Council seeking care home fees retrospectively 10 January at 2:54PM in Deaths, funerals & probate 28 replies 2.2K views

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This discussion was created from comments split from: Care Home fees outstanding after death.

tad1938

Don't want to hijack someone's thread but we have a issues at the present moment. My great grandma and my grandad. Her son. Both ended up in care. She paid for hers as had money. My grandfather didn't as he only has a few quid to his name. So she passed and few years later he does. We never delt with any of the finances and in all this situation there friend. A retired solicitor. Delt with any legal stuff. Well two years ago. My grandad passed too. And well we did nothing for most of the time. I believe a few loose ends were tied up but nothing said about owing fees. So the family home was sold and divided up. And now most probly spent. It wasn't a massive amount buy time was divided up by 9. So now the council are claiming we owe for my grandfather but the house was never his or in his name. Plus again any moneys long gone. If we had fees to pay why has this been kept quite for so long. As far we were Lead to believe all was covered done and dusted. So as far as we're concerned we've done nothing in a way to deliberately hide assets or strip them. They've had well over a 100k for my grandmas care I believe as she had to pay we didn't argue. So where do we stand with council asking us for the balance etc. Hope this makes some sence

Marcon

tad1938 said:

Don't want to hijack someone's thread but we have a issues at the present moment. My great grandma and my grandad. Her son. Both ended up in care. She paid for hers as had money. My grandfather didn't as he only has a few quid to his name. So she passed and few years later he does. We never delt with any of the finances and in all this situation there friend. A retired solicitor. Delt with any legal stuff. Well two years ago. My grandad passed too. And well we did nothing for most of the time. I believe a few loose ends were tied up but nothing said about owing fees. So the family home was sold and divided up. And now most probly spent. It wasn't a massive amount buy time was divided up by 9. So now the council are claiming we owe for my grandfather but the house was never his or in his name. Plus again any moneys long gone. If we had fees to pay why has this been kept quite for so long. As far we were Lead to believe all was covered done and dusted. So as far as we're concerned we've done nothing in a way to deliberately hide assets or strip them. They've had well over a 100k for my grandmas care I believe as she had to pay we didn't argue. So where do we stand with council asking us for the balance etc. Hope this makes some sence

Go back to the retired solicitor and ask him, perhaps? Much will depend on whether your grandfather inherited (or should have inherited) a share of the family home.

Keep_pedalling

It sounds like he inherited from his mother so should have been paying some of his care costs from that point. If the administrator did not take care to look for creditors then they are going to be liable for any subsequent proven estate debts.

You say it wasn't a massive amount but how much in total? The only reason the LA are likely to have come in at this late stage is because they have visibility of the probate records which are showing significantly more assets than was declared when his last financial assessment took place.

Pennylane

So who owned the house?  If it was your Grandad’s then he should have been paying care home fees. 

tad1938

So years ago my Great grandma and her son / grandad got taken Into care hers was for dementia but due to her money we had to pay. She died never needing funding or to sell the house.
During this time her son went into care but under the paying threshold. He died a year or so after his mum. Now he was of sound mind just his body was failing. 
Sadly he past and we settled up any loose ends. He used to write his own check so he dealt with all his finances. And his friend who was a solicitor was in charge of any wills and bits and pieces. So care home is happy the end. 
2 years nearly later the care home is demanding Money for is care. Now there was his mum's house and it was sold about 11/2 years after he passed but before we were made aware of any fees supposedly owing as again he dealt with his finances. 
So it was sold and split between everyone in the family left. But there still adamant he owed Money. If we would have know could have sorted then split the remainder. The problem is now bulk of the money is long gone If any left as the 9 people have used it for house deposits and family cars etc. So we're do we stand as we were never aware we owed anything. And I can definitely say none of us aren't willing to take loads or remortgage in today's climate etc. 

MSE_ForumTeam5

@tad1938 We've merged your posts into a single thread

McKneff

Sounds like grandad inherited the house. 
If so then fees are payable as it was an asset 

Did he have any siblings. 

p00hsticks

tad1938 said:

 And his friend who was a solicitor was in charge of any wills and bits and pieces.

Did you know if mother and/or son actually left wills or died intestate ? 

If so who were formally named as executors ?

Was the son named as a beneficiary of his mothers will  ? If she didn't leave a will and was divorced/ widowed then the son woudl have been entitled to inherit at least a share of her estate under intestacy rules.

It's the executors job to establish if the estate owes any money before distributing the proceeds, and knowing that the son died whilst in care and potentially due a part of his late mothers estate, it was (and is) their responsibility to deal with this.   

theoretica

If grandad inherited the house, from that point on he should probably have been paying for care.  Was anyone living in the house, and how old were they?

elsien

So who was the executor or the administrator of the estate? And were the nine people the money was left to in line with the will or intestacy laws, or something you decided to do amongst yourselves. It’s the responsibility of whoever sorted out the estate, sold the house, distributed the money to beneficiaries to make sure that they get it right, so who was it who took on that role?