Rules do vary from state to state regarding restrictions on who can serve, but these are all obvious: people that stand to gain financially, people with clear conflicts-of-interest, your own physician, health care providers in some states or owners of healthcare facilities, etc. I found no restrictons regarding the residence of the person named as attorney-in-fact. And no restrictions regarding a protected person residing in Alabama and an attorney-in-fact residing in Tennessee. I just asked a paralegal that used to work for me to do the search, so I wouldn't miss something. It may not be a wise choice, but it is permitted.
I believe you need to have the paperwork filed in the state where the protected person resides. The residence of the attorney-in-fact, is rarely a concern to the courts, and I'm not aware of any restrictions in any state that say someone that resides in another state cannot be a POA. That said, some financial institutions require you to complete a unique POA for financial affairs on forms that are approved by that institution, and many refuse to accept paperwork prepared by attorneys. In this case, you often need to have the person appointed as POA physically present to accept the role and sign the documents in the presence of the institution's notary. Other than this, you can pick a person that lives on Mars and no one can stop you from doing that.
Zookeeper, there's several states that do not allow out of state poa. I'm on stupidphone right now so I can't go look it up or insert link. While theoretically it should be possible to have anybody, anywhere, be poa, on a very practical day-to day level it gets too expensive too fast....so most lawyers (if they are ethical) will recommend a LOCAL person, as in, less than an hour drive away, and moreover, someone who is fully ENGAGED with the Principal. Anybody else is not going to "know" what is really going on with the senior, or their living conditions. Yah if you just want to warehouse yourself, it doesn't matter if the poa ever visits--they can put all your bills on Auto-Pay. But if you want "lovingkindness" you should have a Trustworthy, LOCAL person. Just my 2cents and my Utter Xperience.
You may chose whomever you like, regardless of where that person resides. He or she could live on Mars, and you could still appoint them. Just make sure you appoint a person that you REALLY trust will honor your wishes.
As a Louisiana resident & DPOA for my mom in TX, here's my take on doing out of state POA: 1. DPOA document needs to be done by legal in your state (AL), while your at it, would want to get a MPOA, an overall HIPPA form, an Guardianship incase of Incapacity statement & an update (codicil) to your will done all at the same time. I'm assuming whomever you name as POA will be the named one for all the other documents. The forms are going to need to be witnessed and probably with a notary seal on them to be valid - the attorney will know just how all this needs to run so no future issues. I would not do an on-line off the internet form. 2. Depending on your state, the DPOA may need to be recorded at the courthouse. Some southern states do this. TX doesn't but MS does. Again your legal can take care of this or you can do it yourself if your comfortable in a courthouse (take cash to pay for the recording too so it can be done right then) 3. Banks hate dealing with POA documents. BoA, Chase, Regions & Hancock are very un-user friendly; Iberia & Whitney not quite as much (even though Hancock owns Whitney). The banks seem to take the position that all POA's are "springing" and will not do anything until you provide documents (medical & additional legal) to establish incompetency. I'd suggest you have the POA go to the bank with you (you all dress nice and have valid current ID's, if you all have passports take them & the original and copies of all the legal) and have your POA added as a signature on the account. If you want the account to be POD to the POA, then get that done as well. Expect the bank officer to speak to each of you separately to get all this done. Go in the morning, it will take a hour plus of time. Keep the bank officers business card, trust me you or your POA will need it eventually. If you have a good bit of funds, you want to do all this with someone in the trust department of the bank - likely will not be at a branch but the main office. Again get their business card. If you have several accounts or lots of CD or Tbills, speak with bank officer about consolidating to perhaps 2 accounts with auto renewal on the CD's. Some banks do duplicate mailings of monthly statements for a small fee, think about having this added on to your account so you get one & the POA does too.
