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There is plenty of money available to cover her nursing home expenses for a long time, but when and if the time comes that money runs out, I don't want the nursing home to require me to sell her beautiful antiques just to pay those bills. I want the family heirlooms to go to who my mother wanted them to go to and to sell the rest and put it in an account without my Mom's name on it. My father passed away 18 years ago. I am the only child and have managed everything regarding my mother's needs so far. She has demintia and the doctor has deemed her unable to make her own decisions regarding her health. Her attorney is appointed Power of Attorney, but I am still her blood daughter and should be able to make decisions regarding the contents of the house. Right?

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Out of curiosity why is the DPOA an attorney and not a family member?
The DPOA is the point person for all financial & MPOA for all medical so anything under finances or health is under their purview and they make the decision

I'd send a letter to the DPOA to set up a care plan conference regarding your mom and a review of her finances and got discuss your concerns. If you are in fact managing mom's needs (she is in a NH?), then you could ask for a personal services contract to be done to compensate you for your time. If your mom does have "plenty of money" there should be no reason not to do it. It could be that mom's care or future anticipated needs is costing a lot more than your realize or the cost of administrative fees for her is more than you realize.

The NH can't require you sell anything but the NH can require payment for services rendered. If selling some of mom assets are needed to do that then that's what is needed to be done. None of us wants to have to liquidate a retirement account or go into savings or take the cash value of a insurance policy for our spouses or parents or children's needs but that's what it there for. Why don't you and the attorney at the care plan meeting discuss just distributing the antiques now and placing the rest at auction?
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Nancy.. I would deffinatelly discourage the idea of packing everything... There is "legal" technicalities involved here. If Lucinda does not find out for a fact what this lawyer has " power of Attorney " over and she takes it upon herself to take things or do things that may or may not be in her right to do, she could find herself in hot water! A POA is a legal binding contract between the courts and Lucinda's mom. She really needs to find out what is in the papers.
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Igloo is correct. The N H cannot require anyone to sell tangible assets in order to be paid.
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But Medicaid CAN require the sale of assets. They currently have a "look back" period of about five years I THINK. Your attorney will know. If you think she may need care beyond ten years, perhaps the thing to do is transfer the antiques into your name now, so that when Medicaid does the look back, assuming she ends up on Medicaid, it doesn't count against her estate.
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We are currently in a similar situation. My husband has Medical Power of Attorney for his 95 yo Aunt, while his Aunt's attorney holds Financial Power of attorney. Like your mother, her asetts will cover care costs for at least 10 years and she is not expected to live that long. Currently the attorney is update her condo for sale or rental (not decided yet in today's market) and all the antiques, etc will be disbursed of via estate sale or consignment sale. But first , the attorney contacted my husband to go thru everything. Personal items - photos, letters, etc. have been collected. My husband has surveyed the one surviving sibling and all the cousins (Aunt had no children of her own) as to any items they were interested in. We are going there this week to collect the last of those. My husband has accepted responsibility of getting the items to them at their cost. The rest will be taken care of by the attorney. If your mother's attorney as you said is a friend, there should be no problem with you getting the antiques etc. that you'd like to have, after all as the only child ultimately what's left will be yours anyway!
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I would suggest contacting a general knowledge and estate attorney for your self. I would not just go on word of the POA even though they were friends. I would go over every word and phrase of his POA entitlement. Dispursement of her personal property and the sale of might be part of his entitlement. In that case I would think filing for surviving family (yourself) rights of estate matters. Maybe get the POA in your name. It just wouldn't make sense that your mom at a time when she was lucid and making arrangements for future needs would find it necessary to get a stranger to handle her affairs.. I would cover all bases legally for what you can do and where you need to go for legal council. Good luck.
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Lucinda you really do need to get a copy of those papers. If the POA has the financial, you must abide by his wishes or take him to court unless it just to pay the bills. Be sure to have the papers looked at by another attny.
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My mother is in South Florida and the nonprofit has emergency guardianship currently over her. A man from there came in before she went back to her house when they were coming in, took pictures, and said it was to sell the house and assets. I questioned him that we were attempting to keep her in her house and he said that is what they all want. I said the bedroom set in the third room I had wanted for keepsake. He told me I would be able to tell the judge in court and he would make the decision. My mom with her dementia has thrown out things all the time the aids are just letting her keep throwing things out, well some things. She does not have much left but furniture and stuffed animals. Law is good but also stops people’s good intentions of family and keeping family heirlooms in the family.
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Good question. I remember sitting at Mom's kitchen table going through this in detail. The attorney has been a friend as well as the attorney for my mother for years so I was fine with him being DPOA but my mother was insistent that I manager her medical care and decisions. My name is on the "financially responsible documents" for the Nursing Home and I am kept aprised of all her health issues. I didn't see this response earlier, so I asked another question regarding the same issues, but in more detail. That may offer more information. It will be at least10 years before Mom runs out of money and from all indications, her life span won't be that long. It is just that I am too far away, over 1500 miles to watch the house daily and the house needs upkeep and maintenance that it won't get empty. It's a huge worry!
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You are concerned that your mother's beautiful antiques should go to whomever your mother wants them to go to. As her daughter can you not just give the items to those people now? Forgive me if I'm missing something or thinking too simplistically. Hugs to you, Lucinda!
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