To ask if people don't think they should pay their social care bills

[RoastingYourChestnutsHurtsAlot]

Where is the money going to come from?

I'm genuinely confused on this one

I agree with a previous poster who said that the state should fund care for those who can't.
Why should the state pay for my mums care if she ever needs it so me and my brother can inherit her house and money ( which we don't need)?

MaryWestmacott

You cannot leave a house empty for 10 years if you are a self funder.
You have to pay your fees in full by whatever means available until you have less than £20K in total. then, the council will start to put measures in place to assist you, but you may be moved to a cheaper home.
If you own a property and cannot pay your fees you will be forced to sell. Often with less than 3 months to do it.

Even if you are self funding, you are allowed approximately £10 of your own money to spend per week. Any more is considered disposition of assets.

What happens when people get equity release schemes and spend or gift the resulting money meaning that by the time they need to be in a care home, most of the money is gone?

Is that worse than people choosing not to put everything they possibly can into buying and paying off a mortgage?

I was going to start this thread a couple of weeks back but decided I CBA with the flaming! I really don't see the issue with someone "losing thier home" to pay for a care home. If they're going into a care home, they don't need their home. It's unpopular because their children lose their inheritance, the people requiring care have lost their home already .

This needs to be paid for somehow and it seems fair to me that those that can pay. I don't see any earthly reason why the state should pay to protect someone else's inheritance.

I don't object to inheritance tax either and I speak as someone whose parents own a substantial house, so either I will "lose" it because of care home bills or will be hit by inheritance tax. That's fine by me, seems a far less painful way to pay tax than increased VAT, fuel or income tax.

3littlefrogs - that's what meant - people seem to want to 'leave their house' but not think through what that means in reality.

That said, this is really the first generation who a) have had to self fund and b) have had people go into care homes for such a long time.

My grandfather died in 1998, he had Altzimers and he was one of the last ones (around 90/91) where it was treated as still an illness and he went into the "Geniatric ward" in an NHS hospital.

The staff commented that most people only lived 1-2 years once they went on that ward, and that he was unusual to 'last so long'. The year before he died, they weren't taking new paitents, people were being placed in care homes instead, and back then, having their fees paid 100%. The year after he died, the ward was closed and you started hearing that care homes had to be paid for.

Many people coming up to needing care themselves have only experienced people going through this process, having dementia treated in hospital wards or if they did go into a care home, it not being charged for, unless they chose to go into a fancy one, and people not living for a long time after you need care, 1year isn't that long to just 'leave your house' as it is until your DCs take it over.

Most younger people are surprised when told that it used to be something the NHS dealt with on a ward, not in care homes - but it does explain why many older people assume they should get care for free.

Unfortunately, the elderly now are living for a lot longer once they get to the stage of needing care, and there's more of them not dying of 'quick' illnesses younger. We just can't afford to do that anymore.

It's interesting though, no real talk about removing a whole area of care out of the NHS so that now it seems bizare we ever used to do it (even that it's so recent). It could quite easily be a model used for other NHS/council responsibilties being moved out to the private sector.

OP I am also confused. If someone, at a point with their life, needs alternative accomodation, with care provision on site then why should they NOT sell their existing property. Your existing home is no onager fit for purpose hence sell up and then at least you get the right to choose where you would Like to live.

There are already safeguards in place so that people can get three months funded care regardless of income or property assets, and also a home cannot be sold if their is a spouse or dependent resident in the home. Also people can now and always have been able to get a virtually interest free loan from the local authority to cover their home fees if they cannot face selling, loan to be settled after death.

Also many people will be able to get financial support from the state towards home fees, again regardless of property assets, eg attendance allowance, funded nursing care or CHC ( full costs paid by NHS for the most sick).

Why people would expect to have all expenses paid, to provide housing, food, utilities, furnishings, insurance, tv licence, Plus 24 hour per day care access is beyond me, and why, just so that the entitled adult children can inherit!! Sorry no!!!!

3littlefrog, that is not true, as Local Authorities are able to loan the money for the care home fees by entering into a contract, and placing a legal charge against the property via the land registry. Most people don't choose this but some do. It's called deferred payment scheme.

I do not want to get to a point where I have to stay in a care home. I would rather end it. Unfortunately that option has been taken from me by the state. With that in mind I see no reason why the state should not be responsible for the costs incurred in keeping me alive. Either that or they should allow me the right to die.

I would sell my house to get decent care but I shouldn't have to. The price of carehomes is ludicrous and its an industry that needs an overall and some regulation.

And my, I get what you are saying ( voluntary euthanasia) but suicide per we is not illegal is it. Deosnt mean the state ( other citizens) should keep you lock stock and barrel!!

But the state already does keep some people lock stock and barrel.

Some of the people who are old enough to need this type of care may have been able to save and buy a house, but chose not to. That means that people who made different choices and could afford care home fees, at least for a short time, are penalised for being more careful with money. And that's just not right.

The point about self funding residents paying more than the council will pay for residents to receive exactly the same care and accommodation is a good one, and it's things like that that will make me go out of my way to avoid it happening to me. Private residents should not subsidise other people by having their homes sold.

Some people work and pay their rent.

Other people can't work and the state pays their rent.

