Will I or will I not be able to stay in my Mom's house if she goes into a health care facility?

No I don't want to buy her house read questions asked above

Joy, could you buy Mom's house? Would you want to?

Hi igloo thanks for your guidance.
Yes I have sister she is not happy me and my wife living here but mom wants me to stay until I am sorted. Me and my sister both have POA. Shall I ask mum to give me in writing that I can stay in her house etc so my sister does create problem and threthen me via emails or phone which she has done.
and yes I need three to four months since am looking for jobs and getting interviews calls hopefully things will work soon.

Roz - it sounds like mom has enough $ to cover all costs (care home, her house) for 2 -3 years, that it right? I’d suggest you take pen to paper and carefully go over all this to figure out when the zero point will be for no more assets.

So what would be the plan IF mom runs out of $ and is still alive?

If your thinking Medicaid, there will be issues with any $ mom has given to you or others. It’s considered gifting and places a transfer penalty period of ineligiblity on her. To keep this from being an issue Mom really needs to directly pay for any house costs. So checks on her name are send to utilities, insurance co, tax assessor. No mom writes you a check and then you pay.

If your finding that your doing lots of self renovation on the house, I’d try to get mom to go with you to get a gift card from Home Depot, Menards, Ace that is used exclusively for home maintenance costs. It will make it easier to track and transparent if family or Medicaid questions why $ 98.76 spent last mo.

What might be the plan is for 6 mos or so before she runs out of $, is to have the house put up for sale. You can contact a Realtor to tell you what the usual DOM (days on market) is for comparable properties. DOM info is in my experience pretty reliable data, so if it’s 60 days DOM, that gives you 4 months to get organized and moved. So house can be shown without a tenant. You find another place to live within that 4 mos, unless you are buying house at FMV fair market value. House gets sold with proceeds used to pay for mom’s care. If funds left over after she dies, then distributed as per her will.

If you have siblings and they have issues with your living at house rent free, you may want to find out what a property management company and a security company would charge for oversight. And work out your rent to be the difference between those and average rent for your neighborhood.

But please please find & go over all costs and determine what is likely to be the zero point and plan accordingly. Good luck.

Hi
My mum moved to care home last year And I was busy looking after her and lost couple of jobs because going through decision for her move. Now I am living in her house as she said stay here until you are sorted she has got enough savings for two to three years for care home and other extra as well. Just wanted to know how long I can stay there for. She is also helping me with bills etc because she can but it's her wish not in pressure it's that ok.

I know exactly how you feel, Glad. I do believe in trying to keep talking, and I do believe in acting on the assumption that people will be realistic and fair, but oh my goodness my heart rate after I've had that kind of conversation with my siblings…! I hope I didn't say it's easy!

CM, reread you post and you stated in a nice family, then I forgot that part when you suggest staying on to ready house for sale. You know the difficulties I have had with mine, so, there I go getting in defense mode. I suppose I am a bit hypersensitive to this sort of thing.

Sure, Glad, if it's going to turn into any kind of project, I agree - by all means charge a going-rate fee. And no back-chat about "whine, but you're living there rent-free…" either: Homesitters and agencies like that charge a (modest) fee for keeping a house occupied and ticking over, and so can you, Joystar.

Glad, I am visualising a reasonable, "normal" (?!) family where people generally expect to be fair to each other and get along, by the way. Hmmmmmmm…

CM, why would she clean and clear the house while not being paid for it and in the process of finding work and going to that job? She should receive payment for readying the house!

Well, if you were in charge of your mother's money, what would you do with the house? Even if your mother is so rich she can afford nursing home fees without using the capital tied up in her home, it would still make administrative sense to sell her property and put the money into safe keeping ready for when/if she needs it.

But let's assume that you are part of a nice family that doesn't steamroller its members into homelessness. In that case, take your family member's advice as friendly notice that you need to find your own place rather than a threat to evict you the second your mother moves to the NH. Get the house cleared, cleaned, sorted and ready for sale, but meanwhile make plans so that you can move out as and when without hardship. Keep talking to your family - if you've got problems, tell them so that they have a chance to help you.

