Provider Group is committed to helping parents with disabled children.
When speaking about special needs planning, advisor
Gregory Zibricky often asks his listeners why they think in the
Oscar-winning 1988 movie Rain Man that autistic savant Raymond Babbitt,
played by Dustin Hoffman, lives at Wallbrook, a finely manicured
institution.
People often respond with statements like, "He had
no one else to take care of him," or "He burned his baby brother in the
bathtub."
"But the right answer," observes the 41-year-old
Zibricky, "is that his father created a trust, left $3 million in it
and left a guardian with directions. The father had a place, a person
and the money."
Essentially, that's what his firm, Provider Group
Ltd., based in Frankfort, Ill., and Grand Rapids, Mich., is helping
clients do: Have a place, a person and the money to enable their
disabled loved ones to live the most satisfying and productive lives
possible.
Zibricky formed Provider Group in 1999, and the firm
now has more than 350 clients. It offers traditional planning services
but focuses on special needs planning. The firm members' dedication to
special needs planning is apparent in the way they've organized the
firm, the services they offer and how they deal with clients. Their
deep understanding of the issues and commitment to the cause in part
comes from the fact that three people in the firm-Greg and his wife,
Dawn, and benefits consultant Michael E. Frantz-have special needs
children themselves. The Zibrickys' 12-year-old son, Aaron, has autism,
and Frantz's 12-year-old daughter, Aarika Jayne, has Down syndrome.
The Zibrickys and Frantz see the need for special
needs planning, but not just because they have disabled children. In
presentations he does to various groups, Zibricky stresses individuals
with special needs are not a niche population. He says one of every
five U.S. households has a person with a disability and approximately
one of every nine children across the nation is receiving special
education services. Not only that, but crisis is on the horizon: For
the first time in history, he says, dependents with disabilities will
outlive their parents and guardians due to medical advances.
That would seem to present an opportunity for
advisors. However, special needs planning usually isn't as profitable
as other segments of the business because it takes a tremendous amount
of time, the Zibrickys say, and an advisor can get burned out pretty
fast. "If I didn't have a clientele for 14 or 15 years, I wouldn't have
been able to jump into this," Zibricky says. "It came as a natural
progression, and something we've become known for."
The firm's founder and president, Zibricky has been
a financial industry professional for 20 years and has particular
expertise in tax and investment strategies, estate conservation and
insurance analysis. He acts as the "quarterback" for clients, guiding
them through the planning process.
Dawn Zibricky, the group's disability consultant, is
a registered nurse, certified school nurse and has a master's in
neurology. She also is an autism trainer for the state of Illinois and
previously worked as a staff nurse at the Rehabilitation Institute of
Chicago, specializing in the care of persons with brain and spinal cord
trauma.
Frantz is the firm's benefits consultant, compiles
written plans for clients and provides back-office support. Other firm
members include Jeff Cullen, who oversees qualified-plans business, and
Juanita Babcock, the office administrator. The firm has many other
experts to whom they refer clients for particular matters or call in
when needed.
"One of the things we found very early on is the
only way most people can get information on special needs planning is
through attorneys," Zibricky says. "We felt there had to be a softer
approach, parent to parent, advocate to advocate."
Lawyers, he says, stress the establishment of
special needs trusts, which are an important part of planning for a
disabled child's future as an adult. Special needs trusts allow the
beneficiary to continue receiving public benefits, such as Medicaid,
Section 8 housing and Supplemental Security Income (SSI), but the
trusts can only pay for supplemental needs not covered by those
programs-basically anything other than food, clothing and shelter.
Those "supplemental" needs can include things like eyeglasses, dental
work, haircuts, cable television or going to a baseball game.
While some people might see this as taking advantage
of the system, the fact is that most parents couldn't possibly save
enough money to finance the independent life of an adult child over
several decades, let alone a disabled one who might only be able to
work in a limited capacity and might need ongoing medical care. The
only option in the United States for most parents of special needs
children is to plan on their adult child to be considered living in
poverty so he or she can qualify for government programs. They then can
enhance their adult child's quality of life through the use of special
needs trusts.
