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You need to sell her home and use those proceeds to pay for her memory care, and when those funds run out you apply for Medicaid for her, and they will continue to pay if your mom is still alive at that point.
I don't think you realize just how difficult it is to care for someone with dementia 24/7. Right now she has lots of people caring for her, and if she were to come live with you, it will be only you providing that same 24/7 care and you will have no life what so ever.
So no you should not buy any house using your moms money under the guise that it's because you want to now care for her. Medicaid will definitely frown at that, and penalize her if and when she would need them in the future.
Someone in the family reported it, and she went to jail for 5 years.
Be VERY careful. Consult an attorney.
2. Second, depending on what state your mom would be living in at the time that she needs to obtain Medicaid, your mother may well be rendered ineligible for Medicaid for up to 5 years by virtue of any gift(s) of money or real estate. California Medicaid does NOT penalize any such gifts made on or after 1/1/2024. But I do not know any other state that does not penalize such gifts.
3. Further, you could possibly be held liable for financial elder abuse for such gifts in civil court and/or in criminal court, even though you are her financial agent doing what you think is in her best interest.
4. It is very important to see the value of keeping her care in a high quality professional care facility catering to people with dementia. Caring for a person with dementia at home becomes increasingly demanding as her symptoms progress. It becomes an exhausting full-time job that will turn into a 24/7 job. Few family members have the professional skills to handle that care proficiently. And few humans regardless of their professional skills can handle any 24/7 job. Most of my clients who did that full-time care for a family member at home could not go on after a certain point, and they ended up way over their heads and compromising or ruining their own health. Their loved one also received poorer quality care by the loving caregiving family member(s) than the ill family member would have received at a quality facility. For example, in one case, it became impossible for the wife AND the son to keep their loved one clean because the loved one refused basic hygiene to be provided by the caregiving family members, but once the loved one went to a facility, their skilled caregivers were able to work with him to keep him clean.
5. There are so many risks involved in your proposed plan for dealing with your mom’s home. It would be best to contact me up with a long term plan of care under the guidance of an experienced elder law attorney to evaluate your mother’s DPOA and any trust, the options, future Medicaid eligibility, the sale of your mom’s home, capital gains tax consequences, the best way to achieve your goals. You can pay the attorney out of your mother’s funds as her agent.
6. What might be the best thing that only you can give your mom is to visit her on a daily basis in a high quality facility to watch over her care and to give her lots of love. If the facility knows you are coming every day, the caregivers will make sure that your mom is up, fed, cleaned, and dressed. You can and should read her chart, get to know her caregivers, ask them questions, find out how she is doing, and give her lots of daily love, even if and when she no longer recognizes you.
7. So I would say, try to decide where you want to live, and move your mom to a quality facility close to you. And use her money and any sale proceeds to be able to afford quality professional care for her so that you can oversee her care and remain the big provider of unconditional love that only you can give. Best of luck to you. Your heart is in the right place.
This is a legal Fiduciary responsibility that is held to highest standards under the law. You have a right to get expert advice about something you are doing for your mother as her POA. So do see an elder law attorney so that you more fully understand your roles as POA and its powers and limitations.
Depending on where you live, and you find you need to hire 3-shifts of caregivers, it could cost you $20,000 per month, yes per month. That's the amount my Dad paid when he need around the clock caregivers a few years back. That will bite into your Mom's savings a heck of a lot faster than her $6,700 cost in Memory Care.
Do not touch Mom's money to purchase a house. There is always a chance that your Mom may need to go back to a nursing facility, later under Medicaid. And Medicaid may consider whatever $$ you use to buy a house as "gifting". That means Mom will have to come up with the money to pay the facility as Medicaid will not kick in until the gifted amount is reimbursed. See how complex this can be.
As for selling the house, purchasing another and moving your mom in to care for her 7x24 - I did this with my dad (not the sell and buy part, but everything else), and did ok while he was doing ok. But then he had a BIG health event, and even though I had 8 hours of respite care a week (1 4-hour respite care worker shift twice a week), I only got 4 hours of sleep per night. It was unsustainable. I am smart, capable, and aware - and at the end of that timeframe (8 months), I could hardly put a sentence together.
I really advise against taking care of your mom on your own - no matter how capable you are. My dad ultimately needed to be closer to medical services and facilities, so we found a wonderful AL where we visited him 3-5 times a week. And staff to care for him - there were at least 4 ppl per shift who replaced the 1 of me.
It has taken me well over 2 years to regroup after this. While I am grateful I got to help my dad, it was diminishing returns for him, and for myself. As I stated above, I was losing the ability to function well and putting my own health at risk, and Dad wasn’t getting the quality of care he needed.
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