If you or your POA sense that the bank is going to be a PIA or the bank is just difficult on accepting POA and changes, I'd suggest that you move your account to a larger regional banking group that is both in AL and in TN. Your POA should get their own personal account at the bank as well. It will make it easier if there are issues in the future as both of you all are customers of the bank. POA needs to be able to go on-line on the account & there may be another form to allow for that or your ATM card activates on-line. If you have direct deposit of SS or other retirement do the bank switch the day after you get your check and then notify SS later that day. You really need to do all this within a day or two to keep glitches to a minimum. 4. SS and federal/civil service retirement do NOT accept POA's. If anything needs to be done with either in the future, they will want you to get yourself down to their office to do any changes & will want the POA to become the representative payee for you. Rep payee to me is a total PIA to deal with as it has reporting and additional paperwork that is way beyond what is needed for the paltry amount the SSA pays, but that is a whole other discussion….. One way to deal with SS is to go on-line to do any changes to your account & you do this with your DPOA, so that they know your account details and password and security ? details and can manage your SS in the future if need be. You all want to go on-line to SSA about every 4 months or so, just to keep it active and the password and security ? being shown as active.
POA should not necessarily be paid. Most of the time family or friends do it for free out of a sense of duty. (Now guardians, they do get paid to manage you & your assets and it's set under court order.) If you think the POA's travel from TN to AL will not be affordable now and in the long term future, I'd speak clearly with them on this subject before you do any of this. If you are going to reimburse for expenses or pay a management fee, I'd speak with your legal as to doing a simple contract as to what's what. Personally, I'd keep the "fee" to under $ 599.00 a year so that there are no tax issues to deal with. But most POA do all for free - perhaps I'm unrealistic on this though. Also if in the future, you have to apply for Medicaid (lets hope not!) having the contract will solve any gifting transfer penalty issues on your application.
Samara is spot-on about having a successor POA named in the documents. Things change and you want to have some flexibility in place. Good luck and it's good to do all the POA items now & before there is a crisis.
Oh yes Samara what you said is so very true. This happened to my friends Mom. But little did the POA know that her son had access to his Moms bank account and kept a watchful eye as the son always added money to his Moms account and would show his Mom how much money she had. He would do this to give his Mom a sense of security. The son took care of his Mom for over ten years and he payed out of pocket for all of her expenses, his Mom was in charge of the phone bill and he let her pay that one bill every month so Mom felt as though she was making a contribution as well. As his Mom was approaching 93 and health had deteriorated over some time, the son could no longer work full time, and give enough care to his Mom and so the grandson and wife took in grandma. Within two days, the grandson and wife drained all but $5.00 out of her account! You can only imagine the shock that the son felt when he went to add more money to Moms account. He left the bank, went directly to the grandsons house, packed his Moms things loaded everything in the car and took his mom back to his house where she lived out the rest of her life with him. Whom I might add, made the grandson and wife pay back every cent to his Moms account plus interest!
And keep in mind, there is no "Dept of POA Oversight"....nobody checks to make sure all these POA are being honest. To be sure most POA are doing right thing, but the few that are dishonest are hard to catch--unless somebody else gets suspicious, but even then, that person would have to spend time & money to get the unscrupulous POA removed. So be very sure you trust your POA 1, 000 percent.
You can always specify in the POA which expenses you will pay towards the administration of your financial and other affairs; some states will only say reasonable limits to how much a POA can charge for their time. Just be clear in the document about the POA being able to compensate themselves out of your funds! Also include language about reimbursing travel costs, since they are out of state. Be sure the person you want, will agree to your terms. Consider adding a successor POA in the event your 1st choice is unable or unwilling to serve.
It is possible, contact the local area agency on aging, they will be able to refer you to someone that can provide answers. You want to make sure everything you want is covered and is transferable to the other state. An elder law attorney should be able to answer your questions.
It most definately depends on the laws governing the State of Alabama. An Elder Attorney can easily advise you with regards to these important questions that you are experiencing at this time in your life. The attorney will write up a POA for you and also put in place someone to make your medical decisions for you as well. Be very specific as to what your wishes are, both now and in the future. The clearer you present your wishes, the easier for everyone involved later on when your health deteriorates. Best wishes.
If there is absolutely nobody close by, then go for the out of state person.....but in my parent's scenario it was really difficult to manage. The poa was completely out of.touch with what folks wanted, and only visited every 3-5 yrs. Talking by phone a couple times a yr. Send card at Xmas. When they did visit, expected royal treatment, and to have their expenses paid. All during this time (oh for about 30 years or more) I was very close by, very involved, and finally they changed their documents, which will save them a lot of money. Be forwarned--if you give poa to someone out of state, at some point you will be paying their travel costs, so if that is OK with you then go ahead. Also if they are your Executor, ditto, it gets expensive fast. An alternative is to look up your local Lutheran Social Services (or other church or civic organization) because many of them offers poa for hire (yes you will need to pay them but they are close by so won't cost as much as someone out of state).
