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Nora Rowland had not heard from her 75-year-old father, Robert Rowland in several weeks. The two of them had FaceTimed nearly every week for years, so when Father's Day passed without a word from him, Nora drove from Baltimore to Conway, South Carolina where he lived to check on her father. She found that his front door had been replaced and there was a ring camera mounted above it. When she pressed the doorbell, his home care nurse answered remotely through the camera and told Nora that Robert had died three days earlier.
Shocked and while waiting for the nurse to come to the property, Nora entered the home through an unlocked window. Inside she discovered the walls had been repainted and unfamiliar photographs hung throughout the house. When the nurse arrived she displayed a deed showing the home had been transferred to her name by a quitclaim deed in April 2024 for five dollars. It seems that the nurse had gotten Robert to sign a power of attorney which she then used to transfer the home to herself. To add insult to injury, the nurse called the police to the property and had Nora arrested for trespassing.
What Actually Happened in Conway?
Reporting by WMBF News describes a fast sequence. The nurse began caring for Robert in March 2024 as an employee of the home care agency Nora had hired for him. By the end of that month Robert had been moved into a senior living facility. In April, Robert signed the power of attorney naming his nurse who then used the document to deed the property to herself. Bank statements reportedly show the nurse moving money from Robert's account into hers, even after his death.
Robert had Parkinson's disease and a brain injury and had been classified as a vulnerable adult. One of his neighbors told officers on body camera that he had become so concerned for Robert that he had called senior services. Conway police say the matter is under investigation and no arrests have been made. Rowland's trespassing charge was dismissed, and she is still working to challenge the deed.
Why Did the Recording Office Not Catch It?
Catching fraud is not the Recording Office's function. Horry County Registrar of Deeds Marion Foxworth III explained that if a deed contains what South Carolina law requires it to then his office records it. It is not their responsibility to check whether the deed is fair or right. A properly formatted five dollar Deed clears that bar as easily as one for a full price, arms-length sale.
Maryland law works the same way. Deeds are recorded through the Land Records department of the Clerk of the Circuit Court in each county and Baltimore City, and the review is procedural rather than substantive. Recording gives the world notice that a document exists. It is not a finding that the document was honestly or fairly obtained.
Who Holds the Power of Attorney, and Who Chose Them?
Whoever holds financial authority over an incapacitated person effectively controls that person's property, which makes the choice of agent one of the most consequential decisions in any estate plan.
Maryland does impose real formalities. Under the Maryland General and Limited Power of Attorney Act, a financial power of attorney must be signed before a notary and attested by two adult witnesses, and the named agent cannot be a witness. One used to convey real estate must also be executed like a deed and recorded along with any deed that is signed pursuant to the power of attorney. Those rules police how a document is executed, not whether the person named is the right person or whether the person who signed the power of attorney understood what they were doing when they signed it.
Would You Know If Your Parent's Deed Improperly Changed Hands?
In most cases, no, unless you go looking. Horry County now offers residents a free alert whenever a document is filed under their name. Florida likewise provide a free property alert service to notify owners who have signed up for the program if a deed or official record is filed in their name.
While Maryland has explored developing a statewide automated solution, so far no official proactive notification platform is available. Until that happens, Maryland property owners can use their free access to MDLANDREC, Maryland's official, centralized digital repository for all public land and property records. It costs nothing for someone like Nora who is concerned about a parent's property to check the official records periodically. While this method doesn't provide a real-time alert, it may uncover an unauthorized transfer long before it might otherwise have come to light.
What Happens When the Nearest Relative Lives 500 Miles Away?
Distance was the condition that made everything else possible. Rowland's contact with her father dropped off almost immediately after the new caregiver arrived, and her only window into his life was her father himself. That window was the first thing to close, and nothing else in the arrangement was built to notice.
Families managing care across state lines should establish a second channel that is not dependent on the person receiving care. That can mean an emergency contact on file with the agency, a successor agent or a friend who lives nearby, a professional fiduciary, and having duplicate financial statements copied to the responsible family member. Redundancy turns a quiet change into a question someone asks.
Preventing a Transfer and Undoing One Are Not the Same Problem
More than two years after the deed was recorded, Rowland is still litigating it, and her father – the one person who could explain what he understood that day – is gone. Reversing a transfer after a death can take years - if it can be undone at all. Establishing robust safeguards and putting in place effective methods of oversight for older relatives can be much easier and more successful than trying to undo damage after the fact.
References
Evans, M. (2026, August 27). Daughter claims caregiver took deed to father's Conway home before his death. WMBF News.
Collier County Clerk of the Circuit Court and Comptroller. Risk Alert Notification System.
Florida Court Clerks and Comptrollers. Statewide Property Alert Services.
Maryland Code, Estates and Trusts Article, Title 17 (Maryland General and Limited Power of Attorney Act), Section 17-110. The Maryland General Assembly.
Maryland Code, Real Property Article, Section 4-107. The Maryland General Assembly.
Maryland State Archives and Maryland Judiciary. MDLANDREC.net.
Maryland Department of Assessments and Taxation. Real Property Data Search.
