Just out of interest, what are your elderly parents care home fees?

[Tolkienista]

My mother moved into a care home in August 2024, the cost per week (as a self funder £945) Last April the fees went up to (£1,010) per week. In the last week the fees have gone up to (£1,050) per week. It's an excellent place, her room is lovely and well furnished, great carers too who look after her so well.
It genuinely feels like our second home.

In all honesty , never thought we'd make it to this latest fees increase. She's been on end of life care for the last 6/7 weeks , but has remained stable, although she's really frail and weak.
And so we've entered this new round of fees.

I think we're very lucky that her fees are in this region close to £1,000 per week .
How are others faring?

I’m not sure how much my DF care home fees are as he is CHC funded but I know my mother parted with 60k in the first five months before his assessment because he required a 24 hr 1:1 and that was charged @4k per week!
Then double for Sundays and Bank holidays.
The staff weren’t specialist or even that well paid so somebody is making a mint.
This is in the South West.
Government needs to look at these fees just like vet charges.

My DM was in a nursing home in a fairly nice/posh part of Birmingham, until December last year when she died. The fees were just shy of £8k per month and a 10% increase per year was the norm. It was for nursing care and there were registered nurses on duty 24/7. I can’t grumble about the care she received, the staff were kind and caring and genuinely in tears when she died as she had been a bit of a favourite - she had incurable cancer, so was mentally pretty much on the ball until the last few months.

But the place needed more staff - the carers were run ragged and residents had to wait their turn to be seen after pressing their buzzers, sometimes for quite long periods depending on how busy it was. But more staff costs more
money which pushes the fees up. It does seem incredibly expensive per month, but when you break down the costs of medical care on site, three good meals a day, activities, housekeeping etc it works out less than a basic hotel. And DM being safe, cared for and having a peaceful, calm death is worth more than anything to me. But I agree that the system is crazy.

Oh the ones at the top do make a shameful amount of money through shares!

My father-in-law was in an OSJCT nursing home (so not-for-profit) in Gloucestershire for 18 months up to his death in November. Fees increased by 8% last April so were just under £1800 a week.

Whyever not?

Edited. - Sorry I misunderstood.
You're right.

My mums fees were £1500 per week in south London four years ago. It was a huge amount of money but the care she received in her final months was really outstanding and all the staff were so overwhelmingly and genuinely kind, rather than just doing their job.

Sorry for being clueless as I don't have elderly parents on care homes, but HOW THE FUCK can anyone afford those prices? Who's paying?! These prices are insane!

CabbageWater My father-in-law had a good income (state pension, very generous armed forces pension, Attendance Allowance), but was still using up his capital at a rate of 4k a month (3k care fees not covered by income, plus 1k holding/maintenance costs for his house). The house was cleared & on the market when he died. The proceeds from his house sale would have had to cover the rest until he reached the funding threshold.

My MIL died in January - just after we’d received notice of a rise to £93K per annum.

Actually though, it wouldn’t have affected us, as my husband and BILs/SILs had taken out an annuity…. and my MIL lived long enough for her fees to have cost more than the annuity cost! As long as she died before 102, we didn’t have to worry about her fees.

It is worth at least looking at annuities. They are bloody expensive, but mean that you’re not worried about rising fees.

They work on the principle that an average stay in a care home is about 2.5 years, and the value of a house covers that.

I must be stupid but I really don't understand how this works. £93k pa is more than mine and my DH's salaries combined pre tax, there's no way in the world or pensions will ever cover that much individually, so I really don't understand who pays for this.

But if the elderly person has a house worth £500k that's 5 years covered - and as a pp says above the average stay is circa 2.5 years.

Ok, that makes sense. Sorry, I've never had to even think about this yet, so I'm really clueless.

Bloody Hell

£1,400 per week in Somerset, so about £6k per month or £72,800 per year plus extras like hair, nails, newspapers etc

We sold their house, 600K, 375k of which went to the care home. The ones that are self funding subsidise the council places. It’s pretty unfair in my opinion but thats how it works. 23k is the cut off for assets, or was a few years ago.

What are you doing about the lack of care?

My Dad’s fees were £1800 for nursing care in quite an ordinary care home. He has (undiagnosed dementia) in the North. Staff ratios are 3 care / nursing staff on at a time to roughly 20 residents. Don’t know how that stacks up to other homes. I say were as they decided his needs were too great and ‘shipped’ him out to hospital after just over 2 weeks. I’m worried about finding somewhere that can cope for him and how much that will cost.

The last time my mum was self funding it had gone up to £1k a week. Between her and my dad all their assets down to threshold have been used up now so she has a social services place, so now pays all her pension and teachers pension bar £26 each week.

My mum always says the same. I understand yours / her frustration but it’s very difficult to see a way to ethically euthanise dementia patients, who by definition can’t give consent (even if they have previously said they would want that).

£1200 per week (has CHC funding for nursing which would be about £200 extra). Home is excellent, dementia specialist and has different wings for different levels of need, including a palliative care wing. Food is excellent, facilities are excellent, full programme of activities, visits (people and animals) and outings, and the staff and the care they provide are fantastic. (House is being sold so that the fees can be covered for as long as required.) It's an independent home and the owners have 2. They plough a lot of money into keeping the place decorated and keeping the residents comfortable.

Oh yes the extras!
Nails, hair, toiletries, bedding, glasses, hearing aids and endless clothes that go missing ( despite being named) or destroyed in the fiery furnace know commonly as the laundry!
I’ve even witnessed staff take toiletries from one residents room to use on another resident.
Even those are now named in big red pen so they don’t ‘walk out’

MIL are about £1200 a week. The interest she makes on her savings and investments plus her AA and pensions are more than enough to cover this. In fact last year she finished just over £1000 up!! She and FIL lived like paupers. When FIL died and she went into care it came to light they had over £1 million in assets!

While it is a lot of money and I have raged about it in the past, I divided the weekly fee by the number of hours (168), and gained a different perspective. £1400 a week (a lot of money) works out at £8.34 per hour. That doesn't seem a huge amount to keep my relative safe.

£3000 per week, specialist dementia but not nursing care. Inadequate rating on last CQC inspection. Social services chose it as they hold relatives finances.