Paying for care- house ownership

[jenniferpa]

Absolutely. Remember that while the LA can state a property is not disregarded, and so effectively push people to sell a property, they don't actually have any more right to money realised from that sale than your next door neighbor. Such money becomes available for payment of care home fees, but if the person dies, those fees are no longer payable (apart, possibly, for a notice period to the home depending on the contract).

[JPG1]

What would happen (say) if the house was sold to pay for care, but the person died before all the funds were used. Would the balance be returned to the estate?

The money from the sale of the house would already be in the bank (so, in the 'estate during the life') of the person involved. It would perhaps be under the control of their PoA or Deputy who continues to pay the required care home charges until such time as the person died.

The Local Authority doesn't take all the proceeds from the sale of the house 'up front'. The proceeds will still be in the bank, and will still be part of the available funds of the person in care.

It's 'the house' that will no longer be what is called 'a specific legacy' of the will. The remainder of the money will still be part of the residue of the estate, and will go towards any pecuniary legacies if there are any.

[JPG1]

I was just wondering where you got the concept of 'brief while' that you mentioned. You say it's not defined, but since you don't say where you got it, it's difficult to judge if it's a valid concept anyway. IanS didn't mention a period of time and I've never seen that term used.

I got the concept of 'brief while' out of my head - that makes it a valid concept, as far as I'm concerned.

I explained what I meant by that in the paragraph that followed it.

or whether they (meaning the powers that be) decide that you only moved in to live with and care for your Dad very recently so as to avoid the need for the house to contribute to your Dad’s care costs.

And I used the term precisely because IanS never mentioned how long he had lived with his relative. I realise that IanS hasn't mentioned, either, whether his Dad is likely to be moving to care home care, but we are talking about theoretical situations in the main.

If someone moves in to live with and care for a relative for a 'brief while' before that relative is in need of residential care, it's unlikely that the property will be disregarded. How short is brief? How brief is short? Every piece of string, as far as the LA and CRAG are concerned, is an individual undefined piece of string.

[Sotired]

Hello Sotired, that's a new one on me, and probably on many of us. No wonder you're so tired.

Until you get this extremely odd decision in writing (which you may already have), there's not much you can do - apart from seeking help from your solicitor.

It may depend on how long you have taken care of and lived with your Dad. Not that it should all hang on that one, but there you go. The rule book rules, sometimes.

£1500 per month is a fairly hefty 'market value' rental valuation - your solicitor will know more about the local rental market, and will be able to get an equivalent for the house and the area at the touch of a button on his/her computer. Hertfordshire isn't the most expensive part of the country, so unless your Dad's house is well above-the-average, it's hard to understand how the Social Services have come up with that as a monthly rental.

Don't give up hope - just challenge each and everything that comes your way.

Wish you well, and I do hope you will come back and tell everyone about what appears to be an extremely unusual situation that some of us will never have had cause to meet.

Thank you for your comment, must admit I was very surprised myself, I've cared for my dad for 5 years since my mum passed away but only moved in with him 15 months ago, like you say there is no legal definition of how long is "brief", they said it would be payable at market value which I have researched and looks to be about £1500, what I don't understand is that my dads care home is £680 a week, once he has received his pensions and attendance allowance he is only short of £400 a month so why on earth would the LA need full market value? Sorry to sound so vague but this whole thing is so confusing.

Had a lovely chat with a solicitor and they have advised me to push for disregard of property due to children living at the property and if not then offer to pay the top up fee of £400, I rung the council finance department and suggested I pay the top up to prevent a charge on my dads house and got a very curt reply which was "well I dont know I'll have to seek my managers advice not sure if that's possible now"!!

So I'm now still left in limbo until they make a decision, in response to jenniferpa I did question what they proposed to do if I can't make the payments and have to sell the house their response was they wouldn't favour it due of the age of my children, schooling etc and would not want to disrupt them, so really don't know where I stand at all now.

