To put a property in "Trust."

A question about : To put a property in "Trust."

Being 60 years of age now I know there's going to come a time when I'll need looking after. I don't want to burden my children so I fully intend going into a care home. If a time comes that I have difficulty paying for my care, I don't want my home sold to pay for it - my home is my childrens inheritance.
My question is :
How do I put my property in trust for them, so its not taken away from me or my children to pay for my care ?

Best answers:

• You're only 60 now, a spring chicken (11 years younger than me). With any luck you have years of health and activity ahead of you - I married for the second time in my mid-60s!
  Why are you so certain that you'll need looking after and why have you decided to go into a care home? (Not an option I would wish on my worst enemy).
  McCarthy & Stone are offering an alternative to going into a care home. Have you thought of their 'Assisted Living' scheme? This could possibly fulfil your requirements. https://www.mccarthyandstone.co.uk/faqs.html
  The other thought is - if you don't want to use your assets to pay for this care home, then somebody is going to have to pay for it. You may think 'oh, the council will pay'. Cash-strapped local councils will then put you into the cheapest option they have which may not be where you want or what you want.
  HTH
  Margaret
• I agree with everything Margaret has written. Increasingly people who need help with their day to day living will be helped to stay in their own homes by way of increased services such as telecare and telemedecine. Councils are struggling to fund residential places now, they know that institutional living is the worst option for most people, and they are not happy about using their ratepayers money to contribute to the substantial profits made by private business, which is what care homes are.
  Looking at the point Margaret makes in her last paragraph from a different perspective.If you don't want your children to pay for your care through their loss of inheritance are you happy that your children are already paying through taxation the cost of someone else's care who has 'got rid of' their property so their own children don't lose their inheritance?
  However, to answer your question - you can give your house to your children now and rent it from them. The pitfalls to this option are that if you need residential care within a certain period of giving it away the council will not pay for your care as you will have deliberately deprived yourself of the asset. Or your children could sell it over your head and put you out on the street as part of a divorce settlement.
• If you have reasonable pension income, you should look at the idea of topping up with an "immediate needs annuity" if and when you need full time care when you are very old.
  https://www.sharingpensions.co.uk/ann...iate_needs.htm
  These annuities guarantee your payment for life, tax free and are good value assuming you are in your late 80s/90s - as most people in care homes are.
  The beauty of them is that you can sell your house, spend a chiunk of the money on the annuity and be sure that the rest can go to your children.You won't run out of money.Plus you are in control at the care home as you are self-funding, not dependent on the council.
  You do get what you pay for in life, one finds.
• Speaking as a child whose parents are not in the best of health, I would far rather see my parents get the best possible care while they're alive, whatever the cost in terms of my potential inheritance, than have their property 'preserved' for me.
• These options have been discussed exhaustively here: https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/....html?t=452902
  I think my views on this kind of question are well known by now, and I agree with all those who've responded so far. While I fully endorse the idea of 'putting one's affairs in order' - I've very recently seen an example of what can happen when affairs are NOT left in order!! - however a woman of 60 has still got a lotta living to do. When I was 60 I was still busy working and struggling to keep the roof above MY head, never mind thinking of leaving it to others as their 'inheritance'!
  The point about taxpayers paying for others is a good one. DH and I will soon both be 72 and we're both STILL taxpayers! Yes, I resent taxes going to enrich private business while at the same time the people on the receiving end of that private business - people such as the OP plans to be - get the shortest of short shrift, the very minimum of care and standards.
  Margaret
• Well said Margaret. I'm well over 60, working part time and paying tax so that the reckless, !!!!less and greedy can use my taxes to pay for their care.
  Ed's post is useful but it needs to be pointed out that the fees quoted for residential care are out by 50% for the north east and I guess by a similar percentage for other regions. And taking that into account the fees quoted are for a MINIMUM standard of care with fee being the MAXIMUM a local authority will fund. Double that amount for a place in a decent home with good and humane standards.
• Hi Errata
  I have seen Ј60 a day quoted for residential care, that's nearly Ј22K a year. How accurate that is, or not, I don't know. A lot will depend on how long one lives.
