Practice No. 3 — While you are living
Powers of Attorney & Advance Directives
Flat fee from $350
The two documents every Virginia adult should have signed by Friday: a durable power of attorney a bank will actually honor, and an advance medical directive your family can actually follow.
For the family sending a child to college, the spouse handling everything alone, and the adult children of a parent whose memory has started to slip.
How we handle it
The most consequential documents we draft are not wills. A will speaks only at death; a durable power of attorney and an advance medical directive speak during the years when you are alive and cannot speak for yourself: after the stroke, during the anesthesia, in the long gray country of dementia. Without them, your family's route to helping you runs through a circuit-court guardianship proceeding: public, slow, and expensive, everything a family in crisis does not need.
Virginia adopted the Uniform Power of Attorney Act, which gives these documents real teeth, but banks still balk at stale or vague forms. We draft powers of attorney with the specific granted powers spelled out the way financial institutions want to see them, and we keep the execution crisp so the document is honored the first time it is presented, not after three escalations to a branch manager.
The advance medical directive is drafted under Virginia's Health Care Decisions Act, and we treat the conversation as seriously as the paperwork. Naming an agent is easy; telling that agent what you actually want — about ventilators, feeding tubes, and the difference between prolonging life and prolonging dying — is the part that spares your family the worst arguments of their lives. We will not let you sign until the conversation has happened.
What the fee includes
- Durable general power of attorney with granted powers enumerated for bank acceptance
- Advance medical directive naming your healthcare agent, with treatment guidance in your own words
- HIPAA authorizations so the people you trust can speak with your physicians
- A conversation, guided by us, about what you want, not just who decides
- Proper execution with notary at our office, originals bound and copies distributed
- Guidance on where the documents should live and who should hold copies now
- Free replacement of originals if yours are ever lost or damaged
The honest timeline
Day 1 — One meeting
Forty-five minutes covers most situations: who acts, what powers, what medical instructions.
Within 2 weeks — Signing
Documents drafted, reviewed by phone or email, signed with notary at our office. Many clients complete both visits inside ten days.
Same week — Distribution
Copies to your agents, your physician, and your file. A document nobody can find is a document that does not exist.
What to bring
Or what to gather — none of it needs to be perfect.
- The names of the people you would trust with money decisions, in order of preference
- The names of the people you would trust with medical decisions (often not the same list)
- Any existing powers of attorney or directives, however old
- The name of your primary physician
- An open mind about the hard hypotheticals; the meeting is gentler than you expect
Questions we hear about powers of attorney & advance directives
My spouse can already make decisions for me, can't they?
Less than you think. Marriage lets your spouse make many medical decisions under Virginia's default statute, but it does not let them sell jointly titled real estate alone, access your individual retirement account, or deal with your business. The power of attorney closes those gaps for a few hundred dollars; a guardianship proceeding to close them later costs thousands.
What is the difference between a living will and an advance medical directive?
In Virginia the advance medical directive is the umbrella document — it can name an agent to decide for you and state your treatment wishes, which is the function people mean by 'living will.' We draft it as one integrated document, so your agent and your instructions never contradict each other.
When should these be updated?
Whenever a named agent dies, moves far away, or falls out of your trust, and at least each decade, because banks grow suspicious of powers of attorney old enough to vote. A refresh is a short, inexpensive appointment.
Often planned together
Wills & Revocable Trusts
Flat fee from $1,200 individual · $1,950 couple
A will or revocable trust drafted for Virginia law and actually funded: deed, retitling, and every designation confirmed in writing.
Probate & Estate Administration
From $3,500 · scoped in writing at the first meeting
We handle the court, you handle the family: qualification, inventory, the Commissioner of Accounts, and the final accounting, carried.
Elder Law & Incapacity Planning
From $1,500 · scoped after the first family meeting
Long-term care costs, Medicaid's five-year look-back, and a plan that keeps a person's dignity and savings intact.
Put your affairs in order this season.
Thirty minutes on the telephone, no charge, and you will know exactly which documents you need and exactly what they cost. That is the whole commitment.
Or telephone the office: (804) 555-0158