Are you ready to unlock the secrets to becoming a Certified Elder Law Attorney (CELA) and gain a unique edge in your profession? We promise you'll find just that in our enriching conversation with the accomplished elder law attorneys Keith Miles, Teresa Bowman, Tye Cressman, Bob Fectman, Michael Delaney, Beth McDaniel, Angela Odensky, John McNair, and Shannon Lehman Pecoraro. These legal experts share their first-hand experiences on the journey to becoming a CELA, from the rigorous exam to the immense dedication required. They also expose the vital role of continuous learning in staying current in the elder law field.
Expanding on the benefits of being a CELA, our guests detail how this certification sets them apart and enhances their service delivery to clients. They emphasize the importance of identifying knowledge gaps and how the CELA exam helps broaden one's expertise in elder law. From challenges faced during their certification journey to the impact on their business, our guests offer candid insights and share valuable advice for budding elder law practitioners. Tune in for an informative, insightful episode that will surely leave you inspired and better equipped to navigate the elder law landscape.
Check out our new website www.TheElderLawCoach.com.
Are you ready to unlock the secrets to becoming a Certified Elder Law Attorney (CELA) and gain a unique edge in your profession? We promise you'll find just that in our enriching conversation with the accomplished elder law attorneys Keith Miles, Teresa Bowman, Tye Cressman, Bob Fectman, Michael Delaney, Beth McDaniel, Angela Odensky, John McNair, and Shannon Lehman Pecoraro. These legal experts share their first-hand experiences on the journey to becoming a CELA, from the rigorous exam to the immense dedication required. They also expose the vital role of continuous learning in staying current in the elder law field.
Expanding on the benefits of being a CELA, our guests detail how this certification sets them apart and enhances their service delivery to clients. They emphasize the importance of identifying knowledge gaps and how the CELA exam helps broaden one's expertise in elder law. From challenges faced during their certification journey to the impact on their business, our guests offer candid insights and share valuable advice for budding elder law practitioners. Tune in for an informative, insightful episode that will surely leave you inspired and better equipped to navigate the elder law landscape.
Check out our new website www.TheElderLawCoach.com.
This is the Elder Law Coach podcast with your host, Todd Whatley. Let's not waste time, let's get after it. That's right. This is the Elder Law Coach podcast and my name is Todd Whatley, and thanks again for joining us. I am so thankful for everyone who catches the episodes. If you have not signed up or joined, I encourage you to click the button and follow us so that you get notified of every new episode.
Speaker 1:So today I continue from my last podcast where I had sat down with certified law attorneys at the national conference in September of 2023, and we sat down and I interviewed them on two things One, why they love their job and if you've not heard that episode, just go back and just listened to see how consistently and how genuinely these people love their job and love what they do and that one was primarily designed for attorneys who don't do Elder Law. About why do Elder Law? Today's episode is for you attorneys out there who are doing Elder Law but are like why should I become certified? Why go through that hassle? And these same attorneys tell me why they go through this process, why they went through it and how it has tremendously benefited their business from a knowledge standpoint, from a marketing standpoint and from a referral standpoint. And so join us today as we hear these really fine attorneys talk about why become certified.
Speaker 1:Most of this episode is going to be them, not me, and you will hear from them, and then I will come in at the end and I'll kind of wrap everything up. Okay, so let's go.
Speaker 3:I'm Keith Miles. I practice in Atlanta Metro area, particularly Gwinnett County. My main thing is, for lack of a better words, rise above the noise, right. So there are so many people who say they do estate planning or they just do wills and trust and it's hard to differentiate yourself from the crowd that doesn't really focus their dabblers. So that was the first reason. And then, amongst the people who actually do focus, I wanted to have a sense that I was on the latest and greatest and really understanding not only Georgia was happening here, but what are the national trends that are happening that might wind up infiltrating and migrating to Georgia with those thoughts. So for me it was really more self-protection but also a sense of wanting to kind of just be set apart.
