AIBU to think "Its just a house"

[5dcsinneedofacleaner]

First of all this isnt a talk about the rights and wrongs of expecting people to sell their homes to pay for care - tbh I have no clue of the ins and outs of this and this post and the political implications of it, this is soley based of experience of my grandmother who sold her house to move to a home.

She needed more suitable housing and although she doesnt need care at the moment she does need people there to check on her and her needs will increase in the next few years. constantly and she cant maintain a house alone. My dad isnt in the country and neither my sister or I have homes we could fit another adult in plus we dont own our homes so we could offer no stability at all, we have no other family.

When she sold her house everyone was full of how disgusting it was that she had to sell it in order to pay for the care now and in the future (she is 72) and I understood the loss of her house upset her BUT my sister and I were really shocked at the sheer attachement to the house and the fact that it was not just seen as an assest to be used. There was a really clear split between older generation (grandmothers friends etc) and ours (we are in ours 20s).

To me my house is just somewhere to keep my stuff and stop me freezing to death in the winter. I hold no emotional attachement to it and tbh its really hard for me to truley understand the attachement that my grandmother and her friends have to the houses. There is one of her friends for example who I have known since I was a baby she had a wonderful house, but now its is falling apart because she cant care for it either financially or physically, she sits in one room with the fire on rather than heat it properly because she is afraid of the bill. It would make FAR more sense for her to sell it and move, her health would improve etc and yet she doesnt because she doesnt want to leave it. I am not exaggerating when I say I really think that staying in that house will kill her.

I have never owned a house I am not sure that I ever will so AIBU to just not get it? I really dont and people make me feel like a complete freak for not standing and wailing over the loss of a tiny victorian terrace.

Surely the answer is to move to a small manageable home in your 50s once your children leave? Not leave it until you are in yoru 70s?

It is what me and DW are planning right now. I am only 49 this year but 20 years down the road I CERTAINLY do not intend living in anything but a small manageable dwelling. In fact, me and DW are seriously thinking of buying that 'forever' home in a sheltered accomodation unit now as an insurance policy.

We have never owned a home before so renting and moving is the norm for us.

Oh and it's worth remembering, a lot of people have huge problems with the very elderly having to sell their homes to pay for a carehome but wouldn't have the same problem with the same person perhaps 5 years earlier selling up to buy a flat because they couldn't cope with stairs, but didn't need a care home.

It's worth remembering that it's quite a new concept that people will be needing nursing care for a long time at the end of their lives, even 20 years ago when my grandad had altzimers, they were shocked he lasted for 7 years after going onto a dementia ward because most only lasted 6 months. And 20 years ago he was one of the last ones who went into hosptial onto a ward -shortly after his death they closed the wards and older people who needed dementia care went into care homes instead.

If you are in your 20s you probably have never known any other end of life care for those who have a death from illnesses associated with old age other than carehomes, but it used to be provided entirely free on NHS, because not as many people needed it. Either family did it or the old person died or they died of something else in a short time period. There's still that memory from those who are elderly now about what happened for their parents/older people they knew even relatively recently. (If you are in your 70s, things that happened in the early 90s doesn't seem that long ago).

MoreBeta - often it will be sensible option, but will depend on your family experience. My parents, having seen both my mum's parents need years of end of life care, (and having had both their DCs move to the South East from North west as adults) they have sold up, bought 2 small 2 bed places, they currently rent one now and live in the other. The idea being if one of them needs care, they could sell the rental place to pay for it, or the income from the rental would mean it could pay directly for end of life care without the other having to have their lifestyle affected.

My PIL on the other hand have seen both sets of parents die after very short illnesses (less than 1 year), and have seen from both sides their parents get to their 80s in great physical and mental health, and the decline at the end being just physical not mental decline. They don't see the same need (even though DFIL is coming up to 70) to move from their 4 bed place, which is close to both their grown DSs. They don't need the money to be released now and do seem to assume they'll have deaths similar to the ones their family have had.

