AIBU to try and prevent care home fees? Advice appreciated

[Watermelonsuns]

So my parents are elderly, both have health issues but managing well at home. My mum in particular would struggle if something happened to my dad. Recently a friend's parent had to go into a care home and as the parent owned their own house and savings they are self funding and the fees are crazy.
AIBU to try and find a way to protect my parent's property and savings in order its not all gone in care home fees in the last years?
Someone has suggested moving their property into my name but surely that would be an obvious way to avoid fees and would look dodgy? Is there another loop hole im missing? Aby advice from someone working in this area would be appreciated thanks

Seemingly an unpopular opinion here but I'm with OP. My parents have every intention of passing their house down to me and my brother, that's how it used to work. I raised the point of them possibly needing care at some point and they assume I'll give up my life/work/family move 500 miles and provide that for them. I'm guessing this is the only way if you want to keep the house and they want you to keep the house.
Strangely enough the same level of care isn't expected of my brother although he lives just 5 miles away from them.
I think, OP, we're living in the past where you could afford a home on one wage, women could afford to stay at home and raise kids and look after elderly rellies etc - this isn't possible today.
Do I give up my life, work, family, friends and move 500 miles away from my home to tend to elderly parents so they get to hand their house over to me and my brother when they're gone or do I tell them to sell the house to pay for their care fees?! Either way I lose out. It's a different world.
My late gran cared for her MIL in her final years and God knows how she did it, she was resentful of the expectation and the personal care was just beyond her (as it would be for most of us).
I dint know the answer, OP, but inheritance isn't what it used to be.

Whilst this sounds fine and dandy, sometimes a care home, with proper facilities is the only reasonable option. Are you really going to turn a section of your house into a hospital type facility, and if they are not mobile, install equipment for lifting, like a hoist etc, and then pay ££££ for care visits? What happens overnight, when they are screaming because they don't know who they are, or where they are? Are you able to get up and tend to them, multiple times a night, for years and years and years? What about if you want to go on holiday? What then? What if they are mobile and get up at 3am, and leave the house to "go shopping" in their nightie, or light up a fag and forget they have done so and it starts a fire, or they switch the gas on? My Nan did all of these things.

What we need to address, is WHY care homes are so ridiculously expensive. If the Op put her parents into a care home, the bill would be over £12,000 a month. That's so fucking unreasonable, and that's why Op and plenty of other people try to avoid this route at all costs. If the cost was more in tune with the service that was actually being delivered, maybe it wouldn't stick in the craw quite so much!

"My parents have worked hard and paid taxes all their life"

Sadly they have not paid enough. Otherwise we would not be £2 trillion in debt, in a state where the government cannot borrow any more money and in a crisis over old age care.

Your parents can pay, so they should.

I'm shocked you talking about free care at the hospice...you do know what a hospice is... it's where you mostly go to die. The patients I see are mostly in there for a few days and tbh most are in for 24 hours. It's funded by Charity not the government and it's a place that feels like home with amazing support for the family and patient. Often my patients family will be paying for their care home and then the patient is moved to the hospice. You can't compare a short term at most days care situation to a long time care. Yabu.

It’s tough - my mum has openly said she will never go into a care home as she won’t allow the council to take it to pay for fees - her words being I’ve worked all my life so I can leave you something and I’ll die before I let them take it. I clearly want her to use it for fees as she’s more important than anything and I’ve told her that but she’s adamant she’ll off herself rather than go into a care home!

"It is very unfair that if a parent goes into a hospice with cancer then their savings and home are not touched but if they need into a care home for Dementia then the government expects people who have saved and worked hard to pay themselves yet people who haven't are taken care of."

This isn't a fair comparison though. A relative went into a care home with end stage dementia recently and the first four weeks were funded. People in hospices are usually there for weeks not years.

7 year rule only applies to inheritance, not care home fees.
They may look back longer than 7 years for care fees

@Watermelonsuns "... AIBU to try and find a way to protect my parent's property and savings in order its not all gone in care home fees in the last years?..."

YABU.

You aren't really asking whether you should protect your parents' property and savings, you are asking whether you should protect your inheritance.

Publicly funded care homes are not particularly nice places - they don't have sufficient public funding to be nice places.

If you love your parents and want the best for them they need to fund their own fees from property and savings.

Sorry.

And yes, any deliberate deprivation of their assets will be spotted by the local authority and will backfire on you and them...

What is the alternative? That people who can't afford care are left to lie in their own excrement or start fires because they forgot they had something on the stove? To starve because they are not capable of feeding themselves? To be in pain because they cannot administer their own medication?

And how do you reach the conclusion that those with assets have paid higher taxes? If you inherit £325k and you use this to purchase a property, do you suddenly pay a higher rate of tax than those without assets?

If it helps, my father was in a care home and when he'd burned through his savings (annoyed but accepting shaking of fist at the sky), the local authority carried on paying for the exact same care home (which was a perfectly nice care home).

Of course you are right! You can move them in your own home and hire either live-in help or day help. I did it not because I was worried about care home fees - my parents had very little in the way of savings, my dad died relatively young and mum had no assets in the UK (she had a flat in Berlin at some point, but not when she was old). Anyway, mum would have been entitled to a a council-run care home, but the thought of my vulnerable mum being in the power of strangers with me unable to check on her daily and also I was not naive to think strangers on a minimum wage would look after her. We live in a very small flat and therefore could only hire day help. I don't know why more people are not doing it, citing nonsense like 'we don't have room', 'there are only 3 bedrooms, etc. if the carees are not violent. If they are violent, it is a different matter.

