To get annoyed when people try to avoid care costs

[paramedicswift]

People deserve good care in old care, potentially in their own home or in a care home.

While it is completely rational thing to do, people try avoid this cost by spending as much money as they can before they need this care or they give it away to family.

On one side, it is completely rational. I understand that people have paid taxes, national insurance and worked for their entire life. They have a desire to see this work to be passed onto their children for them to benefit from their hard work.

One the other side, it is incredibly entitled. To me, your care in old age is just another cost of life. It is like cost of food, cost of shelter. I wish I did not have to spend money on rent, food and travel to work. But I have to. This is just life.

It makes me even more angry when family inheritances come into it. It is just so greedy and horrible. I do not know why it is unacceptable to some people to apply for benefits and never work but completely acceptable to avoid paying for social care.

It is a bit of tragedy of commons because if everyone did it, then taxes would be wasted on caring for old people that COULD HAVE afforded the care themselves rather than important things such as education for children, public infrastructure projects and healthcare that benefit everyone.

To everyone according to their need. If someone cannot genuinely afford old age care and they did not deliberately avoid the costs, then I have no problems with state subsidised care.

Am I being unreasonable?

I know somebody who was avid to 'sign over' her parents' house to her and her sister, "so that they don't have to sell the house to pay for care homes". Her mother had been diagnosed with dementia shortly before.

I patiently explained the 'gift with reservation' and 'deprivation of assets' rules, which she didn't like one bit. No, her parents wanted their daughters to inherit all their assets intact, and that should trump everything else, in her view. She simply couldn't see any reason why her parents should pay towards their own care.

Incredibly selfish.

This isn't really a long term problem (or it is, but in a much more serious way) because the main reasons why some members of this generation have assets to spend on care are house price inflation and decent pensions.

As most of the generation coming up behind will have neither of these, the real issue is, how are they going to fund their care!

Somehow, when beveridge was devising his five giants to be slayed, I doubt the giant of "wanting to leave an inheritance from the house I luckily bought at the right time" was among them.

Somehow housing has become divorced from the other strands of the welfare state. People seem to think it is rational to expect "cradle to the grave" medical care while still seeing their house as an investment. It's possibly the biggest political blindspot of our time IMHO.

My grandmother had dementia and like dinosaurs roar said lived in a hospital till she died.

All her daughters had it/ have it. My aunt lived in a care home for five years paying £125,000. I can't understand how dementia is not classed as a medical condition like DR said that is how it was treated until fairly recently. She was even denied chc as she was dying. Something I'm extremely angry about.
She failed the assessment apparently despite hardly being able to talk, eat, drink , Doubly incontinent , not having a clue where she was, who she was and had cancer too.

Also in the 90 s care wasnot entirely free, the state pension was removed from you and quite rightly so if you went into a care home.

As someone else said self finders donot get a better choice of home. Certainly in my area they don't. Where I think the mistake was made was handing it all over to the private sector instead of keeping it within councils. Im not saying people with means should not pay I just think their needs to be a fairer system.

My mum has been in care for nearly three years and as someone says it's a shitty...well half line would be a bonus..a tenth of life is more accurate. She hates it, I hate it. I grieve all the time for my lovely, loving, caring mum who was more a sister and friend as I got older. My mum would not choose to live like this. On my last visit she had smeared faeces on the wall. Her room stank of urine so much my eyes watered yet I thank god there are places like this as I couldn't cope with this 24/7 as some brave battling people do. How I'll feel when she goes I don't know. I'm dreading it.

I'm stopping now as I'm upsetting myself.....

It is incredibly selfish but people don't believe in a social contract idea anymore - ie. we put in and we get out. We pay for our services.

Unfortunately, part of the reason they don't believe in it, is because they see the rest of their family and neighbours get everything for free.

Well paying income tax of 60% to fund care would be good for me cause I don't earn much and would stand to inherit a great deal if care home fees never became an issue but it would royally shit on those members of society who don't stand to inherit. So a great boost for inequality then.

OP you are not unreasonable to bring this subject up - the debate is long overdue (and all solutions likely to be unpopular which is probably why non of the political parties are pushing it).

And can we stop with the worked hard all their lives bullshit. Some did, some didn't, some some fought in the war, some lived lives devoted to caring for family, some didn't, some retired on a full pension at 55 and some made massive gains in the housing market. The elderly are no more or less deserving of respect than any other group of society.

www.which.co.uk/elderly-care/financing-care/gifting-assets/343063-what-are-the-rules-for-gifting-assets

I think you'll find the rules are pretty tight!

I know I'll sound money grabbing (meh - whatever) but if my parents have to spend all their savings and sell their house to pay for care I will spend the rest of my life in poverty so the state will have to fund me anyway. Bit of a short term saving really.

Sorry but I can't seem to do links on this Android app.

Dowser

I know how hard it is seeing that happen to your mum. I did everything I could to keep my mum going as long as she could, as that's what she wanted, but it made me certain I really don't want that for myself, when the time comes.

Not really sure where I stand on this tbh. I'm in my 30's and a lot of my friend's parents have already signed over their houses and other assets to their kids. My parents are very young and active so haven't done as yet but I expect will be doing so themselves when they reach 60 or so.

My mil is obsessed with avoiding inheritance tax and so is always gifting us money. I worry a lot about her living to 110 and having no money for herself, but I suppose that's her choice.

I think I agree with pp that it should be regarded as healthcare and we should be taxed accordingly, but then I would say that as I'm a bleeding heart liberal lefty and would be happy to be taxed a lot more for all of our public services. Not sure what the answer is, but I agree that it's a huge problem.

