Transferring Funding for Care Home across Counties?

[Chenecinquantecinq]

Hi just wondering if anyone has experience of this please? Elderly relative (only medical issue is frailty) only asset is home (which I assume will be taken into account in financial assessment). Would be no point in him going into a home in his area he would ideally move nearer to me in a totally different part of England. How difficult is this to arrange please? I assume Council's only fund the cheapest care homes in the area, would it be his Local Authority or the one near me? Any experience of this would be appreciated. Should I look round care homes or is there little point as the Council would dictate which one he goes into? Thanks

Hi @Chenecinquantecinq I had this with my MIL when my FIL (and her carer) passed suddenly. She had advanced dementia. The process in her county was that I had to phone her local authority for advice. As she had no capacity They agreed she would be better served transferring to our local authority so she could have more visitors etc. They then liaised with our local authority to discuss the transfer. Her assets meant she was self funding so we looked at facilities that best suited her needs. Sadly, she took a turn for the worse before a transfer could take place.

One thing I would point out is that you cannot assume that your relative will agree to your plan however well meant it is, so you need to be certain you are both on the same page. We devised a spreadsheet based on the rental of the property to part-fund the cost of care which assumed a longevity of another 10+ years for MIL (she was in her late 80’s but from a long line of people who reached a grand old age) which helped us understand what options were realistically in budget fit that length of time. In our case, the focus on dementia and safety specialism was the priority rather than chandeliers and interior design.

It’s a long road tricky to navigate ahead of you, so sending strength to you.

Owning a home (assuming no spouse/partner still living in it) will put him well over the council funding threshold for a few years. As a self funder you can pick any area, then liaise with the local LA once funds are running low. Depending how long that's likely to take, it's worth asking homes about LA funding policies when choosing one.

Are you hoping to have a deferred payment agreement with the local authority whereby they put a charge on your relative’s house to fund the care home fees?
If your relative has any savings you would need to use this to pay care home fees in the area that you want them to be. Then when they get close to the threshold for savings, contact the local authority where the care home is and ask for a Care Act assessment and Deferred Payment Agreement. Once an older person moves permanently into a care home in a different area, that becomes their ordinary residence even if they own a property elsewhere. Therefore you approach the LA where the care home is. You can still get a DPA on a property elsewhere.

Thank you. Yes the only funding will be his home (no savings etc) so there’d have to be a loan against his house. Unfortunately it’s not registered (we are starting this process but the Land Registry timescale is currently 15 months). So it wouldn’t be possible to put a charge against an unregistered property? Or perhaps it is possible to I’m not sure. Then once/if the house value is used up then he’d be looking at Council funding. Without a significant spend on the house it would be impossible to rent out as the EPC is too low etc. so we don’t have this option. I assume the Local Authority putting a charge on the house is more efficient financially than equity release but I might be wrong?

You are correct, a charge cannot be put on a property until it’s registered. If you are trying to get the property registered with Land Registry, the LA may agree to fund gross once you have signed a declaration that you will pay them back from the proceeds of the house. I don’t know if all LA will do this but I have got agreement occasionally for the LA I worked for to fund gross for a while.
I cannot give financial advice but it would be worth speaking to a specialist service who can advise about paying care home fees. In the area I worked in it was called Carewise and they may cover other areas.

@AdmittowearingCrocs that’s really useful thank you!