Episode 14: The Special Needs Trust Playbook: Protecting Your Child’s Benefits and Future Care
If something happened to you tomorrow, do you know exactly how your special needs child would be cared for—and by whom?
Planning for the future often means preparing for scenarios no one wants to face. For families caring for a loved one with special needs, the financial and legal decisions made today can directly impact long-term stability, access to benefits, and quality of life. As government programs evolve and costs continue to rise, proactive planning has become not just important, but essential.
In this episode, Nancy Ferraro, estate planning attorney and founder of Ferraro Law in Palm Beach, shares both her professional expertise and personal experience as a special needs parent. She breaks down how special needs trusts work, why they are critical for protecting government benefits, and the common mistakes families make when trying to navigate this complex space on their own.
Listen in as Nancy explains how to create a plan that protects your loved one without jeopardizing essential support, how to avoid costly missteps, and how thoughtful legal structures can provide both flexibility and peace of mind for the future.
What You’ll Learn:
Why improper inheritance can disqualify someone from Social Security or Medicaid.
How special needs trusts protect assets while preserving government benefits.
The difference between revocable, irrevocable, and self-settled trusts.
Common estate planning mistakes that can create long-term financial risk.
How to choose and structure the role of a trustee responsibly.
Why naming minors directly as beneficiaries can create serious complications.
How to plan for disabilities that arise later in life.
Ideas Worth Sharing:
“If you fail to plan, the state of Florida has a plan for you—I always say. And you’re probably not going to like it.” - Nancy Ferraro
“Love alone is not enough. But advocacy is love in motion.” - Nancy Ferraro
“You cannot have more than $2,000 in his own name because that would technically disqualify him from Social Security disability.” - Nancy Ferraro
Resources:
When the Bough Breaks: A Mother's Story of Carnage, Courage, and the Triumph of Faith by Nancy Ferraro
About Our Guest:
Nancy A. Ferraro is a Florida attorney and founder of Ferraro Law, where she focuses on estate planning, probate, guardianship, and special needs planning for families in Palm Beach County. Known for explaining the law in clear, everyday language, she is a frequent speaker and workshop leader who helps people understand how legal tools protect their loved ones and their legacy. As the mother of a son with multiple developmental challenges and the award‑winning author of the memoir When the Bough Breaks, Nancy brings both professional experience and personal perspective to guiding families through thoughtful, compassionate planning.
Connect with Us:
If you're ready to stop avoiding your finances and start building the future you deserve, schedule a free call with me at pelicanfinancialplanning.com and let’s create your personalized financial plan together.
And if you want ongoing guidance, clarity, and confidence as you grow your wealth, subscribe to our newsletter for financial insights delivered right to your inbox.
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Read the Transcript:
Nancy Ferraro: If you fail to plan, the state of Florida has a plan for you—I always say. And you're probably not going to like it. And when you have a special needs family member, it's especially important because you have to appoint guardians who's going to take over when you can no longer do that.
Welcome to The Wealth Development Studio. I'm your host, Genevieve George, Senior Financial Advisor and Founder of Pelican Financial Planning & Wealth. Our goal for this episode is to provide clarity about today's financial topic, inspire you to be brave with your questions, and gain confidence in your financial future. So take a deep breath, grab your favorite cup of coffee, and step into the studio. Your dose of financial empowerment begins now.
Genevieve George: Today, we're diving into a topic that many families hope they'll never need to understand. But if they do, it becomes absolutely critical. We're talking about special needs trusts. If you have a child with special needs, a sibling, a spouse, or even an aging parent who rely on government benefits like Social Security or Medicaid, the way assets are titled and inherited can make the difference between long-term security and unintentionally disqualifying them from the very benefits that they depend on.
Today, joining me is Nancy Ferraro, founder of Ferraro Law in Palm Beach. Nancy focuses on estate planning and special needs planning, helping families create thoughtful, legally sound strategies that protect both assets and access to essential benefits.
Nancy, I'm so glad to have you. Thank you so much for joining us.
Nancy Ferraro: I'm thrilled to be here with you, Genevieve. Thank you for having me.
Genevieve George: Yes, thank you. When we're talking about special needs planning, it is something that I know that you you do for many of your clients. But can you share with us what made you sort of focus some of your practice on that?