  Most of that cost will be for bed-and-board rather than for 'care', a bit like holiday B&B! The only 'care' you can expect in some of them is the fact that there is someone around all the time and you get your medication given to you instead of you remembering to take it. I think that's why McCarthy & Stone have jumped on to the bandwagon and are saying that, if you sell your own place, buy one of their 'assisted living' apartments, it remains yours and can be sold by your heirs when you finally turn your toes up. There may be something in that idea, and may appeal to some people. We have concentrated on modernising this 1930s bungalow and making it as convenient and easy-care as possible, and we're also still saving because we don't know what we may need in years to come.
  It's also worth pointing out that an 'inheritance' does not exist until someone is dead, and that no one has a right to an inheritance which they themselves have not earned.
  Margaret
• Current cost in north east for residential care is Ј20,800 funded by residents state retirement pension, high rate attendance allowance and any private pension with local authorities making up any shortfall.
  Many local authorities are now building intensive supported living units as a cheaper and better alternative to residential care.
  Although many offspring are unable for reasons many and various to give their parent(s) the care they may need, if the offspring are sure they will be left a substantial inheritance I simply can't understand why they don't pay for the care their parent(s) need in order to stay in their own home. The cost would easily be covered by for instance the increase in the value of property they inherit. I paid for a cleaner for my parents to make their lives easier and more comfortable, cheap as chips.
• If he/she wishes their children to have their house which they have worked and paid for, and is theirs to do with as they wish, I personally don't see why they shouldn't.
  However, I do understand the burden upon the taxpayer . This is not an easy subject, and I for one do not know the answer.
  I think the only answer, OP, to make sure that the house remains for your children, is to sign it over to them now while you are still relatively young and either live somewhere else or rent it from them at market rent. Then if you live long enough after doing this it should be relatively safe. Nothing else will save it, afaik, and even doing this does not guarantee it will not be taken.
  Be aware that if you do this then any future wife/husband of your children will be entitled to a share, and it may also be affected if any of them go bankrupt. Or they may of course, just chuck you out.
  Regarding a trust to protect it, I don't think even these are foolproof these days. You need to see a lawyer.
  What a world, when we have to jump through hoops to be able to keep our own legal belongings and not have them taken from us.
  Hope you find a way OP. If you do, let me know!
• I think, 7DWE, that the question is not whether the OP can leave her property to whosoever she wishes, of course she can. She can live comfortably in it for the rest of her life and arrange her will according to whom she wishes to inherit. That is not in dispute. What is in dispute, and the subject of the OP's post, is her stated aim to enter a care home at some future point, but not to pay for this by using her assets which may/may not include her house property.
  She may, of course, have sufficient financial resources to find the £60 or so a day (at today's prices) required for this, together with state pension and attendance allowance, without touching the house property. This would obviously be the preferred option. There are so many unknown factors here. We're not told what kind of a house it is - is it possible to live there given advancing age and infirmity, or is it unsuitable, a lot of stairs for example? We don't know whether the OP has other savings or investments. Put simply, the original question read to me as: 'I intend to enter a care home but I don't want to pay for it'.
  Useful suggestions have been made, by Errata, missile, EdInvestor and Savvy_Sue. It has nothing to do with the kind of world we live in. It has always been the case that 'you get what you pay for' and 'nothing for nothing'.
  We all have our personal perspective on this kind of question. Of course it's natural, with advancing age breathing down our necks, to consider what may happen in an unknowable future. We all have our own preferred solution. Mine does not, and will never, include entry into a care home except as an extremely last resort and even then I shall probably have to be carried off kicking and screaming!
  DH and I are still saving and investing because we do not know what the future holds and what we may need in time to come. That's simple enough. This year's project looks like being the front drive and the way down into the garden (steps instead of a slope). These projects are designed for greater safety and convenience, although the secondary effect will probably be an increase in house value. That's not why we're doing it. I applaud the OP's wish not to be a 'burden' on her family. I certainly do not intend to be a 'burden' on anyone - again, that's why we're still saving, and spending money on our comfort and convenience.