Speaker 3:The test okay. So that was a little eye-opener. I, from my experience, I didn't know anything about what the test was like. Bob Fleming did a webinar this was back in September of last year and said, hey, I'm gonna kind of tell people about the test. And I went there thinking I want to listen in so that I know what to do for three, four, five years down the road, once I actually had the webinar, I left there saying I can actually do that this year. So that was the first thing, just the information about hearing about how it was structured. Now the pass rate scared me a little bit. Okay, we're not gonna lie to you. But I said you know, if I focus on it because it was gonna be Thanksgiving break, christmas break and other things I can kind of use those breaks to kind of get myself set up.
Speaker 3:The test itself, going through the review class, kind of gave us an idea of how the test would be graded. I was terrible in the beginning, which I was thankful for, because they told us we would be terrible in the beginning and I knew that it would kick my behind enough to get myself motivated. So where I was in, you know, september I'm sorry, where I'm in November and January was far different from by the time I was in March. So that process of improvement and struggle got me to the point where I could feel comfortable sitting for the test. The test itself was long. It was very.
Speaker 3:I was surprised at how comprehensive it was, even for you know, hearing all these 12 different areas of elder law in my head, I'm thinking, okay, they'll probably hit six and you'll dabble in the rest. They were hitting stuff that was very, very, very focused on and even something like, you know, section eight, housing. You know counseling. They would hit something that I would assume they would have passed over and that was a major multiple choice question. So it is a lot about a lot. So that's what I'll give to telling one.
Speaker 3:Don't think that this is an area you can ignore. They will cover every single thing and you have to weave it all together and it was exhausting. I took it once in March and passed and I would highly recommend it to anyone. Be the best at what you can be. You know, I know, like you said, there's some people who list a lot of things on their site and they kind of try to treat it like the dartboard and helpful clients. They may not know the difference, but you'll know when you are in an area like elder law whether you know your stuff or not. You know this is a lifelong study. So even though I took that test, it is just the beginning of diving in and staying relevant in the current. So you know this is that habit of study. Just keep that up for the rest of your life.
Speaker 6:Teresa Bowman and I practice in Sarasota, Florida. One thing I think is it recognizes, or at least helps others recognize, your experience. There are a lot of people out there that are jumping on the elder law bandwagon who don't do a very good job at practicing elder law. They don't take the time to go through the training that they need, and so that offers clients some level of assurances that when they come talk to me they're getting the right answers. They're getting you know the benefit of my experience and know that I've taken the time and put the effort in to seek certification. So I think that's a big benefit.
Speaker 7:Hi, my name is Tye Cressman. I'm an elder law attorney practicing out of State College, Pennsylvania. I don't think I'm unique in that the process of training and studying for the CELA exam made me realize how little I knew about the practice of elder law and which is staggering, because it's all that I did I thought I was actually a pretty good elder law attorney before I took the exam or before I started studying for it, and then I realized there were these tremendous gaps in my knowledge, and that is an experience that is both humbling and scary and terrifying, and you want to go back and call all the people who used you, you know, before you took the exam. But the exam is very special in that it doesn't just focus on, I think sometimes when people think of elder law, they think of, well, public benefits stuff, or they think of, maybe, as just a state planning stuff or incapacity stuff. The exam is really well balanced in terms of having questions that cover a significant spectrum of the things that an elder law attorney will encounter and that a good elder law attorney should know, and so it exposes gaps and chunks of ignorance that you didn't even know. You didn't know, and so I loved it just because it again it opened this box of ignorance that had previously existed in my knowledge and allowed me to attack on. Actually, because you have this goal in front of you, you have this very objective and you kind of know those practice areas. NELF is a very transparent in terms of the categories and how they are going to be weighted on the exam and so forth. So you get to attack your ignorance in a very mechanical, methodical and, ultimately, goal-oriented way, which is always the best way to attack anything like that. So sometimes I think it's helpful from a marketing standpoint.
Speaker 7:You know, I've heard lawyers say, well, I really wanted to be a sealer, because the other good elder law attorneys in my market are sealers, and I think that's a fine reason as well.
Speaker 7:But it's that first reason that I think you know if you go into it, if you go into it saying yeah, yeah, I want the certification, I want the credentials, and credentials are important, it's okay for that, it's okay to you know, go into it saying, well, I think that this will help me charge more money for my expertise and I think that's a fair thing to care about too.