While the trusts are essential, special needs
planning involves much more, Zibricky says. That thinking led the firm
to devise its proprietary ProvideCare Plan, a reference guide of 125
pages or more, individualized for each client, which details action
steps for today and tomorrow to help a disabled loved one. It maps out
upcoming life transitions for the disabled person, and includes
sections on important details about their disability such as: special
education and development of employment skills; personal information to
help future caregivers; legal issues including wills, trusts and
guardianships; financial topics including insurance and retirement
planning as well as possible future costs; public assistance programs
the individual may be eligible for now or in the future; and estate
planning.
Dawn Zibricky, the conceptual architect for
ProvideCare Plan, used person-centered planning in developing it.
Person-centered planning focuses on a disabled person's positive
attributes-his or her strengths, abilities, desires and talents-in
planning for their future. Her goal when talking with clients, she
says, is to help them to not only identify their child's strengths, but
to determine what parents need to put in place for their child to make
the most of their abilities. She stresses that recording everything
possible about the child-from interests and abilities to doctors and
medication-is extremely important to the child's future, particularly
if something happens to the parents.
The Zibrickys have already done this for their own
son. "We have everything documented on our son so his legal guardian
can pick up where we left off. It would be important to his quality of
life, and we don't want his life to be like jumping off a cliff. Even
before person-centered planning, the documentation has to done," she
says.
The Zibrickys have even bigger plans that they hope
will make their style of special needs planning available to more
people. They have formed an umbrella organization, Provide Care for
Life, which not only includes Provider Group but also a company formed
last year that will offer back-office support for other advisors and
institutions that need assistance with special needs cases.. This year
under the umbrella, they want to form a nonprofit company under
Internal Revenue Code Section 501(c)(3) that eventually would provide
special needs services to less affluent clients at a much lower cost.
Clients say they have been very pleased with the
services they have received from Provider Group. Lori McAleavy, who
lives in Homer Glen, Ill., with her husband, Charles, an air traffic
controller, and their two sons, 10-year-old Robert and 9-year-old
Scott, who has autism, first became aware of the Zibrickys' interest in
special needs planning when she met Dawn several years ago at an autism
training group.
Although the McAleavys had worked with a lawyer to
make sure they planned for their children's futures, they didn't feel
confident that the right things were in place. The lawyer had
"pooh-poohed" the idea of a special needs trust, she recalls, and after
she began working with the Provider Group, she learned the lawyer also
made a mistake in her will that could have been detrimental to her son:
The lawyer allowed her to leave something in her will to Scott that
could have disqualified him for government benefits in the future.
"Mike caught it right away. It would mean that Scott wouldn't
qualify-and that was in the first page of our will," she recalls. She
later used an attorney Zibricky recommended to make the needed
revisions.
McAleavy says Zibricky and Frantz were very patient
and spent many, many hours with them in developing a plan for Scott.
She adds it took about 18 months because of all the scheduling issues
in the McAleavys' lives-her husband works nights and weekends and their
son has many appointments for occupational and speech therapy. Not only
that, but lining up an appropriate babysitter sometimes is a challenge.
"They have helped us so much and have done the
special needs planning-what Scott will need for his adult life and
where we feel he'll be then. They helped us get going on awill and a
special needs trust and funding it with a life insurance policy. If it
wasn't for them and their vast knowledge, both Greg and Mike, it would
have been very difficult to do all the planning," Lori says.
Other clients who are very happy with their
experience with the firm are Dr. Diana Jaime and Dr. Jose Penaherrera,
who live in New Lenox, Ill., and have two sons, including 6-year-old
Antonio, who has autism. Jaime and her husband had looked into their
son's medical and treatment needs, but it wasn't until later that they
started thinking about financial concerns and what would happen to him
if they weren't around.
They contacted Greg, who gave them an overview of
what they needed to do, she says. He provided insight on a special
needs trust, helped them determine how they needed to invest to achieve
their goals and helped them decide who would aid the trustee-her
sister-in making sure Antonio gets what he needs, she notes. Mike
compiled the ProvideCare Plan for Antonio, she adds
"There are still some times when I have questions or
doubt. Or my sister, she wants to give our son money, and we want to
know the best way to do this. Every time we have a question we call
Greg. He is always available," she says.