To think that parents cannot leave money to severely disabled offspring free of IHT

OP have a look at this. It's best set up via a knowledgeable financial advisor.

https://octopusinvestments.com/our-products/business-relief/octopus-inheritance-tax-service/

I would normally think this was unethical as it is essentially a tax get-out. But in your situation I think it is fair enough.

Unless you die at 35, he's unlikely to outlive you by 50 years.
As pp said, benefits are not there to provide the 'nicer things' in life; they are for essentials.

Our son’s package (LA initially, now NHS CHC funded), covers his laundry costs. Accommodation will be paid so it should just be incidentals he’s paying for. A trust would allow funds to be taken for holidays etc.

We believe that sooner or later NHS CHC funding will be abolished by the Tories or Labour (= Tory Lite), because they want to privatise the NHS. No private provider(s) will want to take on the open cheque that is NHS CHC funding. The government would see putting all those people, funded by NHS CHC funding back onto Local Authorities to fund, as a stream lining of two parallel systems anyway.

Local authorities have realised supported living saves them money, because the service users bears the accommodation costs (funded by benefits or rather central government) instead of the Local Authority. My Local Authority is pursuing that policy - they are not commissioning any new care homes, and are moving service users from care homes, especially the out of county ones into supported living in county.

Nobody can be complacent that a disabled DC of working age in a care home, will be able to live there for the rest of their life, especially after the parents have died - who would be there to fight the Local Authority on this; and would they have the time and energy?

We also believe care homes will close, with the budget changes to NMW and NI employers. Maybe not this year, but further down the line, when their reserves have been drained, from having to spend say an extra £1,000,000 Pa, which is unfunded. I can’t see how Local Authorities or NHS CHC funding would be able to fully fund the increase in fees, when the social care uplift is £600 million for everybody and this measure alone will cost £800 million?

I imagine most people have seen disabled people on the news, saying they can’t afford to pay for the electricity for vital equipment or they have to choose between food and heating in the winter? PIP does not cover all the increased costs, associated with disability, so the disabled as a group, are even more impoverished than the “average” person on benefits?

Why do some posters consider they are so hard done to, and OP is wrong to want to lift her DC out of dire poverty, and him have enough money to get out and do the activities, everyone else takes for granted? PP may be married, have a job, have children, have a home (whether it’s owned or rented), can go out the house whenever they want - go shopping, see family and friends, have a drink….Yet they are jealous of disabled people, who will never have that?

My disabled DD would like nothing more than to have a normal life - a boyfriend, a job, children and her own home; and she cries to me regularly that she’ll never have any of it. Her idea of the finer things in life, at the moment is to go for a KFC!

Haven't read the whole thread, but OP, did no-one ever advise you about life insurance written into trust? A whole of life policy generates a sum which - if written into trust - sits outside the estate, and is therefore not liable for IHT. This sum is then available to pay any IHT liability.

I don't know how much it would cost you to set this up now, but it might be worth investigating. DH and I did this, because (London prices) we had two properties which took us over the limit, and didn't want to leave children in a situation, when financially vulnerable, where they would have to sell fast to meet a tax bill.

It seems a neat solution: HMRC gets revenue, children get to keep the estate without having to flog it off at fire-sale prices to meet a bill. DH and I don't want to avoid tax - we're pro-tax, 'cos we like schools and roads and hospitals and defence and stuff! - but we want to be able to plan it over a lifetime and not have it land out of the sky on our beneficiaries after we're gone.

The policy was something like £12 a month when we took it out, it's now £28 a month. It ratchets up each year, as does the sum it generates.

Yes, take specific advice from an experienced financial planner.
For example. It could be a scheme that you have not thought of .. brain storming ...Could you gift your son the minimum in his own name that doesn't affect his receiving of benefits and leave the rest of your estate in a farm owned by your other children.
Have the farming children spend some profits to gift special treats and extras to their brother.

