To liquidate everything when I get to 60 and live in luxury hotels until the cash runs out

[Everythingisnumbersnow]

Just thinking who wants to be old anyway plus I really resent the idea of all my money going to dodgy offshore small business owners (aka care home owners).

We'll see how it goes but I'm pretty excited about this.

@AquaPeer You clearly have a chip
on your shoulder about self-funders. As I inferred earlier, the LA won’t investigate and claim deprivation of assets unless they have a reason to do so. Let me put it more simply, a healthy 45 year old will be fine to give away as much as they want with no come back. The LA have to prove intent.

I have to agree, having visited my mil doing exactly this in a specialist care home. It was a lovely home, but she was dreadfully unhappy and forever trying to escape. They had key codes on all the lifts, all doors leaving each floor were locked. Broke my heart watching her, but there was no way we could have offered her the care she needed.

It’s all very well liquidating everything, but unless you have serious amounts of money, how will you live? I watched an episode of Escape to the Country with a couple who had done just this, travelled round Europe housesitting (a friend of mine does that when she comes over from Europe). I suppose that’s one way of doing Europe!

@westisbest1982 It’s really weird that you are talking to me as though I don’t understand your posts, which are very simplistic therefore unchallenging for the majority.

to boot- I am not conversing with you. All you’ve done is post a link you didn’t read properly

YANBU

It's your money, your life
It's not a life that would suit everyone (hence a lot of messages here) but if t suits you, try it
Maybe not liquidate any property to start, rent it out instead and after a year reconsider?

I turn 60 this year, so the prospect of there (only) being another 20 -25 years of living ahead of me is a very real one. My particular role model in this regard is Martha Gellhorn, the author and war correspondent who, at 88 and blind, decided that since she couldn't read, couldn't write, couldn't travel, her life had lost its pleasure and purpose and took an efficient overdose at home in her Paris flat. This despite being much visited and feted even in her old age (but a Pulitzer prize winning career will help with that!)

Life to your years, not years to your life, thank you very much. I have planned for a comfortable and affluent old age, so I aim to live well until my health no longer supports my goals. Then I'll go.

Care homes are a horrendous notion, I can't get my head round the fact that they are run as businesses,. i.e. take, take, take and give you as little as possible in return. I don't know about other countries, but here they do not even have a staff doctor. About 30 years ago I was a student in London and rented privately from a lady, who owned a newsagent's and a few care homes up North. She was thinking of them in 'business terms', saying it was a great 'business', citing examples like 'old people can't even manage a whole sandwich for lunch, costs are minimal'. But one thing I shall never forget, she told me one day she was 'exhausted because she has held an old lady's hand all night because the old dear was on the way 'out'. When I asked why she did not phone the ambulance, she said 'she was on the way out anyway'. I was young and stupid but even then I realised it was not normal for a barely literate lady to decide whether to call the ambulance.
I think that care homes run as a business are more immoral than health service run as a business. These people are beyond vulnerable and they are treated as a means of making money, not dignified human beings.

So I totally agree with you - do whatever, but don't give a penny to a care home in your old age. Surely you don't expect minimum wage staff to give a shit about the people they are supposed to look after?

You do know that 'the state' means other, younger, poorer tax payers who haven't the money to spend 20 years living in luxury hotels right? I dare say these people would object to funding yourself on a moral basis, just as you object to funding care home companies.

You can spend your money on whatever you like but don't expect others to pick up for the tab for your old age care. If you have issues with care homes, pay for someone to care for you at home privately or arrange to go to Switzerland. Take some responsibility for yourself. There should be no care available from the state, and may well not be in the future, for people who deliberately deprive themselves of assets.

Just derailing to say thank you @bignosebignose for introducing me to a new author. Reminded me of Daphne du Maurice who I love.
As you were...

No of course not, in this case the wife has care needs, the husband currently is ok. He cares for her, and they do receive a little special treatment because they are known to the crew. All their family live around Southampton so they meet at a local pub for the afternoon when the ship docks.

One day this won’t be sustainable but for now it is and I think it’s great way to spend retirement!

This is sadly what some of us face and through no real fault of our own. I am an only child, no children (not by choice) and no wider family (nieces, nephews etc). It's a terrifying situation to be in.

Fabulous story! Love Somerset Maugham! Sorry, OP, didn’t mean to derail!

I understand what you are saying and the woman's comments sound very distasteful. However, it would be totally inappropriate to call an ambulance for an elderly person who was expected to die. Paramedics and doctors can't stop people dying, death is a normal part of life. It sounds as if this woman did care about her resident, enough to be up with her the whole night holding her hand.
I'm not sure if you have ever spent time in care homes because you are wrong to suppose that none of the staff 'give a shit'. That's a horrible assumption to make and incorrect.

Actually most people don’t end up in care homes, they die before they get there.

Disgusting man he was, SM, but what a writer! Thank you so much for the reminder! Have not read him in ages!

I’m confused by your post. It’s completely normal and expected that the vast majority of care homes do not need an onsite doctor- what on earth would you need that level of medical expertise for onsite!?

it’s also perfectly normal for elderly people at the end of their life to die peacefully at home without an ambulance being called (to do what?).
Dying peacefully at home is a common desire, and many hospices offer staff visits to facilitate exactly this. This would be a very common way for care home residents to pass away.

Yes - I shouldn't have said most people.

The "element of healthcare" is a doctor and nurse for whom a person has to pay. You'd need a significant travel insurance policy to pay for this and any additional costs (which, if you needed more than perfunctory treatment and perhaps hospital care, transfers, etc might be mind-blowingly expensive).

If your budget is more Margaret Thatcher than Alan Partridge, go for it!

It should be shocking/unlawful/unsafe not to have a staff doctor in a facility where so many people are infirm. Yes, I know they die, but presumably some of them might survive beyond 3 months despite the best efforts of personnel?

So many posts keep coming back to the fact that 60-80 if you are lucky will be ok. After that and possibly before it you will most likely not be able to pack up and move around anymore physically. Inflation and spending will dwindle all assets. It is your life so no need for permission but elderly and poor does not sound fun. You can have no idea what the care or social provision will be in a few decades time. Guessing choices will be more limited as that is certainly the trajectory.

There is no need for a staff doctor onsite in a care home and it isn’t unlawful or unsafe not to have one- to the contrary, it’s standard not to.

Where did you get the information that there was a law that a doctor had to be onsite?

they’re care homes, not hospitals. They are set up to care for the infirm. That doesn’t mean they need a doctor available 24/7, it means they (may) need carer support and specialist equipment.

I don’t know what the surviving 3 months things means, sorry. I feel like you are thinking of some other facility rather than care homes.

There really are not.

No care homes have a permanent, resident doctor! It's not shocking or unlawful or unsafe. These people are usually very elderly and frail. They are visited by doctors as necessary. Many residents survive beyond 3 months. You sound extremely uninformed on this topic.

Then you can always go to Dignitas. If you want to live like this, that's fine, just don't expect others to pick up the bill for you later.

That’s because you don’t know the details about the deprivation of assets guidelines and I do.

Maybe try chipping away at that rock on your shoulder.