[jenniferpa]

Actually, if you are only £400 a month short, I fail to see why you even need to go through social services at all. You do understand that you don't have to, don't you? If you are not requesting assistance from them in a financial sense, and your father's care home fees are paid, they can't tell you what you can or cannot do. Do you (or does anyone else) have an LPA or EPA for your father. I suppose you do have to be fiscally responsible in terms of managing his affairs but unless I'm missing something major, (which to be fair I might be) I can't see why you have to do what the LA says - your father is self-funded and how those funds are raised are you and your father's business.

[JPG1]

Sotired, I would seriously consider going along with the advice you’ve had from the solicitor and push for the total disregard of the property.

Local authorities don’t make people homeless without very good reasons, especially if there are children involved. In fact, when my relative was in the assessment unit for some 24 weeks, the local authority told me that I could not hand back the tenancy of her extra-care sheltered housing because they would then consider that I had made her homeless and any future residence (which turned out to be care home) would be in jeopardy. So I was told that I had to continue to pay the costs of e/c sheltered housing for another 6 months, meanwhile depriving some other person of e/c sh. housing.

If they were to make you and your 3 children homeless, it could cost the local authority a similar amount to re-house you all, unless you have means, not to mention the distress to you and your children and their schooling. If that schooling is local, the Council would be unlikely to want to move you plus the 3 of them any distance, without good cause.

Be careful about that £400 a month. Any kind of top-up is not fixed and the way things are at present in our current financial climate, that sum is no small amount and could increase considerably. As could the current care home rate of £680 pw, but your Dad’s pensions and AA won’t necessarily be increased at the same rate. Then you could be back to square one again.

If your father has no other assets or income apart from what you've mentioned, his ability to self-fund (with your help at £100 per week now, but who knows how much in the future) could change.

Another thought that struck me - what would be the situation if the current care home decided that it could no longer cope with your Dad's needs, e.g. if his behaviour became challenging? An unknown at present, but worth mentioning to your solicitor perhaps.

Has there been an assessment for Continuing Healthcare? If there has been, were you happy with the outcome – and if not, have you challenged it? If there hasn’t been, there should have been and you can still request a full assessment by the PCT. With your full involvement. It should have happened before discharge from hospital, and before a move into full-time residential care.

Would it be worth asking your solicitor to write a letter to the Local Authority asking them to explain (i.e. justify) their reasoning and suggesting that the property should be disregarded? That could sharpen their thinking –it could be that they are just ‘trying it on’.

[iamjanx]

i suppose this is simlar to me, hubby and i moved in with mum to look after her 4 years ago, we rented a house, so we just left there and moved in with her, i have P.O.E as mum wanted that,for me to pay all the bills and take over as she no longer could, i am the only child, so she said it was all left to me anyway
i suppose if mum goes into care home we can stay here???

am i right???

[jenniferpa]

Maybe, maybe not. If you aren't over 60 it's not automatic.

[iamjanx]

i am 61
hubby is 64

[jenniferpa]

Then you're fine.

[iamjanx]

thank you, its nice to know you are here to advise

[JMU]

There is my issue. I am 30.
I have in fact been caring for my father for some years, even before the Alzheimer's. He has mobility issues due to having had TB as a child, not to mention depression, which he suffered after my parent's divorce when I was a teenager. However, we have never dealt with the local authority before, so, even if they were to query this I could not effectively prove it. Because I have only recently filled in the self-assessment form, I suspect they may try to say I haven't been caring for him long enough to qualify keeping the house (this may be me thinking too hard).
My sister and I are hoping to get a meeting with the social worker some time (he is currently on holiday), even if it's just so he can explain our options a little better. I don't believe my father is happy at home on his own, while I am at work most days- he has taken to wandering the streets, and when he's not doing that he's going to bed. The problem is he would never tell anyone there is a problem. Even if we could get more/better support for him during the day (on top of the temporary care service we have at the moment, not really suited for Alzheimer's sufferers) that would be better than what we currently have. I just wish someone would explain things to me.