Rainbow Flutterby, why will you be in poverty for the rest of your life unless your parents give you a big pile of dosh?

Mileend there's Person D as well:

Worked hard all their life in a poorly-paid job, scrimped and saved and paid for essentials but never had enough left over to be able to save a tidy sum or to pay into a private pension.

Bullshit Bingo, you can't be a 'bleeding heart lefty' if you're planning to benefit from a (doomed) attempt on your parents' part to avoid care home costs.

The 'signing over the house' schemes don't work. Some solicitors are happy to do it since they charge fees for it, but the schemes aren't effective. The alleged transfer of assets will be overlooked, since it is clearly an artifice.

Thank you Annie.

Much appreciated.

The inequality of the system strikes me as unsupportable. It is a lottery. The new government has promised to make £1 million family homes exempt from inheritance tax. But of course that will only be for those who don't have to use their family home to fund care fees. To be fair, I don't agree with the £1 million inheritance tax exemption, but I also think that a fairer system for care home fees must be possible.

I know I bang on about this on here, but what is really needed here is an expansion in private provision of insurance products in this area.

I agree that the State should not be funding what is for so many people an inevitable and foreseeable life cost, indeed very similar to rent, food etc, but by the same token, £900 per week is too much to expect an individual to pay for themselves.

I find it odd that the critical illness, income protection and even private medical sectors are really well covered, yet there are almost no comparable products to fund potential future care home requirement...

Because I'm poor. I finally left an abusive marriage in my 40s having been a SAHM for 10 years. I don't have much of a pension. My financial settlement wasn't brilliant and will be spent on day-to-day living as I am above the threshold for any benefits. I cannot get a mortgage so I have to rent. I'm struggling to find work now. I have nothing.

YAB a bit U I think but it's bloody hard. I don't blame anyone trying to avoid care home fees. DM and I are currently taking IHT advice to protect her assets and I don't really see care home fee avoidance as much different. We are all accustomed to healthcare being "free" and one of the consequences is that many people think shirking a contribution is fair game particularly when the current system is so demonstrably unfair to savers.
I would prefer to see compulsory insurance for all so that the risk is pooled. I do think it is important that everyone pays something, however small, to avoid the suggestion that those who cannot or will not save get rewarded.
One of the reasons that care home fees are so high is to subsidize the fees of all those who don't pay. However I am also nervous about pushing them ever lower because carers already get such an awful deal and ultimately it's the people needing care who will lose out.
Other cultures (including DH's) take care of their elderly at home for as long as humanly possible. It's a nice idea but rather depends on there being a willing and capable woman adult at home, whereas most families now have two working parents. Also older mothers could end up with a seriously raw deal.
It's a nightmare all round

I agree that care should be paid for if home care isn't an option BUT when I took care of my elderly aunt's wellbeing and affairs I nearly fell off my chair when the care home costs were given to me. And it wasn't a "great" home, it was very basic. And that's all she could afford as a self funder when I worked out the costs. It made me really cross. The most basic of basic care and it was an absolute FORTUNE.

In previous generations, we didn't have such a high % of old people compared to those of working age, so we could afford to put them all in NHS wards.
That system now would require multiples of the NHS budget; it's not just increasing the budget a bit. So, a huge rise in taxation. Would people vote for this ? Or just crash the NHS.
Also, people in care homes now have their own room, very different to being on a 30-bed ward for years.

I really hope this government manages to sort out the proposed system where there is a cap on how much an individual has to pay - 72,000 seems quite fair to me, at least for people owning homes in the south of England. At least there would be something left to leave your children; if they live in the south they will need all the help they can get to buy property. Surely it is not beyond the ability of the supposedly great minds in Parliament that a graduated system is introduced reflecting income/property prices in different parts of the country?

I too wonder how nursing homes justify their charges; I know the care ratios are high (or at least are meant to be) but their staff certainly don't see much of the money paid.

My parents were very anxious that they would be able to leave me some money; they had worked hard all their lives and were the first generation to purchase a property. I have to admit I feel the same about my children to an extent.

I haven't read the thread yet, but all posts that suggest people should take or pay amounts from or to the state than the letter of the law requires are unreasonable.

To spell out my claim more explicitly, all posts saying you shouldn't claim money you are entitled to are unreasonable. All posts condemning tax avoidance are unreasonable. All posts saying you are wrong to arrange your circumstances so as to legally maximise your receipts or minimise your payments are unreasonable.

What all these threads have in common is that they assume some other yardstick other than the letter of the law exists, and should be followed. However if you do that, you are being unfair to yourself. When the law is unfair in your favour, you give up money you are owed, but it is equally likely that sometimes the law will be unfair in the opposite direction, and in that case it will be the law not your personal moral compass that will determine the outcome.

Getting an unfair advantage from the bluntness of the law is a quid pro quo for the times it deals out unfair disadvantages.

If we really think everyone in a particular category should behave differently, then we should change the law so it identifies that category and requires them to behave differently. Not use public shaming as a strategy to get the nicer people to disadvantage themselves to the benefit of the rest.

Big Own room is preferable to a ward yes, but honestly, you could only just swing a cat in my Aunt's room.

all posts that suggest people should take or pay different amounts from or to the state than the letter of the law requires are unreasonable.

I'm not an expert by any means but I think if you add up the costs of providing care 24/7 in your own home you'll see why nursing care is so expensive. That's 3 full time carers plus cover for sickness holiday, high water charges (incontinence,), laundry (incontinence again), high heating costs, specialised hoists and equipment, continence pads cost a fortune etc etc. And of course homes have to make a profit cause they are businesses.