can we avoid care home charges

spaniel_dog

if we sold house and gave the funds to our children now then in 1-2 years needed to go into care home would we have avoided the care home charges that would accrued from the assets we no longer have or would the children be required to pay from the financial gift

Torry_Quine

spaniel_dog wrote: »

if we sold house and gave the funds to our children now then in 1-2 years needed to go into care home would we have avoided the care home charges that would accrued from the assets we no longer have or would the children be required to pay from the financial gift

It could very easily be seen as deprivation of assets.

msb5262

Google "deprivation of assets".

meer53

Why would you want to do that ?

Person_one

If it were that easy, nobody would ever pay for their care!

You won't need your house once you can't live in it anymore, anyway.

ognum

It seems you have been given some good advice regarding your home, mortgage and loans not long ago in another thread.

If you do not have much equity in your home, less than 25k each and no other assets you may well not have to pay for care. I do not know exact figures but it would be sensible for you to find out exactly how much you can have without paying for care.

My friends father paid for a funeral plan in order to take his assets down below the level required. Some planning like this may help.

lostinrates

Your children could provide you care needs for you both and negate need for outside paid care.

ognum

While you may feel this and of course many people feel that way why should others be burdened with paying for your care through their tax (that includes your children if they work) when you have the funds to pay yourself?

spaniel_dog

because I dont like to think what little inheritance I have left for my girls would be taken by the state for care that should be provided from all my 51 years of paying into the system

troubleinparadise

spaniel_dog wrote: »

if we sold house and gave the funds to our children now then in 1-2 years needed to go into care home would we have avoided the care home charges that would accrued from the assets we no longer have or would the children be required to pay from the financial gift

Where will you live, and how will you pay for that and your general living expenses in the intervening time before needing to go into residential care if you have given away your house sale proceeds?

Care home charges don't accrue from assets. Care home charges are either paid by an individual if you have funds exceeding £23,500, or by the local authority if you have less than that.

A financial assessment can reveal if you have disposed of assets despite knowing that you need residential care in the future (having a diagnosis of a declining medical condition which will lead to needing residential care).

It may be that you don't ever need residential care, or care can be provided in your home setting.

There is also the situation that the house as an asset is disregarded in the financial assessment if you meet certain criteria, such as age and dependants etc; so you may have disposed of your house and given away money that you need to live on or would have given you greater choices unnecessarily.

This document, the CHarging for Residential Accommodation Guide (CRAG) gives more information:

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/208532/CRAG_guidance_web_publishing_2013_-_06-20rc_1_.pdf

Grumpygit

Oh's mum was on about this recently - she initally was going to sign the house over to OH/brother but was advised against this - purely down to the fact that then, it brings in other parties ie his wife and me and should we ever divorce, then that asset would be included within any settlement and technically, a sale could be forced leaving her homeless or such like.

The advice she got was to get a Power of Attorney drawn up for both financial and care (ie if necessary you could turn the machine off etc)

She was advised that the financial PoA would mean that if she went into a care home, then the house could be sold by the children (and the money invested) but the care home would only receive the interest on the invested money, not the money from the sale of the house with the state topping it up.

Edited to add: This only comes into force is she is mentally incapable ie dementia - this is not for just being "elderly or infirm"......thanks Tonymmm for pointing that out.