O/T: Need urgent advice on where to buy a home for elderly relative

Thanks for your advice.

I just want this relative to find something useful to keep her active and occupy the mind. It is very easy for the elderly to settle into a sedentary routine and waste away.

You have no idea! Yesterday I endured 18 hours of shouting and backstabbing venom from all sides. I just sat there quietly - if I told them I didn't want to hear it anymore my newfound life role as a family therapist would be gone and they would take it out even harder on each other. At one stage I thought I would have to call an ambulance.

Kristen

This relative is old and doesn't have any health insurance. In the UK she has two children who actually care about her welfare to take care of her, plus the NHS. My employment situation is fluid but the other child is a consultant in a hospital in, ironically, geriatrics.

She has relatives in other Anglo and Asian countries but they are either indifferent to her plight or are from the wrong family "faction".

Kristen

I thought about the possibility, but always assumed they would cost more given you're also paying for the price of the caretakers.

In Asian culture from where I'm from it is basically considered a big gesture of disrespect to let one's elderly be taken care of by someone else; the duty should always fall to the younger generations. "Old folks homes" are often used disparagingly and considered a sign of abandonment.

She isn't a British citizen, so I wouldn't want to presume to seek too much charity from HMG. If she needs healthcare she could use the NHS but it is really a matter of trying the most we can do before seeking charity.

Kristen

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There is complete flexibility of choice as long as the home meets my aforementioned criteria. The mobile homes shown in the link by nightjar look alright and certainly dispel my impression of a caravan home.

Ideally as I will be buying the home for the relative I am looking for a place with resale or rental value when she passes on.

Kristen

ty. You then pay

No I don't have to buy. I would just like the freedom to leave the house empty, full of memories, when this relative passes on with no urgency to pack up everything and let a stranger move in. Or to move in myself as a vacation home but not stay too long to be saturated with bad memories.

The relative is about 70.

Kristen

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Sadly I think things have festered to the point that reconciliation will not happen. Fights are almost inevitable when the factions are under the same roof and are sometimes physical.

Divorce, children being disowned, wills being rewritten, smashed glass, banging/slamming doors, broken doors, early morning/bedtime yelling, physical blows, police reports, locksmiths being called in to fix door locks inside the home, marriage counsellors (what a joke), "other" women, childhood abuse/neglect and so on.

Believe me I wish it were possible. It would be so much better if everyone could just get along but I think for everyone's health it is better that they live apart.

One thing I learnt from this is don't divorce and/or marry a divorcee. The relational complexities it adds is unreal.

Kristen

One option that no-one has suggested so far is a flat in a block designed for old people. This has the advantage of not being in a rural area. Though lots of people retire to the country it is only ever for a limited period. Rural areas have poorer services, especially health, as money is syphoned off them to subsidise services in cities. There are practical problems as well. There is little or no public transport. Once the old person has to give up driving he or she is cut off. Villages are losing shops, post offices and pubs so you can't be self-sufficient. Many have holiday and second homes so have few able bodied permanent inhabitants to keep an eye on others. Ambulances take much longer because of the distances and hospitals being centralised. I live in the country and love it, but I know that sooner or later I will move back to a city, in my case a good one, being Norwich.

To buy a second-hand 'over-55s' flat in Norwich at the moment costs about 80 to 90 000 UKP. The UK market is very low. I know because a friend has one for sale. Management fees are about 1600 UKP a year and there is ground rent of about 300 a year. For that you would get maintained grounds, communal meeting area, secure entries and a daytime manager. Please note this is *not* a sales pitch. I am just giving you some facts that I happen to know. Of course if you were interested....

Good luck with your relative. It's a very difficult time and you will need to plan for when she needs nursing care.

Peter Scott

I am assuming that this elderly woman's other daughter won't be able to assist financially. I will know more when she arrives home next week - this arrangement is best dealt with in person.

I'm not sure how long it will take divorce proceedings to give the relative assets to live on but as usual I tend to assume the worst.

Kristen

A flat is alright but I just think this relative has been so aggrieved by her loved ones that living out the rest of her years in a peaceful, rural area is best for her. However, it may also be helpful for her to find new friends to reach out to so I suppose there are pros and cons of each, and in the end the decision may be made on the basis of what I can afford.

Yes, please send a link if you have one, or an email with an attached document to me describing the flat. Give it the same title as the NG OP as I get quite a lot of junk mail.

