Carer funding

BrianJohns

Hope someone can help my wife needs carers but the council won't help. A bit of background a few years ago when I(not my wife) retired with a company pension I opted to take a smaller pension and a lump sum the idea being to buy 2 small terraced houses both with 50% mortgage and rent them out to improve my pension. I did this but I purchased the houses in joint names, me and my wife. Now the problem is the council is refusing carer funding because of these assets but we have little money in savings. So I assume they want us to evict a tenant and sell a house. But to me this is using my pension to fund my wife's care. Which I feel is wrong I can prove where the money came from, my pension, had I taken my full pension without a lump sum we wouldn't be in this predicament. It seemed a good idea but due to my wife developing Parkinson’s we are now in this predicament. Thanks for any advise, who to contact, what to do etc. My wife recieves Pip and ESA with no other income.

Flugelhorn

tricky though I can see the council's viewpoint, would it have been different if the properties were just in your name? Not sure I know how they assess a couple's income  bit seems like you made the money half hers when you put it in both names ?

marcia_

BrianJohns said:

Hope someone can help my wife needs carers but the council won't help. A bit of background a few years ago when I(not my wife) retired with a company pension I opted to take a smaller pension and a lump sum the idea being to buy 2 small terraced houses both with 50% mortgage and rent them out to improve my pension. I did this but I purchased the houses in joint names, me and my wife. Now the problem is the council is refusing carer funding because of these assets but we have little money in savings. So I assume they want us to evict a tenant and sell a house. But to me this is using my pension to fund my wife's care. Which I feel is wrong I can prove where the money came from, my pension, had I taken my full pension without a lump sum we wouldn't be in this predicament. It seemed a good idea but due to my wife developing Parkinson’s we are now in this predicament. Thanks for any advise, who to contact, what to do etc. My wife recieves Pip and ESA with no other income.

 Your money but her assets through your own choice. There is no way around the councils assessment. If you took her name off the deeds it would be seen as deprivation of assets and she would still be assessed as if having it 

turnitround

BrianJohns said:

Hope someone can help my wife needs carers but the council won't help. A bit of background a few years ago when I(not my wife) retired with a company pension I opted to take a smaller pension and a lump sum the idea being to buy 2 small terraced houses both with 50% mortgage and rent them out to improve my pension. I did this but I purchased the houses in joint names, me and my wife. Now the problem is the council is refusing carer funding because of these assets but we have little money in savings. So I assume they want us to evict a tenant and sell a house. But to me this is using my pension to fund my wife's care. Which I feel is wrong I can prove where the money came from, my pension, had I taken my full pension without a lump sum we wouldn't be in this predicament. It seemed a good idea but due to my wife developing Parkinson’s we are now in this predicament. Thanks for any advise, who to contact, what to do etc. My wife recieves Pip and ESA with no other income.

But isn't this exactly what couples do. Take care of each other. 

BrianJohns

turnitround said:

BrianJohns said:

Hope someone can help my wife needs carers but the council won't help. A bit of background a few years ago when I(not my wife) retired with a company pension I opted to take a smaller pension and a lump sum the idea being to buy 2 small terraced houses both with 50% mortgage and rent them out to improve my pension. I did this but I purchased the houses in joint names, me and my wife. Now the problem is the council is refusing carer funding because of these assets but we have little money in savings. So I assume they want us to evict a tenant and sell a house. But to me this is using my pension to fund my wife's care. Which I feel is wrong I can prove where the money came from, my pension, had I taken my full pension without a lump sum we wouldn't be in this predicament. It seemed a good idea but due to my wife developing Parkinson’s we are now in this predicament. Thanks for any advise, who to contact, what to do etc. My wife recieves Pip and ESA with no other income.

But isn't this exactly what couples do. Take care of each other. 

Read again there's no money I should just evict a family from their home of 6 years? 

Spoonie_Turtle

BrianJohns said:

turnitround said:

BrianJohns said:

Hope someone can help my wife needs carers but the council won't help. A bit of background a few years ago when I(not my wife) retired with a company pension I opted to take a smaller pension and a lump sum the idea being to buy 2 small terraced houses both with 50% mortgage and rent them out to improve my pension. I did this but I purchased the houses in joint names, me and my wife. Now the problem is the council is refusing carer funding because of these assets but we have little money in savings. So I assume they want us to evict a tenant and sell a house. But to me this is using my pension to fund my wife's care. Which I feel is wrong I can prove where the money came from, my pension, had I taken my full pension without a lump sum we wouldn't be in this predicament. It seemed a good idea but due to my wife developing Parkinson’s we are now in this predicament. Thanks for any advise, who to contact, what to do etc. My wife recieves Pip and ESA with no other income.