An Elder Law attorney would be your best bet to draw up a Power of Attorney, and to be sure that your POA could legally cross State lines [most States allow POA's from other States].
You can appoint anyone to be your POA, however, being in another state makes it more difficult to manage your care and see what is happening with your care in person.
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1. DPOA document needs to be done by legal in your state (AL), while your at it, would want to get a MPOA, an overall HIPPA form, an Guardianship incase of Incapacity statement & an update (codicil) to your will done all at the same time. I'm assuming whomever you name as POA will be the named one for all the other documents. The forms are going to need to be witnessed and probably with a notary seal on them to be valid - the attorney will know just how all this needs to run so no future issues. I would not do an on-line off the internet form.
2. Depending on your state, the DPOA may need to be recorded at the courthouse. Some southern states do this. TX doesn't but MS does. Again your legal can take care of this or you can do it yourself if your comfortable in a courthouse (take cash to pay for the recording too so it can be done right then)
3. Banks hate dealing with POA documents. BoA, Chase, Regions & Hancock are very un-user friendly; Iberia & Whitney not quite as much (even though Hancock owns Whitney). The banks seem to take the position that all POA's are "springing" and will not do anything until you provide documents (medical & additional legal) to establish incompetency. I'd suggest you have the POA go to the bank with you (you all dress nice and have valid current ID's, if you all have passports take them & the original and copies of all the legal) and have your POA added as a signature on the account. If you want the account to be POD to the POA, then get that done as well. Expect the bank officer to speak to each of you separately to get all this done. Go in the morning, it will take a hour plus of time. Keep the bank officers business card, trust me you or your POA will need it eventually. If you have a good bit of funds, you want to do all this with someone in the trust department of the bank - likely will not be at a branch but the main office. Again get their business card. If you have several accounts or lots of CD or Tbills, speak with bank officer about consolidating to perhaps 2 accounts with auto renewal on the CD's. Some banks do duplicate mailings of monthly statements for a small fee, think about having this added on to your account so you get one & the POA does too.
If you or your POA sense that the bank is going to be a PIA or the bank is just difficult on accepting POA and changes, I'd suggest that you move your account to a larger regional banking group that is both in AL and in TN. Your POA should get their own personal account at the bank as well. It will make it easier if there are issues in the future as both of you all are customers of the bank. POA needs to be able to go on-line on the account & there may be another form to allow for that or your ATM card activates on-line. If you have direct deposit of SS or other retirement do the bank switch the day after you get your check and then notify SS later that day. You really need to do all this within a day or two to keep glitches to a minimum.
4. SS and federal/civil service retirement do NOT accept POA's. If anything needs to be done with either in the future, they will want you to get yourself down to their office to do any changes & will want the POA to become the representative payee for you. Rep payee to me is a total PIA to deal with as it has reporting and additional paperwork that is way beyond what is needed for the paltry amount the SSA pays, but that is a whole other discussion….. One way to deal with SS is to go on-line to do any changes to your account & you do this with your DPOA, so that they know your account details and password and security ? details and can manage your SS in the future if need be. You all want to go on-line to SSA about every 4 months or so, just to keep it active and the password and security ? being shown as active.
POA should not necessarily be paid. Most of the time family or friends do it for free out of a sense of duty. (Now guardians, they do get paid to manage you & your assets and it's set under court order.) If you think the POA's travel from TN to AL will not be affordable now and in the long term future, I'd speak clearly with them on this subject before you do any of this. If you are going to reimburse for expenses or pay a management fee, I'd speak with your legal as to doing a simple contract as to what's what. Personally, I'd keep the "fee" to under $ 599.00 a year so that there are no tax issues to deal with. But most POA do all for free - perhaps I'm unrealistic on this though. Also if in the future, you have to apply for Medicaid (lets hope not!) having the contract will solve any gifting transfer penalty issues on your application.
Samara is spot-on about having a successor POA named in the documents. Things change and you want to have some flexibility in place. Good luck and it's good to do all the POA items now & before there is a crisis.