If one is in their late 70's and doesn't have anybody they'd feel comfortable asking to serve as their financial Power of Attorney, how does one find a professional fiduciary to assist them in that capacity? And how much is an acceptable fee to anticipate being charged for services rendered to serve in that capacity?
The one who watched over my brother's ex-partner the last decade of his life was in fact hired by the ex-partner, and he did an exemplary job.
Any Licensed Fiduciary who acts in an illegal manner will be looking at jail time, as this is a profession with some of the highest fiduciary legal standards existing legally imho.
I am uncertain what your own experience is, but I think it may be unusual? And I certainly hope so.
The courts usually demand the highest accounting standards there are for anyone serving in a fiduciary capacity, family or professional.
Alva's response below is much better than mine:
The PFCA (Professional Fiduciary Assn of California) is at 866-886-7322 or pfac-pro.org. It is the assn. for my own state, and may help guide you to information for your own state. The important thing here is not to trip into a person calling himself a Financial Fiduciary, which is just a professional financial advisor who is paid according to the vehicles he can "sell you" such as insurance company annuities.
pay a percentage of the estate value. I googled “percentage of estate for executor” and found it’s between 1/2% and 5% based on the value of the estate.
For example, in PA, it’s:
5.0% on the first $150K
4.0% on the next $150K
3.0% on the next $1.2M
2.0% on the next $1.5M
1.5% on the next $1.5M
1.0% on the next $1.5M
0.5% on the next $1.5M
I’d expect the executor to hire contractors (movers, junk removal, appraisals, estate sales, realtor , cleaning, etc.) but it wouldn’t be paid with the executor cut.
The article at the website below specifies exclusions for VA:
https://www.estateexec.com/Docs/Compensation?state_abbrev=VA#:~:text=Executor%20compensation%20for%20VA%20estates,on%20the%20next%20%24300K
They also often can be found by calling the office of an elder law attorney or a Trust and Estate attorney, as these folks work with them through the court system when people who have no relatives require state guardianship.