescheduled meetings, less focus on a client's own retirement goals, or a sudden need for funds. Then he asks whether the client is taking on more financial or personal responsibilities for someone in the family.

What documents help a caregiver act for an aging parent?

A Power of Attorney names who could handle financial affairs, an Advance Healthcare Directive names a healthcare agent, and a HIPAA Authorization lets a chosen representative access medical records and talk with doctors. A Will Plan or Trust Plan from Trust & Will includes all three, and exact documents can vary by state. Ryan L. Goldschmitt believes most caregivers are already doing the job without the authority to match.

How do advisors bring up a parent's estate plan?

They go first. Matt Koppelman shares his own family experience before asking about caregiving, and Al Faber tells the story of texting his mom for her verification code. Chitra Patel runs the same checklist with parents that she runs with clients, starting with where their accounts are.

How can advisors support a client's aging parent with Trust & Will?

They can upload the parent's existing documents for an AI-generated plan summary, ask the AI Estate Assistant questions about those documents, and track progress in the Advisor Portal. If a plan stalls, advisors can send a check-in. If the parent has no plan yet, a personal referral link gets the process started.

Interested in partnering with Trust & Will to support your own clients' estate planning needs? Learn more about how you can join over 20,000 financial advisors and firms who are delivering peace of mind to their clients by offering a comprehensive estate planning solution. Sign up for free today.

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