I am very very attatched to my house. I love it so much. It took us a very long time to be here and it would break my heart to have to give it up.

I can't understand your lack of empathy to someone who is attached to their home although if you have yet to experience that I guess you couldn't. After 70+ yrs its more than just a place to 'keep your stuff'. It's not just leaving the house literally that elderly people may fear. It's the acceptance that one enormous chapter in life is closing.

The worry that in closing that you are giving up some, maybe a lot of independance and facing what? Leaving what you know for a good deal of uncertainty at a time when you feel most vulnerable and need familiar surroundings more than ever. Think how it would feel to hand your life over to others to run. Not all decisions can be made with logic and facts alone.

You can't take it with you when you die. Anything that you can't take with you when you die is not worth getting upset about, IMO. Death is so very very final, but people don't like that, so they get attached to 'stuff'.

I couldn't agree more, MoreBeta.

My folks have only owned one home since 1972. We grew up there bar a few times here and then when we went with my father when he was working abroad.

Will they sell it to fund a good care home should they need it, or a move to sheltered housing? In a second! They consider themselves lucky it's appreciated so much in value. As my dad always says, 'The world does not owe me or anyone else a living!'

Well you're pretty young. Maybe you'll understand when you're her age.

'You are young and have never owned a house, it's understandable that you do'nt get this. You don't have 30+ years of memories in one place, and if you are renting, you won't have the same feeling of perminance that an owned house gives you.'

What a patronising thing to say! I'm not young - in my 40s - have both owned and rented. Home is in the heart, 100%. As long as my family are together and healthy, something we do not have the good fortune to have anymore, that's all that matters.

A house burned down this morning here. The family were just so happy to get out, together, unharmed, the rest really is just stuff.

My parents bought land in 1962, and built a house on it ready for when they got married in 1963. My sister came along, and then they built the upstairs part when I was born in 1970.
Unfortunately my mum died 3 years ago, having had to spend the last couple of years of her life in a nursing home, due to having haf Alzheimer's. They had to pay a good chunk of this care from the pensions which they had paid into all their working lives.

My dad now lives alone in that house, having spent a lot of time and money on it over the years, on maintenance and modernisation.

He's physically disabled, but is still capable of looking after himself, in the house, that he and my mum built, as starry eyed 20 somethings, 50 years ago. He's (quite rightly) determined that it won't be sold to fund any care he might need, whilst there are people in care homes, who have pissed every penny against the wall, receiving exactly the same care as self-funders.

Am My whoe family unreasonable in having an emotional attachment to that house?

Its because people in their 20s aren't able to afford a home they will stay in for 40 years, so have to disattach themselves.

Yanbu but what gets me most is the baby boom generation who see their parents homes as their inheritance and not as their parents right to dignified end of life care.

'He's (quite rightly) determined that it won't be sold to fund any care he might need, whilst there are people in care homes, who have pissed every penny against the wall, receiving exactly the same care as self-funders.

Am My whoe family unreasonable in having an emotional attachment to that house? '

It's right to believe every single person who isn't self-funding was a feckless, lazy fuck up? No.

If the house blew up tomorrow, would you feel as bad about it if no one were in it when that happened v. your entire family?

'Stuff' can be replaced, even when it can't, people are more important.

I see no reason why I should toil till I drop to pay for care homes for people who haven't worked in decades so they can hang on to some house when the majority of our children won't be able to buy a lock up.

He refuses to sell it, I refuse to fund people so they can hang onto a thing. I'm far from alone in that sentiment and we'll be making the rules soon enough as more of him and them die off.

I don't think YANBU. My parents were forced to downsize from the house where they'd raised their children because they couldn't pay the mortgage when they retired. They'd lived there over twenty years and poured money, love and time into the place, lots of happy family memories etc.

But they just found it exciting, a new chapter and an opportunity to live somewhere different, rather than some sort of tragedy. It's all about glass half full.

