Council run care homes vs private

[Indiaplain]

We are currently making decisions about my DHs elderly relative. Mil is adamant a council run care home will be fine, and she is pushing for continuing healthcare to fund it. I very much doubt the elderly relative will pass the assessment for continuing healthcare so our next option is the deferred payment scheme using the elderly relatives home.

My view is why not sell the home (worth a fair bit) and just fund the lovely private care home. Or top up the deferred payment scheme to fund the nice care home (does anyone know if that's possible?)

Mil wants to pursue council care home as it will be cheaper or poss free if Contining healthcare is offered. Mil is lovely but I actually feel like she is worried about her inheritance if we go for the nice private care home.

I dont have experience of care homes, but just have a feeling council run ones will be grim. Is this view stereotyping and actually they are usually fine? Any advice appreciated!

You need to go and see the care home in question yourself. Care home.co.uk has lots of good helpful information on picking a care home and you can find so many reviews on there too. When visiting a care home, try to tour it properly. Inspect all areas, non communal and communal at the same time as well. This is a list of things to discuss

Food
Amenities and facilities
Policies
Activities

See if you can find a inspection report.

@NewspaperTaxis

Agree with most of the comments here, in particular the 'first coat no knickers' ones where. you're paying for the chandeliers. That said, in Surrey I never found any Council-run care homes of the kind described (they'd abolished them all years ago, though I understand in the last few years they've set up around five or six, probably as they realised they were paying big private care homes a fortune to house council-funded residents there and were getting ripped off...)

Often you only find out what it's like after you've signed up and handed your parent over. Care home managers I've found are just lobbying for custom and you will never, ever meet the proprietor (talking about private ones, the only ones I ever got to experience.)

Old thing about getting LPA in Health and Welfare before you let your parent within sniffing distance of a care home.

As for it being two years in a care home generally, yes, well you might want to ask how that is exactly. It does seem a bit Logan's Run and I have my own theories about why I had to visit Mum daily for years to give her drink while the care homes refused to do so, after she'd been in one for, erm, roughly two years.

She lasted another four or so, because of our visits.

I work part time in a care home. Everyone know the family who own it, mum dad and kids, he is there several days a week but mum and teenagers also do shifts.

The manager certainly isn't lobbying for custom, has declined to take prospective residents that they don't feel are a good fit for the home.

All of us who work there say it is where we'd want to go if we needed a care home.

If the relative owns their own home and there is no spouse or dependent relative living in the property she will not be entitled to free care. The LA will carry out a financial assessment and the house will need to be sold or held in trust, with the LA getting its money when it is sold.

I agree that price is not necessarily and indication of qualify. The LA will give you a list of local homes or you can find a home yourself.Every home that I know of has both free and fee paying residents. The care is the same.

The only element that she may be entitled to, is for medical condition and this makes up a small part of the fees. The majority goes towards what are known as hotel costs. Food, accommodation, Heating, laundry Staff wages, insurance, etc.

In you case I would leave the decision making to MiL. She will get a rude awakening I fear.

With regard to which is best, selling the home or putting it in trust. If you rent out her home the rent may not cover the fees. You will have administrative charges and fees related to that as well deferred fee charge. There are also fees to pay if the house is put intoTrust.

The unknown factors are , how long the relative will live and how will house price grow or diminish over the time she is I. Care.

As others have said...there are no council homes left where I live, they've all long closed. They were good as staff were trained and paid properly so ended up not financially viable once the market was opened up. Councils never ran nursing homes which were always private, as the alternative were long stay hospital wzrds also long gone. Research who owns the homes....and remember big companies are making money for share holders. 'Which' and Age UK have good info on what to look for in a care home. If you pick a home that is expensive and then run out of money the local authority aren't obliged to keep them there and may move to a cheaper home.

You've had good advice already so the only thing I will add is that there is work involved with an empty home. Someone has to check it once a week for the insurance to be valid and depending on the size of the garden, once a week isn't enough to keep up with the weeds. If I could magically make mum's turn into the cash I would because of the time it would save me.

This is from February so I suspect OP no longer needs the advice!

My friend is council funded in a private home. It's not the poshest place. According to the CQC it requires improvement. But it's ideal for him and I really can't fault the care he receives there. When I was a student nurse I did a placement in a 'posh' home and I was not impressed. The care was the bare minimum and residents had to get up when they were told to. Despite them wanting a lie in. Appearances are deceptive.

I think it's really individual. I had 3 main criteria for my mum's home -

1. Close to me/station so easy to visit for max people
2. Nice outlook/view- my mum loves nature. She is quite calm now though very impaired, and will stare out/talk about the view endlessly.
3. A manager who got what we were looking for and will care for my mother well but without wanting to send her back to hospital unless there is no alternative (broken hip, basically).
4. Quiet place that won't force her to socialise - she might make friends but mum is intensely private so it's unlikely.

Think about the person first and choose on that basis.