  Margaret
• One alternative to current funding of both residential and nursing care is to return to the system that existed years ago, which was completely free.
  Live on a back ward alongside 20 others in a local psychiatric hospital or a geriatric back ward alongside 20 others in a small local general hospital.
  Or move to Scotland.
  It's curious that people should not wish to 'burden' their children but believe it's their right to be a burden on the state.
• Margaret, we to intend to save if we can, but not to the detriment of enjoying our retirement. By the time we get all our pensions, (2014 for the final ones )they should amount to around Ј18000. So not a lot to play with.
  We also don't intend to go into care other than kicking and screaming.
  Only way I can see round it, especially as we will want to live in our UK house again at some point, is when the time comes to give our son a hefty deposit from the sale of our Spanish house so that he can afford a mortgage on a modest flat. (Or are you not allowed to do that either?).
  Then, if our house does eventually get taken off us, then at least he's got something. If it doesn't then he's got more than he expected.
  There is no way our son is going to be left homeless because the state dictate that we can't give him what we have bought with our own money. No way.
  We may even move to Scotland. My neice just has.
• No one is proposing your son being made homeless! You are constantly going on about 'houses getting taken off you' and not being allowed to do as you like with what you own. No one has ever said that, no one has ever threatened to take your house off you - either of your houses.
  All that has been said is that, as the OP said, she intends to move into care. Fine. Let her do that, if it's what she wants. Under present conditions - and who knows what changes may come about before she makes that move - it means she has to find a way of paying for it. Retirement pension and attendance allowance will go some way towards the cost. As Ed rightly says above 'What people need to know is how to fund the gap between the two' i.e. the gap between cost of care and pensions and allowances they're already entitled to. Getting paranoid about 'houses being taken off you' does not answer the question.
  And who ever said that 'enjoying retirement' and 'saving' were mutually-exclusive? We enjoy our retirement too. Who could avoid enjoying retirement on such a beautiful summer day as we had today, doing exactly what we like, no one making any demands on us, no one telling us what to do, just relaxing in our own garden enjoying each other's company and watching the birds being so busy bringing up their families?
  Moving to Scotland may be an option if you have no loyalty to, and no love for, your own country. Me, I could never live in any other country but England. I've visited others, lived and worked in others, but I have no wish ever to live in someone else's country. I'm too deeply-rooted in the soil of England, 'her sights and sounds, dreams happy as her day' as Rupert Brooke wrote.
  Is it really the case that all these things are free in Scotland? And if it is, who is paying for it? The English taxpayer, perhaps, under the Barnett Formula?
  Margaret
• Margaret I wasn't saying that you couldn't save AND enjoy your retirement, I was merely pointing out that my husband and I will not have a HUGE amount of money, but I'm sure we will be able to live OK.
  And actually I concede the point about paying for your care home; if the worst comes to the worst and you don't have enough money, using your home as an income is often the only way out, and this means that many homes have to be sold to do so.
  To be quite honest, the remark about 'homelessness' and the general tone of my last post were not because I think anyone IS going to take my home off me, but a mini-rant, because for the life of me I can't see why everyone doesn't think it an iniquity that it might be. We may bow to the inevitable, but no-one on here seems to have any sympathy for people who might want to keep their family home in their family and die knowing their children are well set-up. For many people, that is what they have worked and saved so hard for. And I just think it might be nice to have a little compassion for those who are worried by it and are trying to avoid it as best they can.
  As for Scotland, my husband would never consider living there - too dark and cold for his liking. But living in another country doesn't mean you have no love for your own. England will ALWAYS be my country and nothing can change that. But we wanted a few years living in this 'land of light' where the sun usually shines and we can experience another culture.
• There are differences accross the EU and it is swings and roundabouts where one chooses to live, for example pensioners are entitled to a "free" 2 week holiday in Spain. These things are NOT free in Scotland and certainly not funded by the English taxpayer - it is funded directly by those who pay council tax in Scotland.
  When I was young(er) only the megga rich could afford to subsidise their kids onto the housing ladder.