In Charge And In Over Your Head: The Complete Power of Attorney Agent's Guide to Managing Your Parent's Money, Healthcare, and Affairs (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9798191388946)

You have the document. Your name is on it. But nobody told you what to do next.

Every year, millions of adult children are named as agents under a power of attorney for an aging parent -- and almost none of them receive any practical instruction about what the role legally requires. They do not know how to access their parent's bank accounts, or what happens when the bank refuses to honor the document. They do not know what records they are legally obligated to keep, or how to protect themselves from accusations of mismanagement by suspicious siblings. They do not know what decisions they can make unilaterally and what requires court approval, or how to navigate the difference between financial authority and healthcare authority, or what happens to their role when their parent dies.

IN CHARGE AND IN OVER YOUR HEAD fills the gap that no one else has filled: the practical, plain-English handbook for the POA agent who is trying to do the job right and has been given almost no help doing it.

Written for adult children navigating one of life's most underexplained legal roles, this guide covers everything the document doesn't: the four types of power of attorney and which one you're holding; how to read the document so you know exactly what your authority covers; how to access your parent's financial accounts and what to do when banks push back; the record-keeping system that protects you from sibling accusations; healthcare decisions and your rights under a medical POA; real estate and property management; protecting your parent from financial exploitation; your own legal exposure as agent; the emotional toll of the role; and what happens when the POA ends.

If you've been named as your parent's power of attorney agent and you're not sure what that means, or you've been acting as agent and you're not sure you're doing it right, this book was written for you. The guide that should have been handed to you the day your parent signed the document -- this is it.