Speaker 7:But if you want the most out of the exam experience more than just the letters behind your name. You go into it as a means to mechanically attack, actually, the things you don't know, that you're probably unaware of, cannot encourage anyone who's listening to this enough to take the exam. For those very reasons I'm one of the big cheerleaders for the certification process. I have colleagues, people, people who I am competitive with from a client standpoint that I encourage to take the seal exam because, frankly, it improves the practice of elder law across the board, and so not only if you're listening to this and you are a sealer and you're actually kind of in the back of your mind was saying well I hope in my jurisdiction or my geographic area we don't add a whole lot of sealers.
Speaker 7:I think that actually an abundance mindset is warranted to that sort of issue. The more of us that there are, the higher the sort of swell of the quality of elder law will take place and, frankly, the more we all benefit from it, and so that's what I'd encourage.
Speaker 4:Marilyn Miller. I practice in Dripping Springs, Texas. Why did I do it? Well, this is like in an historical context. I did it in 1996. After its time it was just starting out and, frankly, I was active in NAELA and a lot of my contemporaries and colleagues were becoming certified and it was just. It sounded like a good thing to do and at the time there wasn't much to distinguish an elder law attorney because it was so new and my attitude was it's not going to get any easier or any less expensive. I think I'll do it now. It was the best move elder law wise that I have ever made. I have made friends across the country that I never would have made. I've gotten. I have people in other states I can refer to and that's. I think that's the key is I know that anybody that I picked out of the CELA list is going to know what they're doing. If I need to make a referral in Pennsylvania, I can go from the C ELAs if I don't know anybody. I think being a CELA has made me a better elder law attorney because I keep up with things. I and you get the elder law listserv, or NELF listserv, that you can ask questions of other advanced practitioners, I think that's it Is there, advanced practitioners, they keep up with things.
Speaker 4:So what about the test? It's not too hard to pass, it's not. It's not easy, but on purpose it's not easy. But if you and you have to study, you can't just do it off the top of your head. Even grading the exams, sometimes we have to look up the answers, because but if you, if you, if you read the I like reading the Naila news and then the stuff that Naila puts out because a lot of the times they take the questions from that answer the questions and what we see from the grading and you're smiling, I guess you know people will not answer the questions. They'll give a canned response or they'll give a response that is perhaps academically correct, but you don't want to send your client to someone who can, who gives a textbook answer that doesn't answer the person's personal issues.
Speaker 4:It covers a wide range of topics, of issues that that you need to at least be familiar with, and I think that's that's the other thing I remember when I took it. I didn't know anything about social security, I knew very little about Medicare and I looked at those things. And if, if all you are is a, an estate planner, and I don't mean to minimize the state planning, but if all you do is estate planning, you're probably not going to pass. Or if all you do are Medicaid applications, you're not going to pass because it's more than that. You don't have to get 100% or 90%. You know you need to give a good passing answer and you don't need to shotgun. That's.
Speaker 4:The other thing we see is people will do the verbal dump and you know it's like I don't care. That wasn't part of the question and it doesn't relate to the question and I don't care what your mother and mother would have done. It's wonderful to be a COA Again. It's a community of practitioners and I have never met, I've never called a seal at Ask a Question and had them just dismiss me.
Speaker 2:It's wonderful Patrick Curley Curley Law Firm in Wakefield, Massachusetts. I jumped on board feet first and then I wanted to really improve myself in that area Obviously learn the trade, become an expert and I learned about the National Elder Law Foundation through a couple of CELAS Certified Elder Law Attorneys and they encouraged me to do that. And preparing for that exam was an amazing journey because it helps expose you to areas of elder law and estate planning and special needs planning that you might not have great depth in, and so it broadens your intellectual knowledge. But there was a rigorousness to it as well, where when you get to that passing the exam it feels like a real accomplishment and the fact that most of other attorneys nowadays it seems like every attorney is claiming to be an elder law attorney the fact that very few of them can say I'm a certified elder law attorney or to know what that you know. Sometimes people might think they are or clients might think someone's certified but they're not.
