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I have been taking care of my mom since 2006, with no income of my own as I care for her 24/7. We have been living on her social security plus a monthly gift from a relative. I obtained POA about a year ago. I have recently read in numerous posts here that if you have POA you need to be very careful to keep records of all financial dealings. I have not done so so far. (I discovered I have ADD in 2004, and no medication has been effective, so I'm disorganized and I'm terrible at managing my own finances, much less someone else's). Since I began taking care of mom, I have only rarely spent money on myself, with very rare purchases of a puzzle book, or a clothing item from a thrift store, plus small monthly payments toward debts I already had when I started caregiving. All other spending has been for mom, or for home maintenance, and several times a month we go out to eat (inexpensive places) and go to a dollar movie theater. We also have a gentleman living with us who, in lieu of rent does handyman work and auto repairs, does most of our grocery shopping, cooks dinner for us a couple times a week, helps me with computer problems, and on occasion keeps an eye on mom if I have to go to an appointment. This has been a very informal arrangement, and it would be pretty hard at this point to put a dollar figure on any of it. Does anyone have any suggestions for what to do about a whole year of not keeping good records, and how to start keeping better records now? Who will want to see this information, and when?

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A POA does need to keep readily accessible records to show how money was spent. Bank and credit card records are very good for this. Another consideration would be if money is taken out of the bank account. There needs to be accounting of what the purpose was. It could just be the house petty cash -- everyone needs a little money around the house. Keeping records protects yourself in the event that anyone ever complains about the way you handled the finances.
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a caregivers finances are expoected to merge with the person being cared for. a simple initial from the caree in a check register is generally sufficient to cover yourself. a good estate attornet will usually shut up a complaining siblings concerns by telling them if they want to hire an attorney and fight this complaint for years theyre welcome to do just that. it will shut most complainers right up..
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