Deprivation of assets for Social Care Funding assessment

Jenferdog

Hi there hoping someone can help with this. We have had a quite heated discussion today with my husbands sister and her husband about trying to safeguard my mother-in-laws money and house. She is not by any means wealthy, her house is maybe worth about 150k and she has approx 50k savings. She has long term carers coming in 4 x daily at a current cost of £44 per day so depending on how long she lives for this as well as her other household bills will fairly rapidly deplete her savings. The argument stems from my brother in law's suggestion that to safeguard her money we arrange to have home improvement work on the house, ie a new garage (the current one is falling apart but isn't being used anyway) new windows and doors (they are very old double glazed ones but they function fine) or work on the roof which will require doing at some point in the future but there is no urgent need. His reasoning is that it will add value to the house which the family can recoup when it is sold after her death, whilst reducing her assets. I find the conversation distasteful however it would sadden us to see all her hard earned money slowly disappear. My question is would this be classed as deprivation of assets for the finding assessment? Another reason I don't like the idea is she is 92 with dementia so having work done on her house whilst she is living there will be very unsettling for her. Her son and daughter have POA.

swingaloo

Anything done to the house and anything spent has to be for the benefit of your  mother-in-law. Presumably she doesn't use the garage much.!

POA does not allow what they suggest doing.

flossymcfly

If the works are deemed necessary then it wouldn't be deprivation of assets...however...someone will be along with the correct terminology, but if she needs to go into a care home the LA will place a charge on the house meaning that it will either need to be sold to pay for care or, if sold after her death, the amount outstanding will be paid before any inheritance is dished out. This may affect the care home she would be placed in too. This is on the assumption she owns the house in her sole name.

I understand the frustration with people's savings disappearing in their later days, however, nobody has a right to an inheritance and the needs of the individual outweigh that of any beneficiaries.

Savvy_Sue

flossymcfly said:

This is on the assumption she owns the house in her sole name.

AND that she lives alone. If someone over 60 lives with her, and in certain other circumstances, the home is disregarded.

Albermarle

Savvy_Sue said:

flossymcfly said:

This is on the assumption she owns the house in her sole name.

AND that she lives alone. If someone over 60 lives with her, and in certain other circumstances, the home is disregarded.

What happens ( using this case as an example) if the lady stays at home receiving and paying for daily care.
Is the home disregarded in the financial assessment? and if the savings run down to £23k, then the local authority will have to start contributing? 

They can only have a Deferred  payment agreement based on the value of the home, if she is actually ina care home . Is that right?

Savvy_Sue

Albermarle said:

Savvy_Sue said:

flossymcfly said:

This is on the assumption she owns the house in her sole name.

AND that she lives alone. If someone over 60 lives with her, and in certain other circumstances, the home is disregarded.

What happens ( using this case as an example) if the lady stays at home receiving and paying for daily care.
Is the home disregarded in the financial assessment? and if the savings run down to £23k, then the local authority will have to start contributing? 

They can only have a Deferred  payment agreement based on the value of the home, if she is actually ina care home . Is that right?

That I am not sure about, but Google says no, for care at home the value of the home is disregarded in any financial assessment - and that makes sense, because if you are living in it, you can't realise its value as an asset!

Brie

 Albermarle said:

Savvy_Sue said:

flossymcfly said:

This is on the assumption she owns the house in her sole name.

AND that she lives alone. If someone over 60 lives with her, and in certain other circumstances, the home is disregarded.

What happens ( using this case as an example) if the lady stays at home receiving and paying for daily care.
Is the home disregarded in the financial assessment? and if the savings run down to £23k, then the local authority will have to start contributing? 

They can only have a Deferred  payment agreement based on the value of the home, if she is actually ina care home . Is that right?

Yes if someone is living at home and has no money and the LA pays for carers to go in the home is disregarded.  

So if someone was really really mean and money grubbing and refused to have Nan go into care then the LA would need to disregard the home.   There have been cases where safeguarding of vulnerable adults has found cases like this making the LA pay for everything but not allowing the heating to be on etc to basically push Nan to the edge of a health crisis.  And all because someone greedy wanted to inherit.   In these cases the carers should have a process to notify social services.   

Likewise if she went into care but had previously been living with someone over 60 or who was otherwise dependent on being there (might be older adult child with some disabilities?) the house would be disregarded.

Someone might manage to make a case for the windows being replaced to make the home less draughty.  Or insulation being upgraded as that benefits Nan.  And paying out a bit to ensure the garage doesn't fall over and damage the neighbour's house or something is just sensible.  But to have a reasonably good roof replaced would and should be questioned.   

And the LA doesn't have nice clear cut rules about "in the last 7 years" or whatever.  They can go back basically as far as they like if they get suspicious.  And they may chase individuals for funds if they feel they are the actively responsible for there being insufficient to pay everything.  

badmemory

Set up an alert on land registry - just in case of equity release or other.

born_again

So carers is £16K a year. What income does she have?

Work on the house should be fine. New garage, could be a bit too far. Who knows how a council will judge this..

Maybe someone needs to have a talk with her & ask is she happy with things are now, or would she prefer to move to a care home where there is round the clock care.

Keep_pedalling

With 4 visits a day she is very close to needing residential care, carrying out adaptions to make her safer and to enable her to stay put longer would certainly be in her best interests, but what is be proposed is not and is being done to benefit her attorney so way beyond his authority. The disruption of major building work could cause you MIL major distress and quicken her need for residential care which will certainly impact your BIL’s inheritance. 

HillStreetBlues

You need to do something about the roof now, although you say it's not urgent, it shouldn't get to that stage. If you know it needs work then it should look into get done asap.  Also need to sort out garage if it's falling down.