Speaker 2:It's a mark of distinction and we share that with clients and with the public with great pride. We do a lot of presentations at senior centers and things like that, and the first thing I talk to the folks about is when you're getting information and knowledge, you want to be sure that the person telling you or speaking to you knows what they're talking about, because there's a lot of salespeople out there that they actually don't know, and so you want to look at what are their credentials, what gives them a platform of knowledge to be speaking to you today? And I think anyone who wants to be serving their community, educating their community because I like doing the education part, as you can see, I'm talking with you, but anybody who wants that should also want to become a certified elder law attorney and then, once you pass that exam and you comply with all of the other requirements, you are now in this really special group and I don't want to use the word elite because it's not a pretentious group. We're at a national conference now. No one is here to show off their knowledge, no one is here to tell you that you're practicing the right way or the wrong way.
Speaker 2:It's really a collaborative measure. It's reassuring to me that when I come to these conferences, you find that other attorneys are struggling with the same questions or challenges that you're struggling with, but there's a camaraderie, because everyone here knows that achieving this mark of distinction was not an easy feat and to do it shows a commitment to elder law and estate planning that I think there's nothing else in the country that gives that same level of achievement. Always a need for more certified elder law attorneys. There's no shortage of expertise.
Speaker 1:This is Michael Delaney. For some reason he did not state his name at the beginning.
Speaker 8:Having a certification, a designation that you can point to, that is a vetted designation, like the designation of CELA is. You can't buy it. You have to study and you have to pass the exam. And although it takes some level of dedication to get there, I mean it's certainly. It's not impossible, it's not horribly difficult. It's just you actually have to be serious enough about elder law to take a little bit of time and do a little bit of preparation to take that exam.
Speaker 9:My name is Bob Fectman and I'm an attorney in Indianapolis, indiana. Well, I know for me I'm the kind of person who I'm gonna do something. I want to really do it. So if I were a doctor, like I had originally intended, I'd be board certified in something and I wouldn't just have gone to med school either. I'd have had a fellowship afterward maybe even more than one fellowship and learn more, because if I'm gonna do it, I'm really going to do it.
Speaker 9:When I got into elder law, it seemed like everybody was doing it. Everybody was. As soon as they'd been practicing for at least five years and they were eligible to apply to become a CELA and take the test, they would do it. So that was the natural progression for me and I feel good being certified. But I have also learned that being certified, being a CELA, has really given me access to all that brain trust of other SELAs and we've been doing educational programming now for ourselves for CELAs for something like 15 years. And it's one of my favorite parts of being a CELA is getting together with other CELAs and learning from them and, I hope, teaching them some things myself. So I would say, become a CELA because it's nice to be certified, but also because then you have access to all the other CELAs who will instantly become your friends and your mentors, and all those things that you need.
Speaker 10:Hello, my name is Beth McDaniel and I'm an attorney in Washington State based at a renton which is in the, you know, greater Seattle area. So I think it's really important and I know in my state there aren't as many, or a number of them had retired or are retiring, you know, just because you know what it represents to the public. You know I say over and over again that if I'm going to refer, you know, out of state, you know that's the very first thing I do is go online and find out if there's a certified elder law attorney, because at least in my state, there, for example, there's not a special specialization, you know. So you know I know someone and he went to Iranically I think a conference in Chicago on how to mark yourself as an elder law attorney, and so he went back and immediately joined NAELA. And then his website says active member of NAELA, National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys.
Speaker 10:Well, I guess, theoretically, yes, but you really know what you're getting. You know, with an elder law attorney, that they are committed to their profession and that they have taken a lot of time, you know, to study various practice practice areas. One thing I'm probably like you know several elder law attorneys. As you know, the longer I practice, the more my practice narrows, because as an elder law attorney, you have the you need to know a little bit about a lot of topics, but so I. My referral list is getting longer and longer, you know. For example, you know I have colleagues that love medicated planning. That's a big part of the practice, you know, just to give one example, whereas I'm choosing to focus more on, you know, estate planning and trusts and all that. But yeah, so I think it's a long answer to a short question that it's an important distinction.
Speaker 5:John McNair, dallas, texas. You think you know elder law, but you don't know elder law until you have studied for and taken a CELA exam. I've taken the board certification in a state planning and probate and a board certification and tax law test in Texas, and the CELA exam is every bit as challenging and amazingly difficult as those, and I took six months and I just my daughter went off to college and I had time on my hand, so every weekend I would study all weekend for six months to get ready for it and I took Robert Fleming's course and I did everything I could to get ready and you will learn a lot. You will absolutely know more way more than you thought that was out there. You will now. A lot of what you learn will be stuff you will never use in your practice, but it's good to know it. It's absolutely really good to know it.
