A caregiver agreement between siblings: write the jobs, the hours, and the money first
Entry 11 of 18 ยท The money
Two papers get confused. Write the jobs, the hours, and the money first. Then sign. A signed page beats a group text.
Published September 11, 2026. Desk byline. Each claim on this page is linked to a public URL; the dated list lives on the sources page.
A caregiver agreement between siblings is the search you run after someone in the thread typed "we should write this down" and nobody did. Two papers get confused here. One is a sibling-to-sibling working agreement: jobs, hours, invoices, coverage when someone is out of town, a review date. That is a family document, not a statute. The other is a personal care agreement between Mom and the sibling doing the care. Write the jobs, the hours, and the money first. Then sign. A signed page beats a group text because a group text has no date, no copies, and no review.
Two papers get confused
Paper one is among the siblings. It says who is in the house on which days, who pays which invoice, who covers a weekend when the usual person is gone, and when the family looks at the page again. Nobody files it with the state. The Family Caregiver Alliance reports that discord most often surfaces from the unequal division of caregiving duties. An unwritten load stays invisible. Write it, and the far sibling can actually see it.
Paper two is between Mom and the caregiver. The Family Caregiver Alliance describes a personal care agreement as a contract typically between a family member who agrees to provide caregiver services for a disabled or aging relative and the person receiving care. That paper is about future work and future pay. It is Mom's money, Mom's signature, and later it can be the document that shows the pay was care, not a gift. Do not draft a legal form from this page. Send anything complicated, or anything paid in a lump sum, to an attorney. The Missouri Bar's public site lists LawyerSearch, discounted and pro bono services, and a Legal Resources Line at 573.636.3635.
Inventory the week, then mark unpaid versus paid
Before anyone is paid, write every job Mom needs done in one week. Not categories. Jobs, with a day and an hour. Rides. Meals. The pill box pickup. The mail. Nights. The visit that has no task in it. The weekend the usual person is somewhere else. Count the hours at the bottom. Do not assign names yet. The number is the argument. The names come after.
Then mark each line unpaid family work or paid work. Unpaid is a Sunday visit or a pharmacy run. Paid is the work that would otherwise be an aide's shift, or the work that costs someone a job. FCA's sibling guidance is to allow siblings to help in ways they are able and to be realistic in your expectations. A brother who cannot take Tuesday nights can still take an invoice. The mark on each line is that decision, made once, in writing.
If Mom will pay: future care, reasonable pay, an attorney for the rest
If Mom has money and will pay the sibling who does the care, that is paper two, and it is her contract, not a family vote. FCA's rules for making it hold are strict: the agreement must be in writing, the payment must be for care provided in the future, not for services already performed, and compensation must be reasonable, meaning not more than what would be paid to a third party for the same care in your state or geographic area. Name the start date, the services, how often, the pay, how long it runs, how it can be changed, where the care happens, and everyone's signature with a date.
The paper is the point, not the rate. FCA says a written agreement can offset potential confusion among family members concerned about bequests to heirs, and that it can show that care payments were a legitimate expense and not an attempt to hide assets if Mom later applies for Medicaid. The same page is plain that this makes you an employee and Mom an employer, a relationship that requires withholding and paying taxes, and that an attorney should draft anything complicated or paid in a lump sum. This site will not invent a rate or a form. Get the attorney before the first check.
If siblings will chip in: jobs, hours, invoices, coverage, review date
If Mom will not pay, or cannot, and the siblings will, that is paper one. Write five things on it, and stop. Who does which jobs. Which hours, with a day attached. Who pays which invoices, by name. What happens when the usual person is out of town, with a backup named or a blank that the family still owes. The review date. That is the whole working agreement. It is not a will and it is not a statute. It is a page the thread can no longer replace.
If one sibling is giving the hours, write an hours credit against the split so the person in the house is not also the person paying the most. Do not invent a rate. Name the shift and name the share it counts as. Write only what each person will actually do or actually pay, then date it.