Saying that, I wouldn't ever want to move into a home either, so if the house sale is all bound up with that, then maybe some transference is going on.

Sorry. "I don't think YANBU" should just be YANBU!

Everyone gets help once their assets drop below £23,250 but if you have the means then yes you should bloody well pay for your care.

The help local authorities provide is minimal, usually less than half the weekly rate with an expectation that a 3rd party will top up the rest otherwise you're looking at moving homes to an inexpensive one

oh god the "why should I pay for my care when other's get it for free" argument always worries me, have people ever seen the difference between the sort of care home you'd want to be in and the sort the council would pay for? I have, I'm bloody glad when it came down to it for my Nana we had the money from the sale of her house to actually be able to get the best quality care for her - not all care homes are anywhere near equal levels of care! Places the council will pay for are normally the lowest quality possible. Increasingly, the demand is increasing for places so they are having to pay for spaces in 'posher' homes. Really, make any elderly people saying this do some visits before thinking of disposing of assets.

The bit that's often seems to be missing from a lot of these debates at the moment stuck me earlier - it's fine for a single old person to say "We'll force the sale of their home to pay for care" but what about couples where only one person needs care? I believe they don't force the sale of the house in those circumstances, but it does seem rather lacking from the debate.

Madbus - but surely if your parents bought the house with a mortgage they knew they wouldn't have paid off by retirement then they always planned to sell it at that stage. Most people don't live like that. Most people have paid off their mortgages well before retirement.

@doyou I agree. Either the house is an assett or a home. You can't sit on an investment while it gathers money (due to the policy of successive governments you probably voted in) and then squawk when you lose the benefits of the less well off imo.

You wouldn't expect to with any other investment so why does that change just because it is your house?

If there is still a dependent person or spouse living in the home it doesn't get sold but recommendation for a deferred payment.

But remember, the older people being surprised that the house has to be sold and thinking it's wrong, probably have experienced before when it was free. As I said up thread, my Grandad went on a dementia ward for 7 years from when I was 11 until he died when I was 18 (the ward was shut and long term elderly care stopped being something the NHS did within 6 months of his death, they'd already stopped taking on new paitents a year before). I'm only in my early 30s, so if my Nanna hadn't then subsquently had to go in a home herself and us pay for it, I might find it shocking that you don't get that for free anymore and it's the councils, not the NHS that deals with.

Imagine if the rules changed and while you got education for free from the state, any exams (GCSEs, A Levels etc) taken, it was means tested if you got the state to pay for the entry fee or not. While you might not register this if you don't have DCs at all or past that age when the rules came in, but then when you found say, your new DCs or DN's had to go through the system they had to pay, would you find it shocking and complain about how it should be provided by the state? That you see it as part of education not separate?

So many people are a bit like that with elderly care. It used to be available on the NHS (although granted, not in all areas), a decision was taken - assumingly when the numbers needing it dramatically increased and people stopped dying shortly after needing care but years later - to take it out of what the state provides to all to being something state means tests and to a certain extent you and your own family are expected to sort it out, the state only stepping in when you can't.

The current working generation cannot afford to support the older generation indefinitely as they will then also be expected to pay their own way too due to the older generation spending all that's in the pot.

You can't take it with you and you earned it you spend it while you can are what I tell my parents.

There should be the expectation of if you can afford it you should pay for it, that should be the norm.

Oh and the comparison with education I think parents should have to pay for numerous resists in examinations. Might kick a few kids into trying a bit harder the first time!

I'm not privy to my parents' financial arrangements, Don'tmind, so I'm afraid I've no idea at what point it became clear to them what their retirement income would be, what their lump sums/assets would consist of on retirement, and what that would mean for the house.

I'm just making the point that they didn't see selling a family house with all its repository of memories as a huge tragedy - quite the opposite. That's why it's strange to me that some people do. It seems such an unnecessarily negative outlook on life.

you do have to pay for resits.

Not in this town you don't. Sil sat several resits at the schools expense