Taking Care of Mom and Dad: Simplify Investments

If your parents have more than one home that they use for their own residence, you should encourage them to sell one of these. In many cases, as people get older, they sell and move out of the home that had been their primary residence and move into a second or vacation home -- which is often smaller, easier to manage and located in a warmer climate.

As we've mentioned before, your parents can keep the home that they sell in the family -- if it has emotional or financial value that's worth keeping. Their goal should be to move the illiquid asset off of their personal balance sheet and onto someone else's...even if that someone else is another family member or a trust that works for the benefit of other family members.