Sadly this recent family episode happened when another relative was hospitalised due to a hip fracture. It brought the disparate factions of the family together from across the world and conflict ignited. Private hip replacement surgery by a good orthopaedic surgeon will cost you about GBP350 in SE Asia, 24 hour nursing about GBP30 a day. Family peace and love though, is priceless.

Out of curiosity how much will those medical expenses cost privately in the UK?

Kristen

Unrealistic almost anywhere.

Many of those areas are priced out of the market for first-time buyers because of holiday homes.

Those rural areas have an unexpectedly high cost of living.

- no mains gas, LPG or oil or electric mean higher heating costs

- poor or non-existent public transport, higher car or taxi usage

- local shops (where they haven't closed down) suffer high transport costs for goods, small customer base, higher prices for essentials

- low population density means poorer public service provision

Unlikely to happen in one of those rural areas

Churches tend not to be so involved with social services here as in some other countries. It's assumed that local authorities will provide services such as meals-on-wheels (a daily meal delivery), emergency wardens who respond to alarm calls, and home helps (who help with some housework).

Caravans/mobile homes get discussed. A couple of points:

1. They're of different construction to conventional housing and may be less easy to adapt with ramps, shower rooms etc. They have a limited lifespan and so tend to depreciate rather than appreciate. (They don't benefit from increasing land values because they only rent the land they're on.)

Not all are constructed/insulated for year round occupancy, even if they're located on a park that allows year-round use.

1. Residential home parks can have quite stringent conditions attached as to external gardening, appearance, pets, etc.
2. Residential home parks can prohibit homes over a certain age being sited on the park. This doesn't usually require eviction on the day the park home reaches 10 or 20 years of age, but after that date the tenant (or the beneficiaries) could not sell the home as sited on the park, it would have to be sold for being removed from the park and resited at the buyer's expense elsewhere. This would significantly depreciate its value as there's a fairly limited market out there for unsited park homes.
3. Residential home parks can have restrictions on tenants eg over-50s only, and can have agency contracts written into the plot rental, so you have to use the park as your selling agent when you want to sell your home and pay them (quite a generous) commission. This is less common than it used to be, but buying a park home and renting a plot does careful research specific to park homes.

Owain

Hip Replacement £5900-8900 according to

ment/ At home nurse from an agency, about £15 per hour

Owain

================================================ I was quoted £8000-00p about 6 years ago for private so the figure of £350-00 (even adding extra costs for travel if necessary) looks like a real bargain.

I opted for NHS which was entirely satisfactory and free.

Cic.

As others have said, buying a quality palce is difficult. Search in our area comes up with this.

But you may be better renting.

I have an elderly relative in her mid 70s. She sold up a few years ago and moved into a flat in a small town near to her local church. The flat is alarmed and adapted for the elderly but other than that she is not botheredby any officialdom. Spends most of her time helping out with dinner groups and church charities.

At 70 you are probably looking at 15 years max before your relative is deceased or needing assistance with daily needs.

Ha! Try telling that to my wife's 96 yr old aunt who lives alone and won't have social service help

Echo the sentiment.

Tim

What are the rules for NHS and non-citizens?

£3.5k upwards for the op. £10 per hour upwards for the care. And it is getting more expensive all the time.

You can find homes selling for less than 50k. However, you will need to be extremely flexible on area and possibly willing to buy something of non-traditional construction (ie, prefab, concrete block & hanging tile houses etc.) and state of repair. Or a terrace in a poor area in bad condition. It may be better to buy a £40k house and spend £10k on work, but that may not be possible if you're not reasonably local.

One thing I can tell you that is good news is that my mum recently employed tradesmen to do a minor refurb on a property, and was taken aback by how many people quoted for the job, and how low the prices were. Now is the time to refurb properties at a knockdown rate. She used a website to advertise the job - I'll try and get the address.

I'd be amazed if you can get anywhere with a garden in a good area for that sort of money. My old downstairs neighbour had 2 bed maisonette with a nice garden, and lived on the outskirts of one of the best areas in Nottingham, close to shops and the church but with fields within a few hundred yards. I would guess at her property being worth at least £100k, and that's leasehold... The less good areas of Nottingham (or pretty much any UK city) are pretty grim.

I'd also be amazed if you can find anywhere that isn't extremely rural (ie, highlands of Scotland) where people still leave doors unlocked.

You need a large town or city for that. I live in a small town at the moment. There is one supermarket. Everything is far more expensive that it should be. Buying clothes or anything more exotic than a bulb of garlic requires travelling to another town.

A useful resource is

Put in a UK postcode and it will give you the nearest doctors, dentists, hospitals, as well as the local crime figures, profile of the neighbourhood etc.

Owain