But isn't this exactly what couples do. Take care of each other. 

Read again there's no money I should just evict a family from their home of 6 years? 

Presumably they pay you rent?

I'm sorry for the situation you find yourself in, but unfortunately the rules are the rules.

If it came to it maybe you'd have to consider selling with the tenants still there.

BrianJohns

It doesn't even add up evict a family  sell the house pay off the mortgage cash in hand £40,000 at best that's a lot of money 2 Carers only 2 hours a day council rates £20 per hour per carer so £80 a day that equals £2480 per month so £40000 lasts 16 months then we evict family number 2 sell the other house same story so after 2.5 years we have no assets but more importantly a lot less income to live off ie no rental income. So we claim e instead of being self financing. I can't see the upside to this. Can you? Sorry for the rant but we've been thrown in at the deep end.

Spoonie_Turtle

BrianJohns said:

It doesn't even add up evict a family  sell the house pay off the mortgage cash in hand £40,000 at best that's a lot of money 2 Carers only 2 hours a day council rates £20 per hour per carer so £80 a day that equals £2480 per month so £40000 lasts 16 months then we evict family number 2 sell the other house same story so after 2.5 years we have no assets but more importantly a lot less income to live off ie no rental income. So we claim e instead of being self financing. I can't see the upside to this. Can you? Sorry for the rant but we've been thrown in at the deep end.

No, but I can't change anything for you - none of us here can.  As I said, I am sorry for the situation you find yourself in but you need to work out how to proceed with things the way they are, not what you wish they were.

Savvy_Sue

The only thing I can suggest is that you check you're getting all the benefits you're entitled to, especially non means-tested. This would improve your income. Parkinson's Society may be able to advise.

BrianJohns

Spoonie_Turtle said:

BrianJohns said:

turnitround said:

BrianJohns said:

Hope someone can help my wife needs carers but the council won't help. A bit of background a few years ago when I(not my wife) retired with a company pension I opted to take a smaller pension and a lump sum the idea being to buy 2 small terraced houses both with 50% mortgage and rent them out to improve my pension. I did this but I purchased the houses in joint names, me and my wife. Now the problem is the council is refusing carer funding because of these assets but we have little money in savings. So I assume they want us to evict a tenant and sell a house. But to me this is using my pension to fund my wife's care. Which I feel is wrong I can prove where the money came from, my pension, had I taken my full pension without a lump sum we wouldn't be in this predicament. It seemed a good idea but due to my wife developing Parkinson’s we are now in this predicament. Thanks for any advise, who to contact, what to do etc. My wife recieves Pip and ESA with no other income.

But isn't this exactly what couples do. Take care of each other. 

Read again there's no money I should just evict a family from their home of 6 years? 

Presumably they pay you rent?

I'm sorry for the situation you find yourself in, but unfortunately the rules are the rules.

If it came to it maybe you'd have to consider selling with the tenants still there.

Yes they do pay rent, me and my wife use the money to live on, we rely on this along with my pension, my wife who was previously self employed now only has benefits. So selling them would bring in money to use in the short term then leave us much worse off. Clearly there is no viable solution to our problem. Thanks for your input.

marcia_

BrianJohns said:

Spoonie_Turtle said:

BrianJohns said:

turnitround said:

BrianJohns said:

Hope someone can help my wife needs carers but the council won't help. A bit of background a few years ago when I(not my wife) retired with a company pension I opted to take a smaller pension and a lump sum the idea being to buy 2 small terraced houses both with 50% mortgage and rent them out to improve my pension. I did this but I purchased the houses in joint names, me and my wife. Now the problem is the council is refusing carer funding because of these assets but we have little money in savings. So I assume they want us to evict a tenant and sell a house. But to me this is using my pension to fund my wife's care. Which I feel is wrong I can prove where the money came from, my pension, had I taken my full pension without a lump sum we wouldn't be in this predicament. It seemed a good idea but due to my wife developing Parkinson’s we are now in this predicament. Thanks for any advise, who to contact, what to do etc. My wife recieves Pip and ESA with no other income.

But isn't this exactly what couples do. Take care of each other. 

Read again there's no money I should just evict a family from their home of 6 years? 

Presumably they pay you rent?

I'm sorry for the situation you find yourself in, but unfortunately the rules are the rules.

If it came to it maybe you'd have to consider selling with the tenants still there.

Yes they do pay rent, me and my wife use the money to live on, we rely on this along with my pension, my wife who was previously self employed now only has benefits. So selling them would bring in money to use in the short term then leave us much worse off. Clearly there is no viable solution to our problem. Thanks for your input.

 If you sold them and it reduced your income its worth looking into claiming pension credits to top up your income if you qualify