Video Summary
What are some signs that my loved one may need a guardianship? Well first and foremost, any time you’re thinking about filing a guardianship proceeding, you have to consider whether or not there’s a lesser restrictive alternative. Well what is a lesser restrictive alternative? Well a lesser restrictive alternative in this situation would be a power of attorney. If your loved one has a valid, durable power of attorney that has an agent named, and that agent is acting on their behalf and is not abusing the power of attorney, then most courts are going to find that a guardianship is not necessary because there is already in place a lesser restrictive alternative, which is a power of attorney.
But let’s just say you’re in that situation where your loved one did not execute a power of attorney prior to incapacity. What are some of the signs that you may notice that your loved one may need a guardianship? Well one sign would be spending their resources, such as money, selling their home, doing things that don’t make sense to their financial plan.
Now we can’t stop people from making poor financial decisions, but a great example that I could give you would be if your loved one has decided to invest $30,000, within the last month, in vacuums. Well that’s not really a prudent investment, and beyond not being wise financially there may be something more going on. Possibly your loved one is being manipulated, and may not be making the financial decisions for themselves.
That’s just one example. Another example would be if you’re starting to see that your loved one cannot manage their health, cannot manage their person, and cannot manage things that are necessary to their person and to their well being. Again, if you do not have a valid power of attorney in effect, a lot of the times a guardianship proceeding will be necessary.
Those are just some of the things to look out for to see whether or not your loved one may be a viable candidate for a guardianship proceeding. If you have any other questions regarding a guardianship, please refer to give me a call here at Waller & Mitchell at 727-847-2288.