Should all the people who are working and renting complain because someone else is getting for free what they have to pay for? well I know some people do complain about this

There's just no way the NHS could fund accommodation for the amount of elderly people who need it. What services should they take money from? and given we already have a huge number of working poor, increasing tax and the burden on them to pay for a small number of people to receive an inheritence doesn't seem terribly fair.

I will agree that care homes are very very expensive though and making them more affordable would be good if possible.

3 little frogs very sensible posts. I believe the person's pension is taken and it must be awful if you are doled out £10 pocket money when all your assets have been taken.

I have no expectation of inheriting property or of passing property onto my own DCs. I assume it'll be used to pay for old age care. And I'm fine with that. We're lucky to have that safety net. Many people don't.

But is it really their home if they can no longer actually live there,

Just Like if me and DP split up we will have to sell the current home to obtain appropriate alternative accomodation etc etc. Needs must.

It can be argued that people having to seek their homes/ properties is unfair as others who could have saved/ bought and didn't get more paid for, but the point is the buyers have already benefitted in kind by buying, probably had years/ decades with no mortgage/ rent, had security etc etc. In my experience most people who can buy do so so this could be viewed as a somewhat skewed argument.

Also I would argue that care home fees are not 'extortionate' either.

An average residential care home in my era costs between £450 and £800 ish, the top figure is for specialised, luxury type homes with high staff ratios and. It's of extras. If you look at the lower figure that means a person can live all expenses covered ( excluding clothing and personal bits and pieces) for £1800 per month which entitles them to care provision, all domestic work,all food, heating, water, insurance, fixtures fittings/ furniture, tv licence, basically everything all for less than the averagely paid person gets per month in the UK. Is that really extortion? I think not!

Also no one ever has to sell their home if they are willing to do some fairly basic financial planning at an earlier stage, for example placing property into a family trust, equity release ( live the high life for as long as possible!!) or sell up and go live in a Hotel!!! We all have choices it's whether or not we want to exercise them.

'Well considering when I retire I'll have paid tax and ni for 50 years (more if government get their way) why the hell should I pay again or lose the house I've worked damn hard to buy?'

Because the money you paid in is not an insurance scheme. Taxes pay for a very expensive component of government known as infrastructure, that, when properly maintained - roads, defense against enemies, free schools, police, fire, ambulance, etc - allows most people to go about earning in peace.

This is very, very costly. And means does not cover the cost of all we take out as normal people and 1, 5, 10 years of very costly nursing and healthcare for a person with complex disorder like dementia.

I agree with hidden. I would like the option to opt out of living then, without having my family prosecuted as criminals if they help me carry out my wishes.

WooWooOwl, does your belief that your assets shouldn't be taken into account, when being looked after by the welfare state, extend to working age people?

On the grounds that someone working as an accountant and living in an inherited 5-bedroom house must obviously have been careful with money; whereas a care-worker on NMW zero-hour contract must have squandered their money?

Or is it all magically different when people pass the age of 65?

I find it interesting that it's mostly tories who want people to be able to keep their homes and have the state pay for their accommodation. The 'small state'/get on your bike rhetoric flies out the window when it's not poor people being penalised.

often the people penalised are not necessarily well off but their house is worth loads on paper. They may have lived really frugally for years'.

I don't understand why people don't complain about the discrepancy between what they pay and what others pay until they are retired? All our lives, people on low incomes, without the means to pay for themselves and those who are qualify for state support are provided with things by the state - free prescriptions, free eye-care, free dental care, free food, free access to all kinds of services that others have to pay for.

We all accept that this is how society works best: when those who have plenty share a little with those in need through taxation and benefits. Then suddenly, usually once you've retired and stopped contributing to that system and started qualifying for some of these benefits, you believe that you should stop having to pay for things that those same people (probably) are getting for free.
It just doesn't make sense that people who can pay choose not to - that would be like people who weren't on a low income deciding that they wanted their child to have free school meals so that they could spend the lunch money on caviar. It's just not the way it works.

'Private residents should not subsidise other people by having their homes sold.'

So someone who worked all their lives but was unable to buy their own home, an increasingly common scenario, should be penalised for the housing boom. Or of you of the ilk who believes such people are poor through their own fault, and therefore, an inferior form of person who deserves substandard care.

Why should those people, who also worked their whole lives, pay for you to keep a home you can no longer use by their taxes forking out for your care? Just because you're you?

'often the people penalised are not necessarily well off but their house is worth loads on paper. They may have lived really frugally for years'.'

And I'm so sure all those doing vital, but not highly paid work like nursing, teaching, driving a train or bus, working in a care home or kitchen, were just living the life of Riley for years and years, too.

Through increased taxes.

It's absolutely not on that people can get the same care in hospital, the same education, the same care in other settings, the same state pension and so on without having to sell their homes - and yet the elderly people, who have not squandered their money or looked to the state to support them all their adult lives, are expected to stump up at the end of their lives.

alot of working class people owned their houses in the past so nurses, bus drivers etc may own houses.

alot of people on low incomes used to be able to buy their own homes but had to scrimp and save to do so.

I don't get the stumping up at the end of their lives objection. At the end of their lives, it's not them but their heirs that are "stumping up". Why should I get a big lump sum on the sale of my parent's house while the state has been paying for their care?