Residential care home fees, would I be unreasonable to ask how much they are ?

[frumpety]

I have tried to find out online, but the average figures quoted seem a lot lower than the rates at local residential care homes ? Also there doesn't seem to be any info on prices on any of the home websites ? why is this ?

Edinburgh. Nice, private. £1200 pw for personal care. £1600 pe for nursing care.

@Bluesheep8 - if someone's savings drop below the threshold then the local authority does have to take over paying. The big "but" here is that they will have a maximum rate they are prepared to pay, so if someone has chosen a more expensive care home when self-funding, if can become difficult. In the best case scenario, the local authority and the care home provider can come to an arrangement - possibly with a third party like a relative paying an additional top-up fee. At worst, the person has to leave the care home and move to somewhere cheaper and chosen for them by the local authority.

Bluesheep

As soon as you drop below the threshold (although my advice would be to ring a few weeks before that) get in touch with the local authority and let them know. They will then complete a new financial assessment and adjust charges accordingly.

Cardy your dad should only have been paying for care if he had savings/assets over the £24k threshold. The house wouldn't have been part of the calculation if your mum was still living in it. Did you approach the local authority for a financial assessment?

what if the individual's savings drop below the threshold

the threshold is the amount you are allowed to keep (and pass on as inheritance though for most people a big chunk of it will be used for funeral costs). However, exactly what happens when your assets drop to this point depends a bit on which care home. in Wales it is different but for the rest of the uk, there are two thresholds, one for full support and one for partial support. when your savings drop below the upper threshold you have to still pay something but the council start contributing a bit. however this is where it can get tricky, because if the home is one which offers better than a basic service there will be two parts to the fees, a basic fee and a top up fee. the council will only help with the basic fee so the top up has to come from somewhere - either continuing to come out of savings or contributed by family members, so saving can be reduced to zero. For most care homes, if you and the family stop being able to pay those top up fees then you have to move to a cheaper home. however, some care homes that are run as a charity or NFP will have a kinder policy where they won't force a resident to move.

What Flev says is also correct.

I would hope that if that kind of situation was likely to happen though that it would have been made clear to families when they chose that home what the situation would be if they approached the local authority for funding further down the line so they can make an informed decision from the outset.

I think most problems like this arise where people arrange things themselves without speaking to the local authority for advice first.

What do you do if you dont have any money? Wow this is so expensive.i dont think I can afford to get old

Surf..if you don’t have any money you will live for free
It just won’t be of your choosing

Trusts..a warning

I’m on my second marriage and my husband was a widower.
They’d had no children so he and his wife Made a will and put the house in a trust. Basically if one died their half of the house went to a nephew in Canada.
So all was fine after she died . However when my husband met me we both lived in separate towns about 40 mins away. We knew we’d want to live together eventually but while he was working another 20 mins further north, it made good sense for him to stay in his house.
Then redundancy struck and there’s not a lot of help for single men, when you’re 58 and no one wants to employ you
So we made the decision for him to move in with me

That’s when the trust bit him in the bum
When his small bungalow sold ( just under 100k ) half of that was meant to go to the nephew. Obviously he wasn’t meant to inherit until both were dead Ie the surging one was allowed to live in the house until their death, then nephew got whole house.

Dh managed to broker a deal with his brother that nephew got 32k the amount of his debts
It still rankles with me but at least dh came away with £64k instead of £48k

So, be very , very careful

Surging- surviving one

The same room in a residential care home could attract several different prices depending on the above which is why you can't find the answer online

Which is why bindings could be given - from £750 - £1,300

Bindings even

Also, if your relative starts to deteriorate you can ask for a dst meeting

This is where they are assessed for chc funding

You really need to be on your mettle here and know your stuff, I used an excellent video which I will post if anyone needs it

It’s not a walk in the park you have to fight for what your relative is entitled to
My aunt was swindled out of her entitlement but I made sure mum wasnt

Oh and here’s another thing you might not know if you’re relative has a diagnosis of dementia, is eligible for AA and lives alone in a property they own they do not pay council tax
Likewise they are discounted if there are two people in the house, so council taxis paid at the single person reduction

I got my cousin back £8k as her mum lives alone

A lot of councils forget to tell you that..and you can can go back 6 years to claim it. I got £2k for my mum

We pay £1100 - £1400 per week. London - a nice area but a charity-run home. Short on swanky furnishings and glitz but very solid on all round care. (Dementia)

We are in greater london and a lot of the care home websites we looked at did have prices. Iirc it was about £1200+/wk for residential care, £1400+ for nursing care, 1500+ for palliative or dementia care.
As it happened my Ddad was funded (but sadly died after less than a month there, so would have been able to bear the costs anyway)
Carers are v poorly paid but I suppose it is covering all the overheads and additional staff like cleaning and kitchen staff and ground maintenance if the place has gardens.

Live in care is definitely not £1k a month. My MIL pays over £2k a week for day and night carers in her home. The turn over in staff is so high and the quality of staff massively differs.

My dad's dementia care home (he had Parkinsons dementia) cost about 6k a month in the SE. It was a beautiful place, he hated it there. I'm relieved he only lived a month there before he died really. Poor dad, wish we could have kept him at home.

You self fund until you drop below the line, and then your care is paid for. If you can't self fund then sadly you don't get a choice in where you are placed and some of those care homes are.. not so great unfortunately.

Does nobody spot the contradiction here?

You can't complain it's too expensive and at the same time complain about the standard of care! Care workers are amongst the most abused in our economy. They are often on zero hour contracts with no guaranteed income, and on minimum wage.

We have to look at how we fund social care in this country. I'm interested in the Scandinavian model where it is largely state funded but everyone pays something.

(And I'm totally about relatives bleating about "losing their inheritance" to fund a loved one's care)

Residential. Our highest fee is £904 per week. That is for the highest level of care.

I work in a lovely, happy Care Home for folks with early/middle stages of dementia. I am not sure how much the fees are but think it is £1000. There are usually about 20 residents, a few day care folks and about 35 staff round the clock. On a typical day shift there are 3 care staff, one senior, one activity person and a manager. Care staff are on min wage and my goodness they work hard to keep the residents cared for in a homely environment meeting standards and trying to improve things all the time. Residents who want to are frequently out on trips. Most of the rooms are en suite and a few have commodes.

Families and friends and pets are welcome 24/7.

It is very sad though to think that many residents, luckily they dont realise, have lost the homes they worked so hard for to pay for the care and have nothing left to give their children ... which is what they would have wanted. I cannot help but think that if I have the strength, if I have one of these terrible conditions, before it gets too severe I would want to end my life so that everything I have worked for does not end up in the coffers of care home owners.

I worked in a residential care home, and prices were around £800. I'm in north wales but I'm guessing they vary all over the country

Sorry just thought I should add I am not a journalist.  Are people aware that nursing care needs in residential homes are met by the NHS community care teams/ district nursing teams ? So if a relative needs an injection in a residential home it will be someone from one of those teams who come in and give it ? Not a qualified nurse working in the same home, if it is a dual registered home ?

Yes, very aware as I have to call them in. We are meds trained but not allowed to be intrusive so no injections, enemas, suppositories etc. Sometimes it is a regular thing like a b12 injection every 12 weeks, sometimes it is an emergency call like a wound dressing (which I can do, but not allowed to) or an enema for example. We also have phlebotomists that come to take blood.

Quote fail, sorry!

Thanks @dowser ...I hope I'm never in this position 😪

Uncles recently in a nursing home were around £800 per week.