It is two years before this becomes law and I have been advised that Labour have a great deal of work to do to make this viable. In the meantime financial bods and tax lawyers will be working on workarounds so there will be plenty of advice on this.

It’s so much more complicated than that - it affects who can live there and how you can draw profit. As farmers are saying, their best option for their children in many cases is to die before April.

Depending on having a trusted family member perhaps siblings? You could give money to them on understanding they pay for the nicer things etc. tbh everything will be burned through by care costs in just a few years otherwise. You could transfer early and it’d be exempt for IHT inn7 years.

Not without risk if they die it’d be part of thier estate, or made bankrupt or be greedy.

I am truly staggered at the lack of human fucking empathy on this thread. Staggered.

Farms are asset rich, cash poor. The need to asset to live.

Disabled* *children, who will hopefully turn into adults, need the means to live too.

The farming is a separate issue and obv needs addressing, the OP will probably regret referencing them as there is a lot of emotion attached to this topic, which many ppl quite rightly feel strongly about.

But just take the farming element out of her post for a moment.

This lady has come on here to ask advice for her extremely sensitive situation and apart from a couple of posts from ppl in similar circumstances, or with close family members in similar circumstances. the level of hostility and condescension on here is unreal. I had to stop reading them bc it was just upsetting and awful.

These posters lack any scrap of understanding or sympathy for what this OP’s life is like (probably bc they’ve written her off as rich - so zero sympathy deserved in any circumstance) and are making light of the fact she is concerned - things like ‘with this figure in the bank, why are you worried?’ ‘Ppl who claim benefits can’t expect nicer things’, etc. and there are many more.

I’m disgusted. This isn’t a woman trying to fuck the system, she is looking for support. The vast number of these posters don’t have children with disabilities. Their outlook is unfortunately common in our society. Why should you be given special treatment? Fundamentally it boils down to: Me and my children aren’t getting any benefits, why are you getting money or expecting what we’re not?

This isn’t a dig at the poster I’m quoting particularly as she had the grace to tack on that she feels for the parent of any disabled child. The thing is that’s lip service isn’t it. To say you don’t would make you scum. You can’t say you dislike ppl with disabilities - especially children. Thats not nice is it. And worse, other nice, normal ppl wouldn’t think you were very nice. I have encountered so many ppl that are the stereotypical cliche of nice, middle-class, church-going, environmental-campaigning nice ppl. When they’re not really very nice at all regarding this topic. But it’s not a class thing as hard-working salt of the earths can also resent ppl claiming benefits for ‘so-called’ disabilities when they have to go out to work long hours themsleves and aren’t living in the lap of luxury, neither are their kids. It seems to be centred on money. Perhaps survival. I resent you for having what we don’t - hate the rich, hate ppl on benefits, even if you do technically deserve it bc your life is challenging in ways mine isn’t and never will be (but I don’t like to/ can’t be bothered to think about that aspect). And I still resent you, as at the end of the day why should your child get it and not mine?

My rant is over, I’ll no doubt get shit for it, I don’t care. Before you angrily click away at me put yourselves in this lady’s shoes for 60 seconds imagining what she has, is and will be going through. I’m not talking about the daily slog of parenting with a lazy-arsed husband, being a single parent or anything like that, I’m talking about being the mother of a child who struggles daily and probably will for the rest of their life. The emotional impact of this alone is unimaginable to ppl who aren’t in this situation. You will never understand but try to.

My heart breaks for you OP, and everyone else in similar situations. I wish you and your families all the luck and good will in the world and I hope you get all the support you need and deserve to ensure your children are looked after and are happy 💐

Very sensible posts.

Don't waste your time posting on MN. You need a good IFA/accountant/lawyer.