Nancy Ferraro: Well, that's a great question. I am actually a special needs mom. So I adopted a little boy from Romania and we were told that he was typical, and George suffers from a host of disabilities ranging from fetal alcohol syndrome to attachment disorder to low IQ. So there were a lot of hoops that we had to jump through for George just to give him some semblance of normalcy.
Throughout the process, I realized that turning George into a family of one — believe me, I had a social worker help me with this, I'm not that smart — and applying for SSDI opened a world of benefits to him because the special needs group home in which he lives was unattainable for us. So without state and federal subsidies, there's no way we could have been able to do that.
But along the way, I learned that there's a very special way that you have to treat providing for George as a family. And one of those is not giving him more than $2,000. You cannot have more than $2,000 in his own name because that would technically disqualify him from social security disability.
It is critical that you make sure you do not violate that for your child because they'll lose all those government benefits, and then where are you? So it's important to start that planning from the beginning if you think your child might need those.
One of the most important ways we do that is through an irrevocable supplemental needs trust. And that assures that your child does not touch the money directly, but they get whatever they need.
And it's a very… not a simple matter, but it's a lot easier than having to juggle them, not touching money. So their trustee touches the money, their trustee pays directly to the providers. And it's a beautiful way for them to have what they need and not have to worry about them going forward. Especially when we're gone, right? Who's gonna make sure that that gets done for them?
Genevieve George: Sure, sure. So setting up that irrevocable trust, that titles things in a way that keeps it out of the name of the person with the disability that's receiving the government benefits, but still provides benefit to them. Is that an accurate description?
Nancy Ferraro: Exactly. And a lot of people are worried about that, but there are a lot of safety features built into that. If you assign a trustee to take over after you're gone, they have a fiduciary duty. And you know what that means. That means they have a duty to look out for the child. They have a duty not to consider remainder men, which is the people who would come after the special needs recipient.
They have a duty to make sure that that person, I say child, they're mostly adults, of course, but that recipient gets their health, education, maintenance support needs met. And on the flip side does not touch the money, but they get what they did.
There are lot of requirements, and I don't want parents to feel like, “Oh my gosh, we're just giving up control” because you're really not.
Genevieve George: Right. And in your experience, who is it that needs a special needs trust? It's my understanding that it's actually a lot—applies to a lot more individuals than we think on them.
Nancy Ferraro: Yes. So you can set up a special needs trust for a child with perhaps a drug problem that could qualify them for benefits. There are certain criteria they have to meet, but if they do meet that, you want to make sure that they're not squandering an inheritance and then living on the street, right? So you can set up an irrevocable trust for that person. You can do it outside the supplemental needs or you can do it inside, depending on what the outlook in the prognosis is. But any child who could qualify for federal benefits should have one of these in place.
Genevieve George: Okay. And what happens if it's a child or a person where that need wasn't previously there, and now it is there? If there is a disability that happens maybe later in life?
Nancy Ferraro: Well, when I do estate planning for my clients, I always put the safety net in. I don't name the child. I don't write a specific trust, but I like to have that language just in case one of the beneficiaries should fall into that category. It's a switch that flips. They don't get outright money. The trustee knows what to do, and it's a safeguard.
Genevieve George: Okay. So there is a way to safeguard against that if that happens later. You've written the estate documents, you've sort of put things in place, but then maybe a disability occurs or a drug addiction, like you said, occurs that wasn't there previously. There's a way to sort of safeguard so that that individual will still receive the HEMS, right?
Nancy Ferraro: HEMS (Health, Education, Maintenance, and Support). And of course vacations or outings are things that they like to do. So the beautiful thing about a trust is basically it's a box. You put things in, you can take things out, right? You have to fund the trust. You have to this stuff in the box. But what you're also doing when you're writing a trust is you are writing the instruction book that applies to the stuff in the box.
So there's a beautiful kind of freedom and control that you get to maintain because it's almost like an if-then scenario, right? If my child has a drug addiction, you withhold the money, you require a drug test, blah, blah, blah, right? If my child qualifies for SSDI or Title 19 benefits, then you treat this as a supplemental needs trust.
And these are the rules. This is what the trustee has to do. And then the beautiful thing is Medicaid can't touch that money. And it's then preserved for the generations to come. So Medicaid will not get a windfall.