Joy - what is going to be the key issue regarding mom's house is how the NH is going to be paid (assuming that mom eventually goes into a NH).

If mom has the ability to private pay 100% for the NH, and also has the funds to pay for everything on her home, then you can stay there till she dies and then the house is dealt with as per mom's will as to who gets what.

BUT if mom needs to apply for Medicaid to pay for her NH, then her home will be considered an exempt asset for the rest of mom's lifetime for most states Medicaid rules. However 2 big issues will come up:
1. upon her death the home reverts to a non-exempt asset and the state through MERP can place a claim or a lien on the property. Which basically means you have to reimburse the state for what they paid for mom by the sale of the home. Now there are all sorts of exemptions, exclusions and hardships within MERP so you could possibly qualify for one or two but you have to do all the work to have documentation that will qualify under MERP rules.

2. once mom goes into the NH and applies for Medicaid, she will be required to do a co-pay or her "SOC" (share of cost) of all her monthly income less a very small personal needs allowance. The allowance ranges from $35 - 90 and is barely enough to pay for her beauty shop, phone or cable at the NH. All the rest of mom's income (her SS and any other retirement, etc) MUST BE PAID TO THE NH. There will be no - none - nada of mom's money to pay for anything on the home. So if you want to keep the house, someone in the family will have to pay for all on the home. Can you all pay the taxes, insurance, yard work, maintenance etc for the possibly many years of mom's life?If there is a mortgage, that too has to be paid by family. If you can do this and also can qualify for MERP exemptions, then keeping the house can make sense. But for most families, this just isn't financially feasible, so the house ends up getting sold. All the proceeds from the sale will be an asset for mom and will have to be used as a "spend-down" or to reimburse the state for whatever Medicaid paid before Medicaid will kick back in for her too.

So think carefully if keeping the house is feasible. Good luck too.

How long have you lived there? Are you paying anything now? I am wondering if your sister is just wanting you to move?

You didn't really give us much info., to help you with. So, all we can say is "maybe."

Everything depends on how prepared was your Mom before getting ill? Hopefully she had a Living Trust, appointed a POA or something other than just a will. If she needs money for care and did not make arrangements for her home, finances etc. it can be costly as you would have to file for a conservator to be appointed. I don't know about any laws saying if you cared for her for a certain period of time you can stay in her house. Probably you should check with an attorney, many family law attorney's will provide a free consultation so you can know what applies in your county and state. If she is still capable of understanding what a trust is then you can probably set up a trust now and save everyone a lot of headaches later on.

We did not get my Mom to sign a trust before she was incapable of making decisions for herself, luckily she had signed a POA for 2 of my sisters to manage her finances, but it doesn't help with the property and house matters. It was even a stretch in getting her into a facility because we did not have the Advanced Healthcare Directive. Families need to start thinking ahead of time about these issues, after the experience with my Mom, I suggested that my sister who had been her acting caregiver get a Revocable Trust set up. We were pretty sure she was also getting Alzheimer's, when she did and was deemed unable to make decisions for herself it was easier. Not perfect because not everyone agreed with what the POA did but at least there was something in place.

I am currently staying in my Mom's house, it cannot be sold, rented or really even renovated until after she passes and then we have to contend with probate.I pay all the monthly bills and take care of the place so there are no break ins or squatters. At first there were some dissenter in the family about my staying but since I am saving money that would have to come from her funds to take care of her it's not such a big deal. The house insurance and property tax still are paid out of her funds but I pay everything else. Hopefully within the next year I will be able to pay the insurance and taxes as well. If I can manage to purchase the house from the estate when she passes I will, otherwise I will have to find another place to live. Hope this helps a little.

Possible. Is Mom on Medicaid? Does Mom have resources other than the house? The money from the house will most likely be needed for her care at some point. If you had cared for her in her home for two years, then the house could have been transferred to you without penalty and if not transferred, not even Medicaid would kick you out had you been responsible for Mom's care before nursing home.