I've also thought this about young dependent children who are orphaned. They haven't yet had the benefit of their parents paying for their home, education, food, clothes, toys, holidays etc so should be able to inherit more tax free than a 50 year old from their 80 year old parents. There is also the argument that they will need more in care, such as nannies, or counselling, than the average child. I believe some countries, like Spain, decide the inheritance tax based on the needs of the recipient rather than a blanket rule for those who have died...and it makes a lot more sense to me.

OP YANBU to worry about your Ds in the long term, and from what I understand from friends in a similar position it is the workings of the benefits system that makes it hard.

It is such a worry, not being able to feel secure about the future of our children who will not be able to secure their own futures.

YABU to conflate farmers and children with disabilities. All sectors of the community have different challenges and need different solutions.

YABU also to expect nuanced empathetic replies in AIBU. In MN at the moment, because everyone being squeezed, is full of people carping on about what someone else gets or wants. Whether it be a refusal to understand that not all pensioners are wealthy and running a household alone on basic state pension is very hard, to being snarky about the amount you will be able to leave your children compared to them, to people not understanding the economics of farming. Under pressure everyone turns against others under pressure.

There will be people on the SEN boards who understand your issues and will have taken financial planning steps.

@Noras Is there any way you can give him as much as support as possible and find ways he can understand so he can live independently one day.
there was an autistic child who learned to speak by pointing at letters

You can give away money you might need if you can have complete trust in your children.

You could, say, put 20k per year per child from now in an ISA in their name. And you could say to them that although it’s in their name and the objective is for them to inherit it when you die, that you would like them not to touch it until then, because it could be needed for your retirement/old age.

I do very much sympathise with your situation, however yabu to compare it to farmers and consider it unfair. You have justified the farmer situation by saying that “most won’t be affected”. Labour justify most of their tax raids in this way. Private school VAT is justified as “most won’t be affected”. I could say that the IHT on your assets and the deprivation of inheritance for your vulnerable child also could be described as “most people won’t be affected”. That’s the trouble with the “most won’t be affected” - everyone thinks it’s ok/nobody cares until they find themselves in the affected minority. I haven’t found myself in an affected minority yet - but I do still think that the policies re farmers are very dangerously wrong for our country. I mean how would it go if I said that racism against black people is not worth tackling because only 4% of our population is black and so “most aren’t affected”. It’s an absolutely terrible justification.

People are naive to think that farmers are loaded and can shell out for IHT. I have to say that if I was a farmer with a £5m farm that I just inherited, I would quit farming, sell the farm to property developers or something like that, pay the IHT and go and live a nice life in Monaco - leaving the UK and it’s food insecurity.

This is excellent advice. OP, see a financial advisor. And connecting farming to your situation is a non sequitur.

I think if a disabled “child” is living in the parent’s house when the parents die, the “child” can stay on living in that house.

And millions of people in this country are living in poverty, especially people with disabilities, through no fault of their own.

Yes. These farmers are really getting on my nerves. Always wanting more and to be treated as a special case. Well they're not.

I assume the OP isn't aware that most parents of disabled children have nowhere near that amount to potentially leave their children? And some have nothing at all.

£500k in a stocks and shares ISA, will be worth 950k after just 10 years, with modest returns.

Start putting £9k per year into all junior ISA for each child now. It limits the IHT & will grow significantly for them.

Don't fall into the government's trap of trying to pit one group against each other. IHT is an insidious tax regardless of who it's levied on. They want you to vilify the farmers (who incidentally are critical to our infrastructure) so that you don't stop and think too hard about why the government is stopping you from passing on your post tax income to your own family once you die...

This. I won’t be able to leave my disabled adult child anything because I don’t have a penny, I’ve spent most my adult life caring for her alone and not being able to work. She’s never been abroad or had extravagant things so I guess she knows no different? 🙄. She will need care for the rest of her life and will need a residential placement soon, she’s disabled so her life’s never going to be brilliant or extravagant, she will claim benefits for the rest of her life and live on the bare minimum but she won’t go without and has never really gone without…she just doesn’t have extravagant things, but neither does a large percentage of society.