The Fear of Home Downsizing Home Downsizing.  Just the words tend to conjure up images and feelings of overwhelm to the point that a home owner freezes and does nothing. After more than 25 years of working with home owners (or their family members) that want or need to sell and move to a smaller home, apartment, or other senior living arrangement, I have witnessed numerous specific and personal needs a person has with the transition to senior living. Some of the items that need to be considered are timing, locating the right new home, apartment, or other senior facility, a move manager and/or moving company, selling the house youre currently in, including what to do with all the stuff in the house, and making this all happen with minimal stress. One of the first primary issues is timing.  If a person is just looking to sell a house and move to a smaller house or independent living community, this may be a one to three (or more) year process. Many home owners think about repairs and updates a house needs or should have done to get the house ready to put on the market, as well as taking care of all the stuff that may have accumulated in the house.   Finding the right new home, apartment, or apartment community may also take some time, especially if a person wants a ground level apartment, or one that takes pets, and in a particular part of town. If someone has a health emergency, then this timeline to find the right place to move to is pushed rapidly forward. Finding the right apartment or senior living community is also very important.  Sometimes the best communities or facilities are not always the closest or most convenient to family members, doctors, or other services that a person would like. It may be much more important to find a community or facility that provides the best care and services for your needs, instead of focusing solely on how close it is to family or friends. One issue I hear from sellers moving to senior living probably more than anything else, is what do I do with all this stuff.  If a person has lived in a house for 20, 30, 40 years or more, its understandable that a lot of stuff has accumulated. It most likely took a lot of years to accumulate the stuff you have, so dont feel you need to complete a project like this all at one time.   Taking small steps like starting with one room and labeling items that you know you want to keep or know you can part with is a start. Moving from where you are now to a smaller home or apartment is a big change, but if youve done some pre-move planning, it doesnt have to be stressful. Creating a floor plan of where you are moving to, so that you know what can be moved and where it will go, can help.  Knowing what you can and want to take with you can then help with parting with items that you know you dont want or cant take with you. Moving resources available range from those that just pick up and move furniture and items already boxed up, to companies that will do everything to move you, so that the only thing you need to do is literally get yourself to your new dwelling. Lastly, what to do with your house?  There are options.  Do you keep the house as an investment property?  Do you sell the house and use the proceeds to buy a smaller home or buy into a community?  Do you use the sale proceeds to invest as part of a retirement plan?  Do you sell the house and turn your equity into a monthly income stream? What you do with your house and how you sell will be determined by your specific situation and how best your house can help you achieve your goals. For all of the above items, the key to getting repairs and updates completed, getting the stuff taken care of, finding the right new home, apartment, or other senior living arrangement, and getting moved from point A to point B, is having the right team to assist you. Just know that there are local resources for each step of the process to help make the transition to a smaller home or apartment as stress free as possible. If youd like additional information about downsizing or downsizing resources, just call my office at (402) 450-0199. **************Ben Souchek is an author of the book Home Downsizing Secrets as well as the owner and founder of Home Downsizing Solutions by The Sierra Group, LLC, a company that specializes in helping seniors and their families transition to senior living by buying houses direct from sellers.  

Enable Dental is the nations leading provider of portable at-home dental services. Our dental teams are dedicated and trained to work specifically with unique populations including those individuals with geriatric populations, those with mobility and transportation challenges or restrictions and intellectual or developmental disabilities. Our focus in working individuals and groups at well over 1,100 communities and senior support organizations across the country is what sets us apart.  Our licensed and skilled dental professionals are highly qualified and are committed to providing the best care to our patients regardless of setting including in the comfort of the patients home, senior home, assisted living facility, or community center.To provide the level of service with the accuracy needed to adhere to the unique needs and requirements of each patient, we developed and own a proprietary technology stack which allows us to meet internal quality metrics and communicate throughout our company. To solve important dental issues and reduce stress for patients and their loved ones, we rely on innovation, technology, and solid training to gain efficiency with every step in our proprietary process.Our success with our program includes the utilization of military grade portable dental equipment and our ability to harness technology to provide both synchronous and asynchronous dentistry. We are equipped with portable technology and advanced systems which allow us to provide at-home or on-site dentistry. We use handheld digital x-ray units, bring our own custom dental chairs, and wheeled dental units making it possible to thoroughly diagnose and perform dental treatment in different living environments. We can also harness EMR data and provide valuable data back to through data integrations if necessary.Editor's Notes please contact Matt Schreiber, Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing at 866-988-4504 for more information.

Plan While You Still Can Do you know what healthcare treatments you would and would not want if you could not speak for yourself? Have you considered what wouldhappen if you were no longer able to make decisions for your healthcare or finances? These are hard questions to think about but taking time to answer them and make them official is essential. To make your decisions knownand give power to those you choose, you need legal documents in place; specifically, a Healthcare Durable Power of Attorney, an Advanced Directive,and a Financial Durable Power of Attorney. A Healthcare DPOA allows you to document who makesmedical decisions about your healthcare. The person designated as your agent is authorized to speak ONLY if you cant speak for yourself. An AdvancedDirective is a document that states your wishes for medical treatments at the end of life. These documents are essential for making your healthcare wishesknown and avoiding a Guardianship during incapacity. You can prepare these documents with an Estate Planning or Elder Law Attorney, or there are freeversions of them available with the Center for Practical Bioethics. A Financial DPOA is a document that gives authority from oneperson (the principal) to another person (the agent) for the agent to act on behalf of the principal. These are much more technical and require theassistance of an attorney to ensure they are prepared properly. Creating a Financial DPOA is essential for you to ensure your finances are in the hands ofsomeone you trust. If this year has taught us anything, its to plan while you can. Talk to your attorney to get started.Disclaimer: This is not intended to be legal counsel. The choice of an attorney is an important decision and should not be based solely upon advertisements.This article was submitted by Aaron L. Love, JD, an attorney with The Love Law Group, LLC and may be reached at 816-554-3330 or by email at planning@lovelawgroup.com.

I am Kim Tucker, a local Kansas City Metro Home Buyer.  I am also a Mom's House Senior Transition Specialist . . . When you put those two together it gives me the unique ability to help seniors and their families who are transitioning to a new living arrangement and are left with a home they no longer need.With my Certification and my partnership with Mom's House, I am getting a lot of referrals from people who are transitioning into a new home and reaching out for help with their home here and all the stuff left in it here in the Kansas City Metro.  I recently recorded a video to tell you a little bit more about me, Kim Tucker.  Our company, kcmoHomeBuyer.com.  And how we might be able to help you.At the end of the video, we share how you can request a free digital copy of my book "Paying for Long-Term Care - The Essential Guide to Understanding and Funding Senior Care"Having helped my Mother at the end of her life, my Mother In Law navigating Alzheimer's, my Brother In Law with Dementia, and my Father In Law moving to assisted living and sell his home in a whirlwind month . . . plus several others, we have been through what many reading this article have been through and we are here ready to help.Grab a cup of coffee and take about 13 minutes to watch my video.