Genevieve George: Okay, so that person would qualify for Medicaid benefits, those funds are protected for the family, they can't really access them other than what the trustee allows to leave. I love that. That makes it so much more understandable. That this trust is a box and whatever we put in the box and then the instructions for how things can leave it. I really like that. What are some mistakes that you've seen some families make in the field of doing this type of trust planning?
Nancy Ferraro: Here's the most recent one that almost gave me a heart attack. Literally, I just can't even believe this lady said it. She was so proud. I was speaking in front of group of special needs moms, and they're frazzled. They're on their last nerve. They're just hanging on for dear life. And this one young lady raised her hand and said, “I'm so excited because I have my nine-year-old's name on all my accounts. She's my beneficiary.”
And after I picked myself off the floor, I said, “Please don't do that.” If you make a minor a beneficiary, what happens is the court swoops in and takes control of that money until the child turns 18. When the child turns 18, they are felled with this enormous windfall. And you cannot do that to a minor, let alone a special needs minor. So what is the fix for that?
And by the way, if that happens, you have to have a guardianship over property and all of that money is under the supervision of the court. But unfortunately, Florida and many states consider our children adults at the age of 18. And you know, even with typical kids, are they?
Genevieve George: Yeah, no, the average 18-year-old is not making phenomenal financial decisions, right?
Nancy Ferraro: No, they're certifiable. I remember being 18. There was no tomorrow. I did it. So you don't ever want that to happen. And that means setting up guardianship through the court, and of course, that magical age that nobody wants.
Genevieve George: So in order to rectify that or to undo that mistake, she should remove her child, her minor child, as the beneficiary of her accounts and create a trust so that there are instructions and parameters on how those assets are distributed for the benefit of that child if something happens to her.
Nancy Ferraro: Absolutely. Oh my gosh, yesterday. And I was so relieved that she said the statement that she did so that I could correct it. But the next step now is to write the documents. And I think the hardest challenge for a lot of people is to wrap their head around the fact that in order to do it correctly, you have to use a lawyer. I have seen so many documents, LegalZoom, please don't get me started. You can't.
By the way, you can't call LegalZoom and say, “Could you explain this to me? I don't understand this and how does it work? How do I?” They're not going to answer your questions. You need a counselor, not a form filler. And when people hear that, they think, “Well, it's so expensive,” But guess what? It's gonna be a lot more expensive to fix it, or maybe you can't fix it. And you have no idea whether those documents will work or they're valid until you need them, and then at that point it's most likely too late.
Genevieve George: Right. Right. And particularly like, because in addition to needing a professional, the rules are different from one state to the next, right? If you're just using this global resource of some sort of online bank of legal documents, they might not even be applicable to your state.
Nancy Ferraro: And I've seen them. I have seen people bring me those downloaded, and they say they're valid in Florida. They're not. They're not appropriately notarized. They’re not appropriately witnessed. They are invalid. And people are walking around with this false sense of security that they have done what they're supposed to do. And boy, did they save money. Well, no, you didn't. But you won't know until later.
Genevieve George: Now in my role and even in my own personal life, the idea of having to do estate documents was something sort of that I see people drag their feet on, right? Nobody is excited about it. They don't want to talk about death. They don't want to talk about what could happen, but it's inevitable, right? So we need everybody to have estate documents. But I would think that it's even more important when you have that special needs individual in your family. Is that accurate? Like those people should be running to their attorney?
Nancy Ferraro: Oh my gosh, if you fail to plan, the state of Florida has a plan for you— I always say. And you're probably not going to like it. And when you have a special needs family member, it's especially important because you have to appoint guardians. Who's going to take over when you can no longer do that? And I've seen so many parents who live in denial and have their children living at home, and think that's going to be their life. But guess what? Circle of life, the way it's supposed to work.
We're supposed to go first, right? And then the children, who is going to care for those children? And I have a very emotional feeling about that because should something happen and your child's not prepared for that transition, there is going to be a very hard adjustment. And most of those kids, I saw it in New Jersey. The state of New Jersey was housing special needs children outside of the state. And then they decided it would be cheaper to pull them in.
And they were retracting the funding for Pennsylvania and Connecticut. And when those kids were transitioned, they were acting out, they were committing crimes, they were eloping, and it was not good for anyone. So you wanna make sure, even if you are not planning to go anywhere, none of us are, right? You want to assure yourself that you know what the available resources are, that your child would have a smooth transition.
