Combining households with elderly parents?

[Stormy Kromer]

Helping aging parents is admirable. I wouldn't consider joint ownership in any form. You mentioned a sibling.....potential problems.

Consider buying a place on your own and renting to them.

[MarieIG]

Perhaps a two family or mother daughter with your parents on the street level. Having your own space would allow for some privacy. Their apartment/ home should be handicapped accessible and have an extra bedroom should a sleep-in aide be necessary. As they age, they will likely need more assistance.

Yes, personal experience here. Even if there is an aide, it is necessary to monitor the aide(s), medications, doctors' visits, and overall condition of your parents. It is much easier to monitor if you are right there.

You may want to own the home, with your parents paying rent. They may wish to gift you something towards the down payment.

[BubbaChris]

Here's how it worked out for us:
2010 - After long discussions with DW, I pitched a shared-housing arrangement with my parents because of similar risk issues and serious physical decline. If my father could have generated cartoon-smoke out of his ears, it would have been there. He was that adamant about independent living.

2012 - DW and I had been living 30 miles from my parents. But the discussion in 2010 reduced our implied burden, so we moved out of state. We chose a location a single day's drive away, so we could (and have) respond quickly to needs on both sides of the family.

2014 - My father was hospitalized and a cascade of medical issues made continued independent living highly unlikely. My sister and BIL pitched an idea of buying a mobile home two doors down from them so my sister could easily help both parents. Part of what made this a worthy idea is that although it is an older park, they pulled a very old unit off that site and were in the process of installing a brand new one.

I agreed to the plan; however, my father died days later. The level of my sister's responsibility for our mother's care escalated as a result. At the same time, I was taking on managing the financial side of things since dad did 100% of it. It was a rough 2.5 months to get my mom moved, then months more were spent getting her place fully comfortable (e.g. adding air conditioning).

Although my sister was getting paid to help, she hired housekeepers almost immediately. And within the first year she also added home health aides too. Even with the extra help, the burden was cited by her now ex-husband as the tipping point in their marriage failing.

2017 - The overall situation was so sketchy I moved my mom to assisted living near me (400 miles from where she started). We lost at least $40K on the sale of the mobile home, as this was before the current run-up in real estate values.

Someone mentioned new doctors earlier in the thread. Getting mom setup with new doctors had a significant positive impact. We consolidated care under one group that specializes in the elderly. All prescriptions were known by the lead doctor, which lead to tapering off some meds and eliminating others because her previous specialists were only treating the one thing they were seeing her for. For a bit she was more alert and she had fewer complications. I was driving her to all her appointments, and our small-town setting meant nobody was more than 15 minutes away.

Mom died in early 2020, which turned out to be lucky timing. We were able to have my sister and niece here for her final days of hospice care. It would have been a terrible toll on all of us had the COVID lock-downs happened before she passed. Mom would have deteriorated very quickly and phone calls or Facetime would not have been an effective way to stay connected with her.

I may have noted in another thread how mom's care, the mobile home sale, two moves, etc all consumed about $400K from late 2014 through early 2020. That amount was in addition to the survivor's portion of my father's pension being enough to cover her monthly housing costs over that period.

Best regards,
Chris

[Ramen]

Thanks for the home aide suggestions and spare room idea.

Chris, sorry for the loss of your parents and the difficult care period. That's a ton of work and money that I would not be able to keep up with.

As for me buying and renting to my parents, I'm afraid it would have to be vice versa. My modest FIRE won't cover a house that size, but my parents' home equity could if we chose the right location.

Or it could cover a CCRC deposit. Some senior places here require little to no deposit, just one monthly payment for room and board. These are "active" independent living only, but they are more ADA accessible than a house, include three meals a day plus light housekeeping, have 24/7 staffing, and can facilitate any needed outside help.

The ones that are 55+ would allow me to live there too if I wanted or needed to be that close. I've heard of adult kids doing this while their parents are living there. When the parents pass on, the kids can move out or stay.

For now the biggest challenge might be getting my parents to act soon before something is forced on them. Mom had major surgery this year with a month of home recovery. I think it was a wakeup call for both of them. I was there for a week, followed by my sib from 1,000 miles away. It took all of us just to manage. All's well now, but what's next?

[TriumphTR3fan]

There have been many insightful posts about this subject. Everyone’s experience is different but eventually we all get to the same place.
It’s important to have a lengthy & forthright discussion with your parents. We went through this with my DW’s parents. We started the conversation about 10 years before they needed help & began slowly by taking them shopping or to medical appointments. It slowly changed over time as they aged. We were careful not to get involved in their decisions. They did the same for us. We were fortunate as they did not have a decline in cognitive function.
After my FIL had a stroke my DW quit her job to take care of her father. You really learn what your partner is made of in these types of situations. For us, we grew closer & it was a positive experience. It helped to have short, medium & long term plans that we talked about as their lives changed.
Please DM me if you want to talk about this in more detail. This part of our lives took over 15 years & there’s too much to share in a single post.
The relationship you have with your parents is so individual & one lesson we learned was that caring about your loved ones is much different than caring for them. Some people don’t have the right skills or temperment & shouldn’t do it. It doesn’t make you a bad son if it’s not right for you.

