Grandmother losing EVERYTHING!

margaretclare

No, it is not true that your Gran will have to pay 'until she has not a penny left'. As Gingernutty has mentioned, £23K remains and will remain to her.

Your Gran presumably has an income - retirement pension? As she has worked all her life, did she pay into an employment pension, or is she receiving SERPS/S2P?

In any case, she should be receiving Attendance Allowance at both day and night rates, and this can go towards her costs - that's what it is designed for.

Look at it this way. If your Gran decided to spend her remaining years in a hotel or a good B&B, she'd have to pay. Maybe £80-£100 a night for bed and board, laundry, service, you name it. Add on to that professional care because of the conditions from which she's suffering and the costs start to rack up.

If someone else was living in her house - well, it would have to be a spouse or a partner, or a dependent adult aged at least 60.

Look up https://www.gov.uk/attendance-allowance/overview

[Deleted User]

My father has not instructed me whatsoever I just thought there might be other options.She is in a great care home that has already cost my father £50k as the house is not yet sold.
So I was not trying to get my hands on the 'loot' as some people have implied/said.

irishjohn

My Mum has been in a nursing home for nearly 4 years and has just reached 90. She had £14000 in savings and is therefore funded in the nursing home as her savings were below the threshold. It is a lovely home and the room which was available there was one of the better ones in the new section. To enable her to have it I signed an agreement to pay a monthly top up fee which is just over £250 a month and increases with RPI annually. My dad died 40 years ago with just enough in his account for his funeral.

At the annual review this year the social worker advised me that I could probably move mum into one of the cheaper rooms, as she really cannot use her ensuite now, but her mind is good and she has a great view from her room.

I will gladly pay this top up fee and my will stipulates that my estate will continue to pay it for as long as Mum survives me - if she does. I am far from rich - recently retired with a nest egg from my pension lump sum and a mortgage free house.

It is a privilege to ensure my Mum is well cared for in nice surroundings - its the least I can do for all she and my dad did for me.

Mojisola

Deleted_User wrote: »

My father has not instructed me whatsoever I just thought there might be other options.She is in a great care home that has already cost my father £50k as the house is not yet sold.
So I was not trying to get my hands on the 'loot' as some people have implied/said.

Your father shouldn't have been paying his own money. If a resident can't pay because their money is tied up in a property, the council will pay the care home until the house is sold. The council put a charge on the house and reclaim the money when the sale goes through.

jabba42

I would hide everything I could from the government too in her situation. Her grandmother paid into the system all her life so why not get something at the end?


My advice would be to keep her in her home and get a live in Filipina for 15k a year. They are lovely caring people. Also add a webcam on 24/7 so you can monitor for something bad happening.


Done deal, saves 20k a year, mother gets to stay in her familiar home.

Steve_xx

Anyhow, the situation is that she will be in receipt of Pension I guess and if she isn't already, she should be in receipt of Attendance Allowance. Those two income streams can be used to offset the cost of care. The rest will have to be made up from the proceeds of the sale of her home. If it's sold then she will pay for her care until her bank balance hits around 23k.


However, I would have thought it prudent in the first instance to obtain Power of Attorney, due to the lady's age, her mental condition and the possibility that she may or soon may become unable to administer the finances herself.


If Power of Attorney is obtained then it may well be worth looking at the possibility of renting the house out and using the proceeds of the rental to offset some of the care costs?

margaretclare

I think the way you worded your first post - and the heading partly in capitals - gave a wrong impression. Your grandmother is not 'losing everything'. Further, the mention of the word 'inheritance' acts as a red rag to a bull to many people who come here.

From my point of view, given that I'm more in your Gran's generation than in yours, I don't like the words 'Dad has had to put her in a home'. Was this what Gran wanted? Had she no say in the matter herself? 'Light onset of dementia' sounds as if it is not too bad. She may still have mental capacity to make some of her own choices and decisions. Falls are very common in the older age-groups but 'putting her into a home' just because of 'light dementia and falls' sounds a bit extreme. There is much that can be done - AgeUK are a mine of information and should be the first port of call on any of these topics.

I would not like this if any of the younger generation talked about me in these terms, took decisions out of my hands, had their greedy eyes on any money left after I had finished using it. Your Gran is not a 'thing' to be 'put' somewhere and her concerns discussed publicly without her say-so.

Insult me if you like, but this is the state of things as I see them.

Steve_xx

margaretclare wrote: »

I think the way you worded your first post - and the heading partly in capitals - gave a wrong impression. Your grandmother is not 'losing everything'. Further, the mention of the word 'inheritance' acts as a red rag to a bull to many people who come here.

From my point of view, given that I'm more in your Gran's generation than in yours, I don't like the words 'Dad has had to put her in a home'. Was this what Gran wanted? Had she no say in the matter herself? 'Light onset of dementia' sounds as if it is not too bad. She may still have mental capacity to make some of her own choices and decisions. Falls are very common in the older age-groups but 'putting her into a home' just because of 'light dementia and falls' sounds a bit extreme. There is much that can be done - AgeUK are a mine of information and should be the first port of call on any of these topics.

I would not like this if any of the younger generation talked about me in these terms, took decisions out of my hands, had their greedy eyes on any money left after I had finished using it. Your Gran is not a 'thing' to be 'put' somewhere and her concerns discussed publicly without her say-so.

Insult me if you like, but this is the state of things as I see them.

I agree with you.


I digress here a bit. In addition to what you said isn't it amazing that somebody will "put" their parent somewhere when they wouldn't dream doing something similar with their own children? I just don't get that.

p00hsticks

jabba42 wrote: »

Her grandmother paid into the system all her life so why not get something at the end?

Given that the grandmother is 93, she's most likely been retired and getting a state pension for over a third of her lifetime.....

jabba42

p00hsticks wrote: »

Given that the grandmother is 93, she's most likely been retired and getting a state pension for over a third of her lifetime.....

The smokers who die early more than make up for her. In any case it was announced that the pension fund is going to run out of money next year. From then on the powers that be will start raiding the tax system more or private pensions to pay for it.


The sooner it crashes and burns the better. Whoever devised a system that makes fantasy promises into the future needs to be shot.


The oldies now are living in a golden age that will not be repeated for a long time. Hopefully ever, as whatever replaces the current Ponzi should be funded correctly.