And frankly, I just heard that the emergency group housing, supported housing waiting list in Florida is now 10 years. That's the emergency list. I'm not kidding. In New Jersey, when I was dealing with the state, it was seven years.
Genevieve George: Wow. Put that into like a case for me. If I had a special needs person in my family, and I die and that person needs to go into a facility, it's a 10-year waiting period. Is that what you're saying?
Nancy Ferraro: Right. So what happens in the meantime?
Genevieve George: Right.
Nancy Ferraro: So I just counseled a lovely family with a child who is autistic. She's only four years old. And the dad was crying in my office saying, “I can't picture anyone but us taking care of her.”
But acknowledging that the waiting list is 10 years. I said, just get on the list, just get on the list. Because there is going to come a time where they cannot manage that child, adult, adolescent in their home, and they're going to need help. So I'm not saying that any of this is easy.
Genevieve George: No, no.
Nancy Ferraro: But I am saying that you can make it a little less painful if you have the foresight to plan ahead. None of us want to face the fact that we won't be here. It's 10 out of 10. Nobody gets out alive. And so I don't know why we're in denial about it. And removing the stigma around death should be one of our main focuses. Knowing full well that there will come a time where you might be ill or too old or you might not be here to care for your child. Wouldn't it be nice to know that you had a plan in place?
Genevieve George: Right, right. I always use the word clarity. I feel like you're creating the gift of clarity for your family by documenting what your wishes are. And that just goes so much further when you're talking about this special needs individual, whether it's a child or an adult to that point, that you have a plan.
Right? That here are the resources. Here's the trustee that's going to manage that piece, and here is what we would like to happen.
Nancy Ferraro: Believe it or not, I've had a couple of people tell me, “Don't worry, there's a sticky note in the drawer.”
Genevieve George: That's not the right plan.
Nancy Ferraro: That's not the right kind of clarity, I don't think.
Genevieve George: No, no. And that is in the documentation, but that is also in the communication with the family as well. I really care deeply about that for people that they get their estate documents in order and that they communicate with their family what their wishes are, so that it's not crisis planning.
Nancy Ferraro: And so I'm sure that you do all of that, preparing for the special needs and helping people build the wealth of the need to fund special needs trusts and whatever their child might need in the future. And that is an important relationship that financial planners should have with the state planning attorneys.
Genevieve George: And it is an interesting balance, right? Because you’re maybe paying those resources on behalf of the child, but when I pass, I need it to flow into the special needs trust to continue to benefit that child. So is it always a trust that is only funded on the front end, or it can be funded sort of after the passing of the of the family member or the parents?
Nancy Ferraro: So when you write a trust that includes a special needs provision, you can write a freestanding one, but then you have to put the money, you have to front load the money, right? Because you have to have it funded. But when you write a revocable living trust with a supplemental or special needs provision, the money goes into a pool. And that's when the switch flips.
So there might be three children in the family and the typical children might each get their own trust and that's either managed by them or something else. And then the third share goes in for the special needs child or a disproportionate share because obviously that family member is going to need more resources. So that is the beauty of writing the trust because you can designate two thirds or whatever you wanna do, but it's not separately funding that particular trust.
You're funding the whole thing. And then when it's needed, that's when you get the proportionate shares.
Genevieve George: Okay. And how do those trusts work sort of alongside the governmental benefits if an individual is receiving social security disability or Medicaid? What is the coordination there?
Nancy Ferraro: Well, that's why it's critical to have that trust because that irrevocable supplemental needs portion, Medicaid can't touch, right? As long as you don't give the child power, they can't manage it, they can't be the trustee. As long as you don't allow that and the money is handled appropriately when that family member passes, you can designate a next beneficiary. So it goes right there. You are actually shielding the money.
Genevieve George: Mm-hmm. That's great. That's great. You shared that you were presenting to a group of parents with special needs children. Are there other resources that these families should be seeking out and looking for when it comes to the actual trust writing and that kind of thing? Maybe share some of that information.
Nancy Ferraro: As far as writing trusts, this is the challenge. I meet a lot of parents who have dedicated all their resources, all their energy, all their wealth to supporting the special needs family member. And what I'm finding is they don't have the appropriate spare money, if you want, to write the trust.
