Name Change on Durable POA

[shalen]

What is the name of your state? WA
I need some advice please on doing a name change on a Durable POA for Financial. Last November my sister took my mother in to an attorney to make sure "everything was in order". At the time of the visit my mother had a will, a living will and a POA that listed both my sister and I as the attorney-in-fact which she took with her for the attorney to examine. After the consultation my mother was told she needed to change the living will to a Durable POA for Health care and Nomination of Guardian which she did. She was also told that the POA for financial had to be re-worded to be up to date. When they went back to sign the documents the attorney had my sister listed as primary attorney-in-fact with myself as secondary. My mother was not happy with this, but she was told that you can't have two people listed as primary, and since my sister lives closer to her that the attorney put her as the primary designation. My mother did end up signing the document, but made it clear that it was not what she wanted. To make matters worse, she is blind so she can't read anything.

Long story short, since then my sister has done some unscrupulous dealings and my mother wants to change the name on the Financial POA from my sister's to mine. She does not want to go back to this attorney as she thinks she was charged too much for the few changes that were made ($1200.00), and the attorney was referred by my sister (who she is not trusting). Since this is simply a name change how much should she expect to pay? Thanks in advance for any advice

 

[Dandy Don]

Your mother needs to get her own attorney to help sort this out and revoke the durable POA or change it to someone else if in fact that is what she wants to do. Getting another attorney puts your mother in charge of making the decisions and cuts sister off at the knees. Congratulations for being smart enough to wake up and take care of this before it gets even more messier.

 

[pojo2]

I thought you earlier stated Sis DID NOT have POA in this rental fiasco? Has that changed recently or is the other oost no longer relevant?

 

[shalen]

I thought you earlier stated Sis DID NOT have POA in this rental fiasco? Has that changed recently or is the other oost no longer relevant?

What I said was "There is no dual ownership of the property. It is owned free and clear by my 83 year old mother. There is no POA in effect as she is still of sound mind."

There was a valid POA (the one this post is about) which at that time I didn't think was in effect as my mother was still mentally competent. I knew that the POA she originally had before needed to be invoked and I assumed this one did too. SHAME ON ME. This one is "In full force as of the date of signature to said document." Thankfully my sister finally got some creative financing and was able to purchase the house and they funded yesterday. My mother wanted to wait until the house deal was settled to do the name change as she also had no idea that this POA was in full effect (she is blind and had to go off of what she was told at the signing) and she didn't want to jepordize the house sale going through. Had she known this was in effect she would have changed it sooner as she was worried about something happening that would invoke the POA and she really doesn't trust my sister anymore. I feel really fortunate that something hasn't gone really wrong yet, so this is going to the top of my list.