Would this be deprivation of assets?

[Wambamcam]

My DM has just turned 80 and, besides the inevitable slow down, is in good health but lost my DF a year ago and has no support nearby except us. As she worries about managing on her own, just basic things like if she had a fall etc, we're all thinking about her moving in with DH and me in the next couple of years (everyone involved is happy with the idea, it's not a debate about whether she should move in with us). We both have careers that are likely to keep us working from home as well which should make this easier.

However, to afford a big enough place to live all together and do adaptations (ramp, stair lift, usable shower etc) we'd have to use the money from selling her current property. We'd be happy to have her at home even when she needs care, she really doesn't want to ever go into a care home, the only thing I can think of that would need a care home move are if she got aggressive with dementia and there's no history of that in the family so I'm crossing my fingers that won't be an issue. If her health ever went extremely bad though she might need home care.

If we did this the idea would be actually to save any care costs, we're genuinely happy to look after cooking, personal needs etc so the hope would be there would never be care costs anyway, it's not to 'steal' the money from care costs. BUT if there was care in future we couldn't cope with, mainly if there were personal care issues we weren't physically strong enough for, would moving in together be classed as deprivation of assets? How does it work?

Assuming you buy jointly with her, she hasn't given away anything. If she gives you money to buy it is deprivation of assets as there no other reason to do that other than to avoid care home fees or at least none that anyone recognising they might need the money in future would make.

You mean she would hand over the proceeds of her house sale to you and you would do adaptations to your home? Yes, thats deprivation of assets.

A bigger question to ask might be - how will we fund care for her if necessary if we get away with taking and spending all the money now? If you get away with it and get free state funded care will you be happy to put your mum in any old care home 50 miles away with a "requires improvement" report and stinking of piss and cabbage because thats the old state funded place that can be found?

"only" state funded place

We'd be buying jointly with her, so she'd own something like 40% of property, but then what would happen if she needed care, especially home care? I'd expect to sell up and split the money if she moved into a care home but what if she needed care at home, would they think we were trying to tie up her money by keeping it with ours in the house? As in if she lived alone they could suggest to her to downsize to a retirement flat?

Sorry my reply seems a bit harsh

A better solution might be for your mum to sell her home and move in with you. You use SOME of the proceeds of the house sale to make adaptations and then invest the rest so that you have money to pay for care if she needs it.

First you were talking about her moving in with you - now you're talking about buying a property jointly with her. Which is it? Because it definately now sounds as though you're trying to avoid care costs. Keep your mums money for her to have good quality care - don't spend it on yourselves :(

We're basically trying to avoid the any old care home outcome - mum's house is worth enough that it would help towards a nice house for all of us (she'd still own her share) but it wouldn't go far at all in paying 100's monthly for a care home so she'd run out of money and be left in a stinking one anyway. We're hoping buying together will cut down joint costs and we can do all care up to a certain level so avoid anyone paying for it, if that makes sense.

Go onto the Age UK website or use their phone service. They have lots of details.

What you suggested above would still be considered deprivation of assets, yes.

I think you might be a bit naive about what provision of care will involve as your mum approaches death, and, possibly, for years preceeding that. So I think the scenario @Chowtime describes is unfortunately quite likely if you proceed.
I'm not sure who to recommend you speak to. You need a mixture of good legal and healthcare advice to better understand what the future will bring. In Australia you might be able to start by contacting My Aged Care, no idea what equivalent is in UK.

Oh cross post, that looks like a good place to start.

Sorry, I worded it badly, I was calling it moving in with us because we don't currently live together but we'd both sell our houses and buy jointly. We wouldn't be looking to spend it on ourselves but we'd have to use it for her 'portion' of the house as we can only afford a small place for ourselves.

Eg, (numbers are obviously made up to avoid giving real details),

Our house is a very small 2-bed worth £100 (with mortgage, not much equity), mum's house is about the same size but worth £75 because of the different area. We could buy a bigger place to fit all of us for £160 (we'd pay mortgage) and use the leftover to pay for adaptations but then of course that would leave no cash for DM but we could house and care for her.

You know you can buy a care annuity package?
For example an £140,000 annuity together with my mothers pension covers her care fees of £48,000 a year.

Legally deprivation of assets is partly a guessing game on how long someone will live. If she sells, gifts the money to you and she lives at least 7 years before dying/needing support from social services then you on paper don't have an issue, if it's 6 months down the line then you could have major issues. As long as you meet care requirements privately there is no direct risk, inheritance tax may not be a factor, depending on wealth

You do have to be careful, but if she was living in her current home and needed home care then the council would start funding her when she got down to £23k savings. There would be no expectation of her selling up to pay for her home care.

