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?

Several important points:

It is only classed as deprivation of assets if you act in a way to deliberately and knowingly remove funds/assets to avoid these being used to fund care which you know will be needed - in your plan it is clearly not deprivation on two grounds, 1/. you are intending she lives with you, you provide the care and she never goes into a home, at this stage there is no indication she would need to go into a home and you intend to provide care, so you are not deprivating. 2/. nothing is being taken away, her asset will still be there in the form of a share of the home, anything used for adaptations etc, is fair.

The 7 year thing only applies to inheritance tax, they can look into deprivation back as far as they want, but in practice they don't as they need to be able to prove the action was to avoid care costs. If it can be shown as inheritance planning or as in your case planning to look after - no issues.

If she dies need care at a future point, her share of the house will be included in that calculation - depending on which local authority you are in (all have slightly different policies) they can at their discretion disregard (ignor) the value of her share in the house if they feel the care you have given has saved the tax payer that ammount or more, if either you are over 60 at the time she enters care they have to, by law disregard the property.

If they don't disregard, they will value the share of the property and then there are various options going forward, which may, or may not leave you in a position where you are forced to sell to free up the funds (it would be down to a court ultimately to judge that).

I would advocate having a chat with a solicitor to be sure of your liabilities up front - I think go into it with the knowledge that you may have to sell or buy mum out at a later date.

It isn't deprivation of assets as you would be splitting the equity in the house. Therefore you haven't deprived her of anything, she still owns that money that was invested in the house. In regards to home are, if you're in England, equity in a house is not taken into consideration for contributions to care. So any care (without going into a home) takes into account savings and income and ignores the house. If she has less than £23250, then she will be assessed for a weekly contribution towards her care based on her income/expenditure
If she went into a care home, you may need to sell the house/buy her out of the house to release the equity, unlikely to get a deferred payment agreement due to multiple owners
You would get a 12 week property disregard where you would have time to work out whether to buy/out or sell and she would only pay a contribution based on income
I would also suggest getting her to apply for attendance allowance if she hasn't already

Lol, you've got it all planned out haven't you?

What's with the snarkiness? It would be plain dumb if the OP hadn't given consideration to these things. Adequate planning does not equate to fraud.

Only 15% of over 85s live in care homes.

Both my parents made it to 90 and didn’t go into a home (but did have carers), I have two other relatives who are living independently at 94, none of my grandparents went into homes. In fact no one in my extended family.

Yes, it is really sensible to plan for a range of contingencies, but Older people are allowed to make their own plans, such as buying into a relatives home.

She has, how sensible. Presume you haven't then given your snarky comment?

I second the PP who says care involvement from the NHS / LA will be limited if you have taken the mantle of carer, my DF lives with me, at no financial advantage to me, but we didn't want to go down the care home route, at least not yet.

I will say that whilst I wouldn't have it any other way, its a hard job, getting up in the night two or three times, incontinence, showering, lifting after falls etc. it's full on, rewarding, but not for everyone.

I get a district nurse visit once a fortnight.

Do make sure you register with you LA/Drs as her carers and get the odd visit from the care co-ordinator so it is all recorded that you are doing this. Get her to consent to you talking to the Dr on her behalf, get LPA for finance and health.

See what benefits (Carers Allowance, Attendance Allowance) you are entitled to as you go along.

As she becomes frailer, be aware that you probably won't both be able to work full time, especially if night care is needed.

Also as you are doing all this for her, assuming that she never goes into care, you don't want to then still have to sell up to divide the proceeds in the will - If I was in your shoes, looking to provide a great deal, going forward, I would be wanting to see the Will in my favour in regard of the share of the house.

It is really difficult because you cannot predict the type of care she will need, or for how long. If she just needs a bit of help with bathing/dressing until the end of her life, what you are doing will be fine.

But if she does develop any type of illness which means you cannot cope and she needs to move to a care home, it is more complicated.

I don't see it would be deprivation of assets, in that she still has the assets - her 40% (or whatever percentage) of your joint home. It is fine to fit it out with mobility aids like walkin-in shower or a stairlift in order to meet her needs. To release her assets in the event of her needing a care home, you would have to be prepared to sell the house.

At 80 my mother was living independently in her own home. She is now 88 and has been in a dementia care home for several years. She is immobile, incontinent and not able to feed herself. You never know what the future holds.

Do not underestimate the care you may need to give your mum for many many years.
Dh and I considered Dm and DF moving In With us but unfortunately DF passed away quite suddenly before we looked into it thoroughly.
DM went into a care home as she had dementia and I KNEW that I in time would resent having her living with us. She also by this time hated me because I had a husband and she didn’t.
Im so fortunate that the care home was amazing and looked after mum far better than I could have done.
Think long and hard about managing once your mum becomes incontinent and confused. It’s likely to happen.

Yes, it's obviously lovely having an anxiety disorder so you end up unable to help planning out everything that could go wrong, with 3 ageing parents across the 2 of you, with siblings who couldn't care less about helping out with any care, even in the planning of it. There's easier ways to make a few quid if that's what I was after!

Thankyou so much to the PPs defending me and giving really helpful advice, it sounds like it's doable but there's a lot to think through, I'll get in touch with Age UK.