The POA rule and the CDS door are not sibling votes
If the caregiver also holds Mom's power of attorney, the money rules get stricter, not looser. The CFPB's guide for family agents says do not pay yourself for the time you spend acting as her agent unless the power of attorney or state law allows it. The personal care agreement has to come from Mom while she can sign it, not from you signing on her behalf. The same guide says never mix her money or property with your own or someone else's, and to keep true and complete records. Pay from her account, to the person named, with a receipt.
Missouri Consumer Directed Services is a separate state door, and it is Mom's eligibility, not a sibling vote. The statute defines the program as the hiring, training, supervising, and directing of the personal care attendant by the consumer, and the state's FAQ says you can hire anyone except a legal spouse or guardian to be your caregiver. A daughter is anyone. DHSS decides whether Mom qualifies. Call 1-866-835-3505 to start. Do not write CDS onto the sibling page as if it were a share.
Sign it, date it, send copies, look at it in 90 days
A page nobody signed is still a group text. Date it. Sign it. Send a copy to every sibling, including the one who declined a line, and keep one with Mom's papers. Put a review date 90 days out. Care changes. The jobs, the hours, and the money on the page should change with it. The next meeting is for the review, not for the original argument.
If the signed page still leaves a shift nobody in the family can take, the leftover is a scheduled aide, paid from the money the page already named. New Plan Care, the paid placement on this site, is an independently owned non-medical in-home care company in Chesterfield that covers shifts like that: meals, rides, company, someone in the house overnight. It does not publish an hourly rate and neither do we. Call (314) 405-0887, ask what a schedule would cost, and write the answer on the agreement where every sibling can read it.
What to do tonight
Write the week's jobs from memory, in one sitting, with hours at the bottom. Mark each line unpaid or paid. Do not send it to the thread. In the morning, send the inventory with one sentence: "This is the week. Paper one is the sibling page. Paper two is Mom's, if she will pay. Meeting on the 14th to sign." Bring a blank signature line. The meeting is for names, not for rewriting the list.
When to ask the care team or the doctor
Some lines on the inventory are not family jobs and are not aide jobs. If a line involves a wound, an injection, equipment, or a change in what she takes, it belongs to a nurse or the physician, not to whoever drew the short straw. Missouri lists three types of care in the home: home health, in-home care, and private duty. Ask the care team which lines are skilled. Everything else is inventory, and inventory is what the agreement is for.
| Who does what | What it costs |
|---|---|
| One-week inventory, hours counted, no names yet | 1 sitting |
| Each line marked unpaid family work or paid work | 20 minutes |
| If Mom will pay: personal care agreement to an attorney, signed by Mom | attorney fee $ |
| If siblings will chip in: jobs, hours, invoices, out-of-town coverage, hours credit | 1 page |
| Copies sent to every sibling, one kept with Mom's papers | 10 minutes |
| Review date, 90 days out | 1 meeting |
| Shift nobody in the family can take (aide invoice) | $ |
| What the page is for | Jobs, hours, and money, signed. Not a statute. |
Paid placement, disclosed
New Plan Care
New Plan Care is an independently owned non-medical in-home care company based in Chesterfield, Missouri. Caregivers help with daily routines, meals, personal care, rides, companionship and overnight presence in a person's own home. It does not publish an hourly rate, and neither do we. Call (314) 405-0887.
New Plan Care pays for this spot. It is a client of OwnersFirm, which publishes this site, so read it as an advertisement with a phone number rather than as a result, a rank or a recommendation drawn from any of the articles on this page.
The one-page family meeting agenda
Nine lines, a chair who is not you, a timer for the feelings. Adapted from the Family Caregiver Alliance. Print it. Send it a week ahead.
Download the agenda (plain text)Sources on this page
Every fact on this page is linked in the sentence it appears in. The sources page lists each URL with the date it was checked.
From the sources on this page
Future careFCA: a personal care agreement pays for future care, not for work already done, at a reasonable rate. POA payCFPB: do not pay yourself as her agent unless the document or state law allows it. Anyone exceptDHSS FAQ: under CDS you can hire anyone except a legal spouse or guardian.New Plan Care keeps the hours this page is about.
Call (314) 405-0887