[BubbaChris]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ramen Thanks for the home aide suggestions and spare room idea. Chris, sorry for the loss of your parents and the difficult care period. That's a ton of work and money that I would not be able to keep up with. As for me buying and renting to my parents, I'm afraid it would have to be vice versa. My modest FIRE won't cover a house that size, but my parents' home equity could if we chose the right location. Or it could cover a CCRC deposit. Some senior places here require little to no deposit, just one monthly payment for room and board. These are "active" independent living only, but they are more ADA accessible than a house, include three meals a day plus light housekeeping, have 24/7 staffing, and can facilitate any needed outside help. The ones that are 55+ would allow me to live there too if I wanted or needed to be that close. I've heard of adult kids doing this while their parents are living there. When the parents pass on, the kids can move out or stay. For now the biggest challenge might be getting my parents to act soon before something is forced on them. Mom had major surgery this year with a month of home recovery. I think it was a wakeup call for both of them. I was there for a week, followed by my sib from 1,000 miles away. It took all of us just to manage. All's well now, but what's next?

Thank you for your kind thoughts. In our case it was a lot like how TriumphTR3fan described. DW and I knew it was a limited time period, so we made adjustments along the way. For example, multiple holiday dinners were spent at the restaurant in the resort where I worked. This was so mom just needed to be dressed for an outing and my work was limited to coordination and transportation. Now we can go back to making our own traditions.

All the money all came from my father's pension, along with their savings and home equity. My contributions were focused on love, time, and mental energy. I was grateful she had the financial resources to support extra care as needed.

The experience certainly set DW and I up to have a great understanding of things when we sat down with our attorney to define and create our trust. Since we are child-free, we've selected a nephew as our executor and my medical care agent. And we've had multiple conversations about our priorities.

The assisted living place I chose for my mom had a mother/son pair as residents. I can't say for sure, but it was likely in one of the two-bedroom units. A notable thing was that pair always dressed nicely for their visits to the dining room.

Some assisted living facilities can function like a CCRC, but many are not willing at all to cross over into the Skilled Nursing care side of things. If you do a little research you should be able to find a chart/table that describes the differences between the two types of care.

There was a period where I thought I'd have to move my mom to a memory care unit at another facility. When we had a chat with the assisted living folks, they were willing to schedule someone to get her up twice each night to use the restroom (for an extra monthly fee). Luckily that kept her in place until nearly the end. She spent a couple of months in Skilled Nursing at the end. And my niece made sure some of her belongings when to other residents of that facility to enhance their situations.

Best regards,
Chris

[Mark1]

Quote:

Originally Posted by cathy63 ...... Maybe it's better if you are the sole owner and your parents pay rent, or vice versa. Or if the caregiving becomes more like a job, maybe they pay you for that work. I don't know the answers, just that these are questions I'd be asking if I were in your shoes.

This is what we did for my DM and SD. We had DM/SD sell their house and put the money in the bank. My sister bought a house near her and rents it to DM and SD for fair market value. My sister initially wanted to charge them less than fair market valve, but I only agreed to the idea if my sister got the appropriate rent and no one subsidized them until the house money was gone. I figure the state 5 year look back would be fine provided we could show that the money was spent on rent. After a year now, DM/SD haven't even had to touch the house money yet to pay rent, as they can make rent payment on SS alone.

[Souschef]

Everyone's' situation is different. In my case my mom stayed in her condo with 24/7 aides. There came a point where she was running low on funds, but had some stock that was promised to sister's grandchildren. I told my sister I was unwilling to subsidize her grandchildren and sell the stock to take care of my mother.
When Mom finally passed, my sister got 100 % of the small estate. I had absolutely no problem with that. She was the one handling all the finances and visiting my mom a couple of times a year. She earned it.

[MarieIG]

Another thought. OP's parents buy the house, and OP lives there w/o paying rent; so as not to deplete OP's nest egg, especially if OP increasingly assists parents.

[isisdave]

DW and I are the parents in this scenario. We're barely 70 but knew eventually we'd move to be near our only child. Covid and the housing boom caused us to pull that trigger several years before we imagined.

