A durable power of attorney is a document that will allow you, the principal, to appoint someone you trust (an agent) to engage in specified business, financial and legal transactions on your behalf.
For purposes of the Texas Durable Power of Attorney statute, a durable power of attorney is valid if:
- It is a writing or other record that designates another person as agent and gives the agent authority to act in the place of the person signing the power of attorney.
- It is signed by an adult principal or signed by another adult in the adult principal’s conscious presence and at his or her direction.
- It contains the words: “This power of attorney is not affected by subsequent disability or incapacity of the principal” or “This power of attorney becomes effective on the disability or incapacity of the principal” or words similar to those phrases that clearly indicate that the principal intends to confer authority to the agent notwithstanding the principal’s disability or incapacity; and
- It is signed by the principal or another adult at the principal’s direction in front of a notary.
If the law of the jurisdiction in which the document was executed provides that the authority conferred on the agent is exercisable despite the principal’s subsequent incapacity, the power is considered a durable power of attorney under Texas law – regardless of whether the term “power of attorney” is used.