Think long and hard about managing once your mum becomes incontinent and confused. It’s likely to happen.

Think long and hard about managing IF your mum becomes incontinent and confused. It COULD happen.

OK, I get the point: it is important to have thought about the most difficult scenarios that could occur, and dementia is right up there. But as the OP’s Mum is currently OK and independent this is not a fire gone conclusion. So not deprivation of assets as they have no diagnosed condition that dictates a care home.

OP: Whilst there are very useful sources of support, Attendance Allowance, Adult Services OT assessment etc, I would not apply for them before your Mum is happily installed in a house with you. In case you do need to argue that you had no indication of inability to manage etc.

Age UK are really helpful on all these matters.

Check out with them what would happen if in the end your Mum did need to go into a home. It may not be that the LA can tumble you out of your shared home. And there are models where the LA put a charge on the house/ your mother’s share of the house, rather than insist on immediate sale.

The LA paid for adaptations to my parents’ house so that they could stay at home, and put a charge on the house which was paid she. It was sold. It was a charge that depreciated over 10 years.

Beteer to have a plan than make one in a panic when a crisis hits.

OP your plan sounds excellent.

It’s only deprivation of assets if the person should reasonably expect to have to pay for care, and has obviously given away money to avoid paying. Your mum is in good health and has no expectation of ever needing care. So I don’t think it would be classed as deprivation of assets.

Think very carefully about making this decision. I see this happen many times over and families very often realise they have taken on more than they can handle when a significant deterioration happens I.e immobile, not safe to be alone, doubly incontinent. This can affect all relationships hugely too. What may be a better option would be an assisted living scheme/housing with care. Some level of independence by having own flat but living in a community with 24 hr care on site. This way you get to enjoy spending quality time without straining relationships and combining finances.

Provided you did it right with a legal agreement in place covering as many potential issues and your Mum owned a % of the property it is not deprivation of assets as she still has the assets.

If, your Mum did require care at home it would be exactly the same as her living in her own home because it is her own home.

The fact you would sell if necessary to pay for a care home also means it’s not deprivation of assets.

The deed of trust/legal agreement needs to cover things like divorce and also you & DHs health e.g. sorry if one of you dies, seriously disabled etc. Really go through all the life events that could happen and agree what will happen.

Really think through that this is potentially a 15-20 year commitment.

What an unpleasant response, uncalled for.

You could ring the adult social care financial assessment team and ask them the questions. I work on one of these teams and I would be happy to give someone guidance for our specific council. So you do inadvertently find yourself in a difficult position further down the line.

As well as the deprivation-of-assets issue, there are some other scenarios you need to think about carefully.

For example, what would happen if you were to die before your DM? Would your DH be happy to live and care for his DMIL? What would happen to your DM if (understandably) didn't feel up for this, or if he met someone else and wanted to start a new life with them?

Another point to consider is what would happen if you and your DH were to split up during your DM's lifetime. Would you be able to buy your DH out of his share of the house and remain in it with your DM? Or would the entire property have to be sold? Bear in mind that any changes you make to it to make it suitable for you, your DH and your DM to all share may affect its saleability.

Finally, what would happen if you and your DH became ill or incapacitated during your DM's lifetime? One person caring for two is massively different to two people caring for one.

I know all of these scenarios may feel very unlikely, but they absolutely can and do happen. It's important to have a robust plan in place in case any of them come to pass.

As someone who grew up in this situation - grandparent living with us (their house sold to pay for an annexe) I'd be very very wary of what you're letting yourself in for and I would never do this to my own family having lived through it once.

Have you been a carer before? It's one thing to make an extra portion at mealtimes and do more laundry but quite another when it gets more involved. How are you going to manage work (even WFH) alongside hospital/medical appointments, visits from nurse, chiropodist, elderly friends who expect a cup of tea on arrival. Most of which you get no say over timing-wise. How are you going to deal with incontinence, being up in the night, someone who can't be left on their own? We had years of only being able to holiday for short periods with a couple of hours of home in case we needed to get back for an emergency. How are you going to have a holiday, take a break, maintain hobbies, enjoy an evening with friends round etc?

We were about to hit the point when care needs were more than could be met at home when grandparent died. But it was going to mean a lot of upheaval to work out paying for it as ownership of house wasn't clear cut (grandparent had paid for building of annexe but it was on land owned by parents). What happens when more care is needed or a care home?

It's all very well saying you could sell the house to be able to extract her portion for care/legacy etc. But that's a lot of upheaval and may not be fast - we found it very difficult to sell the house/annexe as there was a very limited market. It took well over a year. Depending on your share of the equity would you be able to stay in the area?

It’s a great idea. Provided you’re confident re the legal side of it, then I think you seem in a position to make the last few years of your mums life really nice.

As per pp, most people stay at home for end of life. Nursing homes and care homes aren’t the norm. Of course, your dm could end up needing specialist nursing care or dementia care that could only be provided in a residential setting. That’s a risk you would be taking, but worst case scenario is a stressful year in which you have to sell and move.

I would try to make sure that your dm has some income or savings that could pay for support in your home, should she need it.