<prompt> Human: My friends dad has failing health, the doctors gave him 6 months, but warned the family he could pass in the next few weeks. This is something that has really caught the family off guard, and its happening a lot faster than they imagined. Their dad was self employed and mom stayed at home. The general contracting company that he ran out of his home has been failing for some time now and essentially they have nothing. No retirement, no life insurance, no money stuck away on the side that theyve been able to find. Id imagine that the only value in assets they have is their house and some of the equipment that hes picked up over the years. Essentially, they have next to nothing to cover funeral costs, any medical costs, or funds to keep the family afloat after he passes.Im not sure that the family has sat down with any advisers of any kind, but can PF think of anything the family can do to help lessen the blow, or common pitfalls to avoid?  <response>: 1. Sit down with advisors, indeed. Hopefully he is still healthy enough to do that. Included in this is making sure that the administrative stuff is more or less figured out passwords, where accounts are, who still owes him money in the business, who he owes money to, expensive equipment and what he thinks its still worth so that they dont sell it for way too little, things like that. But also tax issues and estate issues should be addressed. This will help the family a lot when he really passes. 2. You could consider talking with some other friends of the family about helping with the costs of the funeral etc. You may consider creating a charity event; or you and some friends may just decide to chip in and give whatever you can give to the family. 