And it's so critical. And that is part of what I'm working on now is to figure out whether there are grants or charities that would support that. And it's funny you say that because I have someone on my radar right now. I'm to be grilling her about giving me money to do that. Of course, I would love to work free, but my dog likes to eat.
Genevieve George: Yeah, we still have to pay our bills too, right?
Nancy Ferraro: Yeah, somebody has to pay for the puppy chow. But I would, in coordination with the service, obviously, discount my fees. I work with people. I do payment plans, and I believe that everyone who needs the document should have the documents.
Genevieve George: And to have the proper level of documents, right? Not the online downloaded, potentially not sufficient.
Nancy Ferraro: Yeah. So aside from having to feed my dog, we still have to pay the bills, but yes, I do have a heart for the special needs planning, and I do as much as I can to help out with that.
Genevieve George: And when I was talking to another individual that was telling me about his sister's special needs trust and different components of that. There was some back and forth about the type of trust and whether Medicaid could attach to some of those dollars. So I know you mentioned that a couple of times, if it's in the irrevocable trust that Medicaid should not be able to access that.
Is that correct?
Nancy Ferraro: Correct.
Genevieve George: What type of trust are people out there concerned about where Medicaid might be able to claw back some of those resources?
Nancy Ferraro: I see the problem balloon, right? The revocable living trust with a separate trust for the supplemental needs child without it being labeled or designated as supplemental needs. Because I can see that if a parent dies, the money goes outright to that child. That's a problem. You never want to do that.
You want to make sure that upon your passing, everything becomes irrevocable, but you also want those guardrails in place so that... Now, when I write a trust for a family, and they are not concerned with supplemental needs or special needs children, I say at a certain age they can manage the trust. I would never do that in a supplemental needs trust. Because once they have the availability to touch the money, that's where the problem comes.
Genevieve George: Okay. And what about in a situation where maybe there was an accident, and so somebody that was previously typical is now special needs. If there is some sort of settlement or something like that, what do you guide those families to do in that moment? Because the second you give money in their direct name, it's not protected in the way that you're talking about.
Nancy Ferraro: Correct. So if the recipient or the plaintiff, let's say, gets a settlement and now they are disabled where they previously were not, that's a different type of special needs trust. That's called a Self-settled Trust. And it's perfectly legitimate, and you can write them for those folks. But again, the same rules apply. They cannot manage the trust that the person who needs it, they have to appoint a trustee. They can't direct the funds, and so it's a little more complex, but it's certainly doable.
Genevieve George: Okay, okay. So there's action that needs to be taken in that situation as well to protect that injured individual from having those resources pulled from them. Cause I'm thinking through like if there was a pretty significant car accident and that person is now qualifies for social security disability.
We want any settlement dollars received from the car accident to be in what did you call it, a self-settled trust where they are not the trustee, even if they're mentally capable of being that.
Nancy Ferraro: Yeah, and so there are some restrictions. There's an age restriction and some other rules around it, but it is certainly doable in most cases. Yeah.
Genevieve George: Okay, okay, so there are things for people to consider for these instances where somebody that wasn't previously disabled is maybe now qualified as disabled. And we've talked a little bit about the trustees. So what are some guidance that you give these families related to, you know, creating or assigning those trustees?
Nancy Ferraro: A lot of times we end up with siblings as trustees. What you're doing when you are naming successor trustees is you're really giving someone a job. And it is not an honorific as much as it is a responsibility. So it's a very difficult decision for some people to make. I just had a family name there, a 21-year-old, for lack of anyone else capable or willing to do it.
But the nice thing to know is that as time goes and that 21-year-old matures or you have other family members or you have friends come into the circle that you trust, those things can always be changed. They're revocable. Everything is revocable until the music stops, kind of like musical chairs. Once the music stops, we're stuck with the words on the page.
And even at that, we like to appoint several people in a row. So that if someone falls out, dies, refuses to serve or can't serve, that you have backups to those people. But when we write those initial documents, people get a little nervous because they think they're gonna be stuck with that decision, but life happens, right? And things change. So I like to say it's etched in stone until it's not, because you, as the trustee, can always change it.
Genevieve George: Okay. If I was in a position where I needed to write this document, I can assign trustees that I think would be appropriate, but as life changes, I can make adjustments to who those trustees that I have assigned prior to my passing, of course.
