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

If i was in the situation, then i would have them move in with me and look after them and use their house sale to pay for a cleaner, self care for them, a companion, any upgrades needed to comfortably house them.

I've worked in care homes as a teenager (lovely private ones which cost a bomb) and the staff are lovely, the surroundings are.....but they are still kept for hours in their room, have everything done for them (so they very quickly loose their faculties) and....i just wouldn't want to put them in one (dementia/alzheimers is a different story). I'm not and would never judge anyone for making a different choice.

My DP and i work from home and we have the space and the desire to have my mum stay here if she needs it....i appreciate we are in a unique situation in this regards and my DP thinks of my mum as his own (he isn't close to his own), so he would be entirely supportive.

But i wouldn't do as you are thinking.

My parents are in the best retirement-escalating-to-care complex we could find for them, in my home country.

The finances of the arrangement are rapidly spending down our inheritances but in return we get the privilege of knowing that they are in lovely, secure surroundings and well looked after. DSis is nearby with her family, so the logistical burden falls more to her which I worry about but she also has the gift of time with our aging parents.

The feeling of relief is indescribable, and a great contrast to the feelings of many forced to put elderly relatives in council run care homes.

Of course you might be able to offer your parents something similar by combining households. Then your question becomes moot.

Looks like the only loopholes are:

1. Getting CHC funding (which authorities will do everything to wriggle out of)
2. Gift your assets very early
3. Don't gather assets in the first place, spend it all well in advance

If your parents go into a state-funded care home, the local authority will do a financial assessment and will go back many years looking for what they would consider deprivation of assets.

You could agree to provide all care for them so they don't need to go into a home. I think that's probably the only way to ensure that your parents assets aren't used to pay for their care.

So just to be clear, they have the means to fund their care if needed, but you want to keep it for yourself and are looking for a way to get taxpayers to fund their care instead? YABU. Care for them yourself.

If your parents go into a state-funded care home, the local authority will do a financial assessment and will go back many years looking for what they would consider deprivation of assets.

There aren’t many state-funded homes around now - most are owned privately which is why more self-funders than ever are living with people who haven’t paid for themselves.

Your parents need specialist (tax?) advice, OP. If there was an obvious/widely known loop hole, everyone would use it.

Yeah, definitely do that, the rest of society will be thrilled to pay for their care so you can enjoy your inheritance!!

Jesus.

Ensuring their house comes to you simply means that you are personally enriched to the detriment of tax payers who will foot the bill for your parents care and in addition you owning a second home disadvantages society as it means that there is a shortage in housing that you will be exploiting no doubt by charging unaffordable rents.

The best way to avoid care home fees so you can protect their assets (cough, cough, your inheritance), is for you to care for your parents yourself.

HTH.

As the OP hasn’t come back, I suspect this may just be one of the very many goading posts.
OP, if you are for real, of course you (your parents) won’t be able to get away with this. Local authorities make checks.

If you are protecting inheritance that won’t go down well here. As far as I understand it anything transferred to your name needs doing so 7 years prior to being needed or than can come after it, 7 years is a long time when you are elderly/fragile. You could care for them yourself in your home. And frankly, the care homes funded by the state for those with no money are the pits unfortunately (not the staffs fault- just underfunded by the gov)

I knew someone who's parents sold their house so the daughter could use the money to build an extension so her parents could live with her. Eventually they needed to go to a care home. They had to pay the money back that they had used for the extension as it was still classed as an asset of the parents.

what you are suggesting is immoral. If you want to protect your inheritance either care for your parents or take out insurance-its expensive but would protect something for you.

Brighter than a thousand suns.

The only way is for them to receive care at home. They will spend their savings then the value of their home is disregarded as they need it to live in, especially as it is co-owned, so can get home care visits free oand / or supplemented by pensions. However it's often not enough so extra visits may need to be paid for.

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?

Why do you need to 'protect' your parents property if they'll be in residential care? They won't need their property again so may as well use the proceeds to ensure a decent standard of care and comfort in their final years.

If you mean you want to protect 'your' inheritance, well, it ain't yours until the fat lady sings and (one assumes) you'd prefer your parents to spend what they worked to earn all their lives on their own care and wellbeing?

As others have said, the “7 year rule” applies only to inheritance tax. For deprivation of assets, the local authority can go back indefinitely to find any transactions which they can categorise as intentional deprivation. Adults signing away their home to their adult children is pretty much always found to fall into this category - unless there are extenuating circumstances such as an adult child with a profound disability at home who they are trying to ensure has security of tenure - because in short there’s pretty much no other reason for anyone to want to give up ownership of their property but to try to avoid some kind of taxation, liability, or care fees.

The 7 year thing is inheritance tax, there is no time limit fir deprivation of assets.

Some of it depends on how long you think it might be until they need care. My Mum took out an equity release loan 7 years ago for 50% of the value of her flat. Unfortunately she is now in a care home, so we will have to wait and see if they consider it deprivation of assets when the money for the 50% left runs out.

But she is in a lovely care home, where she is happy, which is much more important than us having inheritance.

The care system is broken and on its knees and situations like this don’t help.

If you parents will need care and have the money to pay for it that’s what should happen.

This is what their savings are for! Help them find safe, reliable care and use their savings to pay for it. My parents had over a million saved. Almost all of it has gone in fees for my mother, who has dementia, to live in a gorgeous, loving, small care home. She's doing so well there, the money will probably run out before she does, but for now, it is lovely to see her so happy and thriving there.

IMHO, care for the elderly should be fully funded from general taxation, so nobody has to pay, BUT inheritance tax should be much, much higher (higher rates and lower thresholds and close the 'trust' loopholes), so that it is fairer to people who don't get any inheritance.
Re-distribution of wealth across society is a fundamental value of mine.

I also know someone where the dad was the only named owner of the house so in his will left the house to his only child. The mum still lived in the house until she had to go to a care home but didn't have to pay as the daughter owned the house now. Maybe that's the loop hole.

Not RTFT, so don’t know if PPs have mentioned the issue of, if you were to put your parents property in your name, and if you’re married and were to divorce, your parents property would be part of the financial settlement.