Im seething...

[JWV]

because I just checked my mother's bank account online. I've talked about this before on this board but long story short: she had a incapacitating stroke 2 years ago, younger brother and I had POA because previous to the event she spent 6mos here, 6 mos there. She is now in a care facility there.  He didn't pay bills, pay taxes, etc. so I took over-hard feelings ensued- we now no longer speak.  Why am I seething?  He &/or his wife have been writing checks to SIL's adult son/his stepson for $100-130, about 6 in the last 2 months. The memos say medical appt and medications.  I pay her bills, she has medicare and a supplemental and any outstanding bills come to me to pay.  What is he thinking?  I know I need to get his POA revoked but wondered if anyone had any experience with this family crap.  I plan to speak to an attorney here tomorrow and will call her attorney.

Lessons learned:1. if 2 people have a POA and one can't TCB don't continue to allow that person access to money.
2. Have everything you can think of in writing before you need it.

Judy

 

[Martha]

Judy, if you haven't already, close the bank account.

I hear these stories frequently. Sometimes to the exent that all the money is gone and no bills are paid. The worst I heard of late was a judge who was trustee of an incompetent person. He took all that person's money, was caught, and is now in jail.

Thank goodness your mother has you.

 

[haha]

One of my brothers took his girlfriend and her 2 kids to the Caribbean courtesy of my incapacitated, nursing home dwelling mother. The awful thing is he was the money man for her, while my sister, who actually helped care for her, visit her, etc, was kept in the dark. I was too far away, and only found out when this all blew up.

Ha

 

[JWV]

In a strange sort of way it's good to know my family is not the only screwed up family in the world. If you had told me even 5 years ago that this would happen, I would have laughed in your face.

As Ann Landers used to say "Time to wake up and smell the coffee!"

Judy

 

[Mr._johngalt]

Well, we are not "screwed up" (yet). I was waiting for a
"disaster" to get involved in my folks finances. When I finally did,
it was much worse than I expected. Fortunately, I only have one
brother. He is a little wimpy but it makes things easier for me.
Don't get me wrong. I love the guy, but I would never have to worry
about him taking advantage of our parents, and that's a "good thing".

A final thought. The sooner you can start addressing these issues,
the better. I avoided this for years and now feel a real sense
of urgency. Everyone is going to die. That's a given. There is no shame in planning around the inevitable.

JG

 

[JWV]

but I would never have to worry
about him taking advantage of our parents

Famous last words, JG. As I said, if you had told me 5 years ago...


Judy

 

[SteveR]

My ex-MIL was living with my ex-SIL. The SIL was "taking care" of her mother and her finances. Ex-MIL is not the sharpest tool in the shed and never worked a day in her life. Her husband died 15 years ago and left her pretty well off. She sold the big house and moved in with her single daughter nearby.

Well, the SIL has been milking the accounts for a while and decided to move out of state and to dump her mother high and dry with no money and no place to stay. She moved in with my ex-wife 6 months ago while my ex-wife is getting ready to get a warrant on her sister.

The SIL has been a real piece of work her whole life with a long string of well to do Southern gentlemen that fell into her tender trap to find out too late that the woman is a black widow spider. She has made a living cheating others out of their money.

Anyway, family member can be worse than strangers sometimes. My brother and I share financial responsibilities for our mother. He lives close by and takes care of the daily bills; I take care of the assets and the long term income stream. We share everything down to the monthly bank statements and brokerage accounts. She does not have much so anything going the wrong place would show up fast. We trust each other with our lives so I have no fear he would ever do anything wrong; I am sure he feels the same way.

In some families, blood is thicker than water.

 

[Mr._johngalt]

My ex-MIL was living with my ex-SIL.  The SIL was "taking care" of her mother and her finances.  Ex-MIL is not the sharpest tool in the shed and never worked a day in her life.  Her husband died 15 years ago and left her pretty well off.  She sold the big house and moved in with her single daughter nearby. 

Well, the SIL has been milking the accounts for a while and decided to move out of state and to dump her mother high and dry with no money and no place to stay.  She moved in with my ex-wife 6 months ago while my ex-wife is getting ready to get a warrant on her sister.    

The SIL has been a real piece of work her whole life with a long string of well to do Southern gentlemen that fell into her tender trap to find out too late that the woman is a black widow spider.  She has made a living cheating others out of their money. 

Anyway, family member can be worse than strangers sometimes.  My brother and I share financial responsibilities for our mother.  He lives close by and takes care of the daily bills; I take care of the assets and the long term income stream.  We share everything down to the monthly bank statements and brokerage accounts.  She does not have much so anything going the wrong place would show up fast.  We trust each other with our lives so I have no fear he would ever do anything wrong; I am sure he feels the same way. 

In some families, blood is thicker than water.

Yep, I have one brother and (although we've had our differences), we trust
each other. We are now deeply immersed in our parents finances.
Stealing money from your parents is about as low as you can get IMHO.

JG

 

[justin]

Anyway, family member can be worse than strangers sometimes. My brother and I share financial responsibilities for our mother. He lives close by and takes care of the daily bills; I take care of the assets and the long term income stream. We share everything down to the monthly bank statements and brokerage accounts. She does not have much so anything going the wrong place would show up fast. We trust each other with our lives so I have no fear he would ever do anything wrong; I am sure he feels the same way.

That brings up a good point - checks and balances. If the responsibilities are split up, then one custodian should notice the other custodian's malfeasance in time to catch it and prevent any further malfeasance.

 

[uncledrz]

Judy
Ditto on what Martha said. A few additions. Put the money out of reach until the matter is settled. Pay the bills you have to with you mom's money and keep receipts so that you can verify it was spent for her benefit and only for her benefit. Get her income, if direct deposit, sent to new account. Get to an attorney as soon as possible to stop this nonsense.

I've seen this situation many times. One of the worst was a grandson, took grandmother in, ran through her money in a variety of schemes, all of which failed, and then had the audacity to say the money he got from his grandmother was "gifts".

Judgment against a n'er do well with no assets is not worth a great deal. She is now relying on other family members (honest and loving) for her care. So very unfortunate and sad.

 

[kz]

One of my three sisters and I have POA for our mom. She does the bill paying while I do the investing. At least once a yr I send a "net worth" statement out to the other three to let them know what is going on with mom's finances. Of course we all trust each other to the nth degree so it works great for us.

Sorry this is happening for you but it's good to know you'll get it taken care of as soon as possible.

 

[Mr._johngalt]

Since I am the "go-to" financial guy (and like it that way)
I am scrupulous about keeping my brother up to date.
He seems quite satisfied with this so far. We have the wills, living wills, medical POAs, Financial POAs, the whole 9 yards.

JG

 

[JWV]

Thank you all for your words of wisdom and support.  Since I took over her finances, I have kept scrupulous records and at last end of year sent out a complete accounting to all three brothers.  I also sent a modified version of the form Bob_Smith (remember him) had posted here at some time,  listing bank accounts, insurance policies, healthcare info, etc.  It had taken me the better part of a year to get things straightened out from the same brothers mismanagment of the previous year.  If something happened to me, I wanted someone to know what was going on.

Anyway, things are getting righted.  The difficult thing will be getting all those auto payments switched to a new account. 

Judy