Janet Berry-Johnson, CPA, CFEI

Being the family project manager isn't a retirement plan. You can't protect your parents by draining your own resources.

Taking care of them doesn't mean sacrificing yourself.

Save this for the next time you feel guilty about prioritizing your own financial future.

Many people over 65 skip a valuable tax credit because they've never heard of it.

It's called the Credit for the Elderly or Disabled. Your parents might qualify if they're 65 or older, or under 65 and retired on permanent and total disability with taxable disability income. There are income limits, so not everyone gets it, but if a parent qualifies, it's worth $3,750 to $7,500.

That's a tax credit, which means it comes straight off their tax bill, dollar for dollar.

If you're not sure whether your parent qualifies, the IRS has a free online tool that asks a few questions about age, filing status, and income, then tells you where you stand.

This is exactly the kind of thing that gets missed when you're managing your parents' finances on top of everything else. Follow for more tax moves most families don't know to look for.

If you're looking for an assisted living community for a loved one, this Kiplinger article is a tough read but an important one.

The author writes about his friend, Julie, whose routine surgery went wrong. At 62, she can't walk or use the restroom without help and moved into assisted living. The place advertises 24-hour care, chef-prepared meals, and a family dining restaurant. But the reality was much different.

The author offers advice on what to look for when checking out a community. Don't just take the scheduled tour. Ask questions and make unannounced visits at different times of the day. Talk to the families who are already there.

And if you're local to the Omaha area, I know a few wonderful senior care advisors who can help you find the right place for your family. (Their services are free of charge to families!)

Link to the full story in the comments.

If you've already gone through this with a loved one, what red flags (or green flags) did you see?

Nobody clocks in for this kind of labor.

There's no job title, performance review, or paycheck. But if you're a parent's primary caretaker, you're tracking medications, calling the Social Security Administration, and digging through boxes of paperwork to find the information you need, you're doing labor.

This Labor Day, I want to recognize the people doing this work. It takes a lot, cognitively and emotionally, and it's often invisible to everyone except the person doing it.

If you're the default person in your family for this kind of thing, drop a 🙋‍♀️ below. You're not the only one.

Credentials matter, but so does empathy.

When you let someone into your parent's finances, or your own, you deserve to know they're qualified, ethical, and trustworthy.

I'm a CPA, Daily Money Manager, Certified Financial Education Instructor, Paper Solution Certified Organizer, Trustworthy Certified Expert, and HIPAA-certified.

Those credentials tell you I understand the technical side: the tax rules, the documentation, the compliance. What they can't measure is whether I can listen without judgment, or recognize that behind a stack of unopened mail is usually guilt, grief, or just plain overwhelm.

Organizing your finances, or your parent's takes accuracy and care.

Sorting through someone's financial life, especially at the end of theirs, takes patience most spreadsheets don't account for. I bring the professional expertise to get it right, and the calm, steady approach to get through it without adding to what you're already carrying.

Follow for more on how I work.

Your filing cabinet can't evacuate with you.

If a wildfire, hurricane, or flood forces you out of your house, you don't grab that four-drawer cabinet full of paperwork. You grab what you can carry, or nothing at all.

This is why Lisa Woodruff at built the Paper Solution Binders the way she did. They're designed to grab and go so you can pull them off a shelf on your way out the door.

And you don't even need the physical binder in hand to be prepared. Once you have your paperwork organized in the binder system, you can digitize it and store it in the cloud. That way, even if you can't get to the physical copies, you have access to insurance policies, account numbers, etc.

September is National Preparedness Month, so it's a good time to consider, if you had to evacuate right now, do you know where your most important documents are, and could you get to them?

I'll include my affiliate link to the Organize 365 Paper Solution Binder in the comments so you can get started. If you make a purchase using my link, I earn a small commission at no extra cost to you.

I'm a Paper Solution Certified Organizer, so if you need help finding the right solution or implementing it, please reach out!

You don't want to take over your parent's finances. You also can't watch things spiral and do nothing.

That's a genuine tension, and there's no clean way through it if you're the one wearing both hats: the daughter and the accountant.

This is usually where a neutral third party helps more than another family conversation. Someone who can organize and manage the day-to-day finances, keep your parent involved and informed, and take the money part off the table before it turns into a fight about control.

It's not about replacing your parent's independence. It's about removing the tension that shows up whenever family and money mix.

Follow for more on how this works.