Speaker 5:You get to meet a lot of really, really smart elder law attorneys when you go to conferences and learn a lot from them, and I think it's a really good way to find other attorneys in other parts of the country when you need to refer clients and I have done that a number of now when somebody asked me for an attorney to do something, even if it's.
Speaker 5:It's not traditional in the elder law, it's just a state planning. I suspect any CELA that I know of can do a fantastic job with this regular state planning just as well as they can with a Medicaid case. So I will start with the NELF list. I've only been CELA for five years so I 'm not as familiar with people, having gone to conferences for as long as a lot of people have. So I don't know any as many of them personally. But I have a directory I can go to and find them, and I've actually had one or two people that were referred to me that came into Texas and were referred from CELAs and other parts of the country. So it's a great way to expand your network of really smart, knowledgeable people that you can work with in other parts of the country.
Speaker 11:So my name is Angela Odinsky and I practice in Houston, Texas. I also am licensed to practice in Washington as well. I think it opens certain doors, so there's an additional education aspect to it. Being a certified elder law attorney, you get to come to locations like Chicago and have great conversations with people all over the country who are also certified elder law attorneys. You get to talk to people who are really well respected and knowledgeable and have additional information and education on incapacity issues and on dementia and on all of these things that are kind of medical and social work.
Speaker 11:And while I understand that you can get some of that stuff through other organizations I mean NAELA is fabulous and if you're an elder law attorney, you should also be a member of NAELA, 100% but being a certified elder law attorney also gives you an extra something to rely on. When your clients come to you and they've been told by everybody online like how to choose an attorney, the very first thing on those lists are make sure they're certified make sure they're board certified. Well, you know what? In Texas we don't have a board certified elder law. The only way to get certified in elder law is through NELF and is to get the certified elder law attorney, certification through the National Elder Law Foundation, and so when you want to be able to talk about your credentials and your expertise and sort of put it out there, that has meaning being able to say I am a certified elder law attorney. That holds weight with people because this is what they have been trained to know is quality and educated in this specific area.
Speaker 12:Shannon Lehman Pecoraro. I work at Park Ziegler in Virginia Beach, virginia, so I think, in particular when I am working with something that maybe crosses state lines, I first look to a CELA, and the reason I do that is because I know that they've been vetted, they have been tested, and if I have to randomly pull somebody or make a referral I can say like I can't, I don't, may not know this person, but at the end of the day, they have been vetted, they have been tested and so this is who I would trust.
Speaker 1:Okay, so there you go. I think it is crucial that if you want to do elder law and you want to be seen as someone who does it well, I think certification is absolutely necessary. And you've just heard from professionals from across the country who are very passionate about this and they too they they feel that to do this well, you need to be certified that they became better elder law attorneys by going through this process, and I know definitely that was the case for me. I had done elder law for five years and I thought I knew it, but when I sat down to take the test and I'll be honest, I did not pass the first time. It's it is challenging. It's not impossible. It is challenging and it can be done because all of these people did it and a lot of people passed on their first time because they had the experience and they studied. But I think what you know, that's important to make you a better attorney. But then also, you heard almost everyone say that when they are referring outside of their state to an area that they don't know someone personally, they're going to refer to a certified elder law attorney. So I think it's it's good for the profession for there to be a certification so we can know who does it well and it's good for you personally. It makes you better and you will get referrals from doing it.
Speaker 1:So I highly encourage that, if you do elder law, seek out the information to become certified, and you can do that by going to the national elder law foundation website that is in e l f dot org. Call the nef headquarters. You will speak with Meg and Meg will give you all the information, get you pointed in the right direction, send you out a sample test, tell you exactly what you need to do, walk you through the process. They are very good at that and I would encourage you to do that. And if you have questions or comments on that issue and want to talk to someone who's done it, I welcome your conversations. You can always email me at tide at the elder law coachcom and I would love to talk to you. And thanks for listening and join us next time. You've been listening to the elder law coach podcast. For more information, Go to our website, the elder law coach dot com. Thanks and we'll see you next time.