Nancy Ferraro: Correct. And we can even get fancy with it. If people want to spend the money and they just don't feel it with their trustee, there is such a thing called a Trust Protector. And a lot of people appoint their attorney or someone, professional that they know, because that trust protector has the power and authority and the duty to check on the trustee to make sure that things are being followed correctly, and if they're not, to remove the trustee and appoint a new one or act as the trustee themselves.
Genevieve George: And even if you’ve—when you're writing these documents early on, right, you maybe have a trustee and a backup and a backup, but the reality is life is going to continue to happen, and these individuals are also going to age. So is there like a point where it becomes like this outside third party because all of these family members are no longer available?
Nancy Ferraro: I hate to do that, but sometimes I have to. But I always encourage people to go down a generation at least. And you give that person or the two people or the three people the power to appoint a new trustee as they go, right?
Genevieve George: Okay. And is that something that you're encouraging your clients to communicate with those individuals prior, like as they're writing those documents, hey, I think that it would be wonderful if you could serve as trustee, and here's what that means. Are they having that conversation as those documents are being written?
Nancy Ferraro: It depends on the family. Because this young family with a 21-year-old, I am not encouraging them to discuss that with him now because they might have someone new step in. And when you open that discussion, you are now taking a vote. It becomes a committee decision, and that doesn't get anything done. It's always best to have something in place.
And yes, you can discuss it or broach the topic, but it really depends on the family.
Genevieve George: And so from like a legal standpoint, if I'm working with you and I'm writing my state documents and I'm deciding who my trustees are, I'm just providing that information to you, and those individuals don't find out unless I die?
Nancy Ferraro: Right. And one of the reasons I don't encourage sharing those documents, I mean, yeah, you can refer to them and be vague, but as things change, if you give out those documents for people to have in safekeeping, now, once you change them, you have to retract all the old ones. And now you're creating a paper trail to say, “Hey, why did mom take this from me, and why did she give it to you? And now you're causing the conflict that it's my job to prevent.”
Genevieve George: Right, Yeah, so having multiple versions out there and multiple. There's a balance there on the communication too, right? Because some of that is related to the financial piece, but some of it goes back to like your healthcare surrogate and your power of attorney and that kind of information, right?
So some of that had like, if you don't have copies of that when needed, right? But at the same time, you don't want to have millions of copies out there.
Nancy Ferraro: Right. So those are the kinds of documents I recommend sharing. But the durable power of attorney in Florida becomes effective when you sign it. So sometimes my clients ask me to hold the original. You would need the original to effectuate it because we don't have that safeguard from the legislature.
So if a client calls me or a client's nephew calls and says, “Aunt Lulu's gone crazy. I need the power of attorney,” it gives me the moment, you know, to say, call Aunt Lulu and find out what's going on, make sure that that is actually the case before I released the original document because maybe the nephew is looking for a Maserati. Right. And I'm not going to release the—
Genevieve George: Right, right. Yes. Maybe he is 18 and looking for that one fault that we talked about earlier.
Nancy Ferraro: Oh yeah. So, yeah, I like to safeguard the original.
Genevieve George: Okay. And you having had gone through this yourself with your family and then working with other families, obviously like it's very easy from the outside to say we need to do X, Y, and Z, but there's a heavy emotional burden there. How did you work through that? How do you work through that with your clients to help them?
Nancy Ferraro: It's funny because even when I have spouses in the room who might not necessarily agree on the decisions, once I start to explain what the process is, once I start to put it in real-life terms for them, where they can wrap their heads around it, I mean, it's a lot. I don't expect people to remember everything, understand everything.
But when I'm in the moment with those folks, and I say, this is what would happen if you do nothing. This is what happens here. This is what happens if you change it five years down the road. It gives them a kind of peace because they don't even know to ask those questions, right?
But you're addressing something that in the back of their minds could be keeping them from making a decision. And that, if we don't like Aunt Marie in three years, that is something we could change. And when you give people peace of mind about those decisions, suddenly it becomes easier for them.
Genevieve George: Yeah, because it does feel like we have to write this down and it is forever, right? But you're saying we have to write this down so that it's in place. But if things change, we can adjust it.
Nancy Ferraro: Correct.
Genevieve George: And then taking that time to explain to your clients what it all means, really like put it into real-world terms.