My understanding is that if she sells up and puts all her house money into a property with you then nothing has changed - the house equity still exists as an asset that is hers - there’s been no deprivation of assets. So home care would be funded on the same basis. If she sells up and buys with you and has £ left over that she saves, then those savings would also be available for funded home care. As long as the assets remain in her name and available for foreseeable care needs there’s been no deprivation.

As you have rightly identified, your watch out would be if she needed residential care, when it would be expected that she sells her bit of your joint home.

Thanks both, I'll give them a call and ask for advice.

I'm absolutely not trying to take mum's money, it's more than I'm aware her money won't pay for much care so I'd rather she lives with us and we can do a lot of care for free rather than buying through £1000+ a month just because she, for example, needs someone to take her to the toilet and help her eat dinner (in future, she doesn't now).

Needing a residential care placement and needing a nursing placement are 2 entirely different things.
If it was only residential care you needed then you could probably manage at home if you are committed enough. When they cross that line into needing 24 hour nursing care it would be near impossible to manage this at home .
Personally I think you are risking your home as you may be forced to sell up to cover the fees.
I would do as the previous poster said and use a lump sum for adaptions then keep a nest egg for any care she may need.

There is a lot of unfounded assumption on this thread.

Your Mum currently has no conditions (except being old, but the majority of older people never go into care homes) that indicate care would be required, and she is not ‘giving away’ her assets, but using them for herself.

Read the AgeUK info.
https://www.ageuk.org.uk/globalassets/age-uk/documents/factsheets/large-print-factsheets/fs40-lp-deprivation-of-assets-in-social-care.pdf

Short version: https://www.ageuk.org.uk/information-advice/care/paying-for-care/paying-for-a-care-home/deprivation-of-assets/

She is allowed to pay for housing that suits her.

Would all her capital and savings be used? I would say keep a chunk for care and support as may be required for home care visits. Respite when you go on holiday etc. Or even out for the day, if she needs more help in the future.

Thanks, I'd fully expect to sell up and split if she needed to go into nursing care, that would be the worst case scenario as DM doesn't want to go into any sort of facility so things would be irretrievably bad by that point. It's the bit before I'm trying to avoid where DM may need someone on hand 24/7 (judging from how grandparents and DF health went) but not nursing care, so if we didn't live together she'd end up in residential care unnecessarily.

Do you have siblings?

Worst case scenario you and DH split, what happens? Does DH have elderly relatives, what happens with them?

7 years is IHT and nothing to do with social care.

OP, please read the AgeUK material.

Oh yeah, don't forget to take siblings and divorce into account lol.

It's a minefield isn't it.

If your DM ended up needing someone on hand 24/7, does that mean you and DH would never go out together, go on holiday etc?

I would think very, very carefully about this.

Do you have any siblings or others who would expect to be involved in caring for or inheriting from your DM? If so, what is their view?

What would happen if either you or your DH became disabled, ill or died? If you died, would your DH promise to care for your mum? Someone in my family proposed this and I flagged all my concerns which very sadly and unexpectedly happened. The elderly relative is still in her own home in her mid-90s.

Local authorities seem to make up the rules as they go along about how much they are willing to contribute towards care for people living in their own home - we are currently spending far too much time correlating care charges against the LA contribution, even though the relative has now spent nearly all her considerable lifetime savings.

Finally, one of the first questions anyone connected with health or care will ask is who does the person live with? It is hard enough getting care for an elderly, disabled and ill person in their 90s who lives alone and is housebound (can’t even access the whole house), so don’t expect too much care if she lives with you.

Having said all that, I do know two families that cared for their parent for decades. They provided such loving and diligent care that the parents lived respectively to their mid-90s and to over 100. One brought no money when they moved in and the other brought about 20k as a contribution for very expensive adaptations. As you can tell there clearly was no deprivation of assets in those cases.

I have a brother who isn't in a position to live with DM and vehemently doesn't ever want to so is very happy to go with whatever DM is happy with, obviously he'd expect us to buy him out if DM died but he's more worried about having to look after her so isn't going to object (he's more worried about having to be responsible than missing out on money!). DHs parents are younger so we've got more time and they dislike us and are much happier with the idea of a residential home. They have no money at all though and one of their other children is loaded but miserly, unlike us, so that's a nightmare waiting to happen no matter what we do regarding my DM. If DH and I split I'd probably have to live with DM anyway financially unless DH and I had paid off a lot more of the mortgage.