The factual answer is that properties can be put into trust to avoid this kind of scenario. And there are estate planners who can set these up.

The moral answer that always troubles me, is there is something deeply wrong with a society that believes the state owes them complementary board, lodging and care in order to facilitate passing wealth to another generation. Put more simply, why shouldn’t your parents use their assets to fund their care into their final years? It’s a strong sense of entitlement, and in my personal view, is partly contributing to the low standards of care in this country.

Particularly when you consider that most of these people acquired such wealth not through skill, hard work or anything else. Predominantly it’s luck and the time value of money. £10k house in the 1960’s worth £0.5m today (south east example).

Easy solution- you let them live with you and you so their 24 hour care which includes meals, bathing, nappy changing, talking to them multiple times during the night etc.

On another note, comparing a cancer sufferer entering a hospice and someone with dementia entering a care homemis an absolutely disgusting comparison. When we enter the hospice which I'm likely to do within the next 6-12 months, we go there to die within probably 2-3 weeks. Most hospices are also run by charities so them not charging is irrelevant.

This ^^ 😂😂

If one parent needs to go into a care home and the other is still alive the house is protected. Financial assets should be separated so for example, Mum enters care home with £100k to spend. When the money is gone the council will looks at options for payment and will contribute alongside any pensions or other benefits Mum receives.

When Dad needs a care home (only about 25% of people do) he will be expected to use his savings and income first and then sell the house and use these funds. In most cases there will be money left over but not all.

Your argument about hospice care is flawed; most people are only inpatient for a very short time before being returned to home care, some of which could be self funded.

It is sad to see the family home being swallowed by care costs but extreme old age and frailty is, unfortunately very expensive. My in-laws spent almost 10 consecutive years in care. The second one was so excellent that the cost was worth it.

The place where my own father was placed was dire. I genuinely wouldn’t have wanted my dog to be there. Unfortunately circumstances were such that we had no choice.

Think of the care home as a last resort and the savings as something they will have to use if needs be. If one of them is still in their house, there's no way it would be sold to pay for care.

Also, there are care at home options in many cases. Moving and downsizing can precipitate earlier decline in some circumstances. Others might feel less pressure moving to downsizing or care. It's a tough call. If they have a lifetime mortgage or equity release, staying put is best in many circumstances.

Personal experience - Mum and Dad lived until their 90s independently but with some help for my mother who was blind. She spent last 6 months in nursing care, 3 on end of life (no charge for 3 months as palliative). Father lived independently in own home. MIL was cajoled by 2 of her children into moving away from her house to be near them. A fairly swift and sad decline after the move. We can't be sure how much the move was a factor but it was an upheaval.

The reality it's the same care home, same staff, same treatment just one is paid through savings and one is paid through government.

With respect not all care homes are the same. It’s like saying Eton is the same as the local comp they are both schools.

If you ever need to find a home you will soon see the difference when you visit.

Distorted,unkind post that isn't representative of OPs post

My parents have changed their hose ownership from joint tenants to tenants in common. This means that they each own 50% of the house whereas if they were joint tenants 100% of the value would be used.

I think moving the whole house into your name isn’t moral. They can’t take their money with them you are protecting your inheritance rather than their money.

Agree....home ownership was beyond most people until recently... my parents scrimped and scraped to buy a home and move out of renting a council home...the end result you have nothing to show or pass on for your efforts...

And the people who donate to them, and work for them care deeply that those final weeks are as comfortable as they can be. I’m sorry to hear that you’ll be needing their support @Whatevershallidowithmylife
My comment is entirely focused on elderly care homes and not in any way aimed at Hospices, for the exact reasons you mention.

I see some tone deaf replies here - the issue for you, as I see it, is that if you are forced to sell a home because the joint ownership arrangement of your parents means it has to be sold, you could end up using 100% of the proceeds (less the £23k or whatever it is) on the first ailing parent and have nothing left over for the second, leaving them homeless or having to be moved into state housing because you’ve been forced to sell.

This seems deeply unfair, especially if both parties have paid into the system whilst working, as well as having been responsible enough to buy their own home and not be a burden on the state during their lifetime. If you do the change of tenancy thing (to TiC) then you are able to safeguard parent 2’s home for the rest of their lifetime.

Unless we are talking about a Georgian estate with 50 acres, it is not about inheritance but about ensuring that an elderly, vulnerable parent who is separated from their life partner through illness or death is not then cruelly deprived of their home. The lack of empathy here is staggering.

@Watermelonsuns the government expects people who have saved and worked hard to pay themselves yet people who haven't are taken care of.
My parents have worked hard and paid taxes all their life, why shouldn't they be taken care of in comparison to those who haven't?

erm, there are a LOT of people who have worked a DAMN site harder than your parents all their lives but were low paid so they have little to show for it. They too have paid taxes ,NI etc. Is it only HARD work when you have savings? own your own home?

People who need help are cared for if they don't have the money to care for themselves. people who can fund, should fund.

That's interesting

Unless you want the poorer elderly to die in the workhouse or in the street, that's how it is. And it's all the more reason for those who can pay to pay.

We look after those who can't look after themselves. It's the true mark of a civilised society.