Nancy Ferraro: Yeah. And my favorite thing about my practice is that folks call me all the time, two years, three years, four years later with questions. And as long as it's related to the work we did, and they call me with other things, their kid gets arrested, they have a traffic ticket. I like to think that I'm their lawyer, and I am not going to send them a bill for 0.1, 0.2, because first of all, I don't believe in it. Second of all, I hate keeping track of my time, but I am their attorney.
And that's my job. So I hate to bring up the downloadable forms again, but it's important to have a relationship because what happens if you have a question? What happens if you want to change something? What happens if the law changes? So I'm very grateful that my clients feel free to pick up the phone and ask me those questions. I'm happy to have them rather than them making a mistake or wondering or just going away.
Genevieve George: Yeah, it's not transactional. It's an actual relationship where you're a resource to them well beyond signing those documents.
Nancy Ferraro: Yeah, and that's what I love about my clients.
Genevieve George: That's awesome. And how often do you recommend that they actually do sit down and make sure everything is still in alignment with what they want, their wishes and their lives to be?
Nancy Ferraro: I recommend every three years or if there's a life-altering event: a birth, a death, a divorce, something happens. But three years is good. And most attorneys who write your documents will conduct that for you free of charge, which I do, because I don't want people to think I'm just pulling them in to churn a fee. But every three years, they should go back to their attorney, review everything, see if everything is the same, or if they want to change something. Then of course, if there's work, then we do that.
Genevieve George: Then there's work, and we're paying for that. If there's something that's changed that requires an update.
Nancy Ferraro: Yeah. The Secure Act sent all of us into a tizzy because I gave one kind of advice before the Secure Act came down. And then I went back to all my clients and said, "Let's undo that IRA into the trust because the laws change.” So yes, it's a good idea to review at least every three years.
Genevieve George: Yeah. It is important to have that relationship and to have somebody that's going to proactively reach out and say, "Hey, it's been a couple of years and the law changed.”
We need to look at this. Well, Nancy, how can people talk to you and work with you?
Nancy Ferraro: It's ferrarolauponbeach.com. I have a phone number there and there's a QR code that I can give you for the introductory chat. And would love to speak to anyone who's concerned about solving this issue.
Genevieve George: And you also wrote a book. So tell us about the book so that individuals can read that if they're interested.
Nancy Ferraro: I did write a book. It's called ‘When the Bough Breaks,’ and it is a memoir about my son George, who is from Romania. And the reason I wrote it was because when you have a special needs child, and you cannot, or any child with a difficulty that you can't solve for them, not only do we blame ourselves, but society blames us. And it's a very dark, lonely place.
So if you remember Son of Sam, who had voices in his head. His mother never wrote a book because we don't want to talk about it. But it's critical to talk about it if we're going to make any progress and get any help. And so I was very lucky in that this book won a national writing competition, and it garnered me a traditional publisher.
And that is the vehicle to being in front of special needs parents, parents who have experienced traumatic parenting. It is so essential for these parents to know you're not alone. You don't have to do it alone. We're not meant to do it alone. You're not a victim. You're not an angel. You're just a parent. And let's throw back the mantle of shame and start a conversation because that is the only way we're going to make progress forward for ourselves and our children.
Genevieve George: Well, yeah, that's very powerful. I appreciate that you were brave and shared your story so that you can help other individuals. And I think that's so incredible. So thank you so much. Yeah, so you said ‘When the Bough Breaks’, correct?
Nancy Ferraro: Yes, it's ‘When the Bough Breaks’ and it's available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble, where books are sold.
Genevieve George: We can link it in the show notes as well. I think it's very powerful. And then we'll put your information, and just anything else that you want to add to today so that individuals feel well educated about these trusts?
Nancy Ferraro: Well, it's important when you have a special needs child to know you don't have to be a lawyer, but you have to familiarize yourself with the law, what your children's rights are, and you have to form a team and basically become your child's best advocate because when I adopted George, I thought I will just love it out of him, whatever it is. But love alone is not enough.
But advocacy is love in motion. And I want parents to know that you're courageous. Asking for help is not a sign of weakness. And you're brave and keep going.
Genevieve George: Wow, that was really powerful. Thank you so much, Nancy.
That's it for today's episode of The Wealth Development Studio. Remember, financial clarity is powerful. Do you need help with your financial plan? Go to pelicanfinancialplanning.com to schedule a call with me. Until next time.
