In this video, our Polk County special needs attorneys explain that a court-appointed guardian is an individual who has been granted legal authority by an Iowa court to care for and take responsibility for another individual who is unable to legally take care of herself and make decisions or is incapacitated and unable to care for herself and make decisions. The court must determine that the potential non-parent guardian will act in the best interest of the ward. The most common type of court-appointed guardianship in Iowa is guardianship for an incapacitated adult. This type of guardianship includes everything from adults who have been in sudden accidents and left with an inability to complete a mental or physical task to adults succumbing to mental or physical diseases such as Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s. The adult does not have to be completely physically or mentally incapacitated to require a guardian. Generally, for the court to appoint a guardian for an adult, the individual with a disability must lack the ability to make sound decisions regarding their own well being and/or financial issues.

In this video, our Polk County special needs attorneys discuss how a to use  Special Needs Trusts, also known as Supplemental Needs Trusts, in order to allow disabled individuals to accumulate assets and income in excess of these amounts without reducing the amount of SSI benefits that they are eligible to receive. Typically a loved one will create the trust and serve as trustee, with the disabled individual being the beneficiary.  A bank account will then be opened in the name of the trust.

In this video, our Polk County special needs attorneys explain how a special needs trust is a tool that can be used to benefit a person with a disability.  It allows the person with a disability to accumulate assets and earn income without negatively impacting government benefits.  Many government benefits are “means-tested” meaning that if the recipient earns more than a certain threshold in income or accumulates more than a certain threshold in assets, the benefits will be reduced or eliminated.

A testamentary special needs trust is one that is provided for in a third party’s will or trust.  An example is when a parent of an individual with a disability provides in her will that upon her death a special needs trust will be created for her child and that a certain portion of her estate will be transferred to the trust.  This can also be accomplished through a revocable living trust. A testamentary special needs trust does not actually come into existence until the death of the third party whose will or trust provides for it.