So here we are in Evansville IN, a city of 116,000 but about 2 hours away from any other big city, so it's got a very good collection of national stores, restaurants, and two huge medical systems. But it's surrounded by very rural areas, if you prefer that. We bought a house about 20 minutes from our son, although when the house four doors down from him went on the market first, we teased we were going to buy it. He looked shocked, and unfortunately it didn't meet our needs, or we would have done it.

From my own experience with my parents, living 30 minutes away was fine until there was a health crisis, and then it wasn't. I'd get you to their town, or them to your town, or something close, while they're healthy.

Then make it so their doctor has met you, etc., so that eventually there is some familiarity. We've never lived in what we think of a small place before, and we're surprised how much this counts for. Maybe it's a Midwest thing.

Personally, I wouldn't want to be in a parent's or in a child's house if it could be avoided. There are times when we just want to avoid others, it's unfair to your child-in-law, and our mealtimes never coincide.

We know friends who bought an almost adjacent home for their parents -- imagine the two red squares in the corner of a checkerboard -- and opened up their backyards together. That has worked well.

[KarenF]

Quote:

Originally Posted by mountainsoft Combine households with elderly parents? My mom lives in assisted living. It's not cheap, but they tend to most of her needs. I only take her to doctor appointments and grocery shopping, and I wouldn't do that by choice. We were never that close to start with, and I'm clearly just her "Uber Boy". If she didn't rely on me for transportation, I would probably never hear from her (she had no contact with me for 20 years before her stroke put her in assisted living). ...

I am sorry you feel that you are just your Mom's "Uber Boy". You are a good person to still care for her. My Mom had dementia, and it was not the pleasant kind of dementia. She had to be committed to a geriatric psyche ward twice for trying to run away and hurt people. Luckily she was too small and weak to really hurt anybody. She told everybody that would listen that she did not have any children. I still visited and took her to appointments, but it was hard. At least your Mom knows who you are.

[Rusa]

First, get the legal and financial affairs in order. Wills, durable general power of attorney, medical power of attorney, HIPPA release at all doctors, living wills, POLST/MOLST forms, list of all financial assets and their locations, beneficiaries on all financial accounts and maybe you should be joint on their checking accounts. Funeral wishes.

[zippy2020]

+1, a thousand times over.

Here's something no one has mentioned: get a copy of their retiree medical benefits summary ASAP. It would be highly unusual, although not unheard of, for such retiree benefits to include any home healthcare, Dementia Care or Skilled Nursing Care.

Another factor to consider in deciding where to live: what kind of seniorcare facilities are in the area, and how well do they rate? Most states publish that data nowadays. Turnover ratio is an important qualification; the lower the better.

Non-profits give better care vs for-profits, but for-profit chains are buying up non-profits at a rapid rate. There are no guarantees an excellent non-profit facility will remain one forever., unfortunately.

[marion10]

I agree with zippy on the dementia care and not for profit. Chair lifts work until they don’t- any kind of cognitive decline and they become dangerous. I would not buy anything jointly with out consulting an eldercare attorney. My mother is in a villa home in a 55 plus community. There are no services- but it is all on one level and snow removal and lawn maintenance is taken care of. She is in a duplex and she gets along well with the lady in the other side. They text each other every morning. She drives locally, but the county she is in has excellent senior transportation and will take her into the “ city” for doctors appointments.

[Ronstar]

We talked to our eldercare attorney about future possibility of MIL moving in with us. Attorney said to have MIL pay us rent.

[Ginger15]

As an only child (now retired and married 48 years) , my father was a saver from the depression era of course. He had a blue collar job and we lived comfortably. I was NOT the spoiled brat I was called by being an only child, they made sure of that. Fast forward to 2019. Parents lived in house next door to us, in OUR retirement community. I took care of them for 12 years. They were in their 90’s, married 70 years. Mom fell and I had some health issues that I could not lift or take care of her. Reluctantly she went to a beautiful assisted living apartment. My dad had saved money to pass on to me and my children but agreed to pay the $6K a month that my mom would be taken care of and enjoy her time there. She didn’t. My dad stayed in the house next door to me which really made my illness worse (the stress) until he declined so bad missing my mother, hospice became involved. He died 6 months later. I alone sold their house and possessions and it went into my mothers care fund. Covid hit the world, I was diagnosed with cancer, couldn’t see my mom but for 4 times outside that year, and she passed this past summer. They were both in 90’s. I inherited a couple hundred thousand $$$ thanks to my dad. My husband also has cancer. We have no where to go or anything to spend it on. We have helped our adult kids out of debt a couple times so we have decided to keep the inheritance because we may need to go into assisted living/memory care sometime soon. Kids will get what’s left over. My dad would be so sad to know that his saving is going for my healthcare.
I loved my parents but them insisting on me taking care of them took a toll on my marriage and definitely my health. There was a time I was so sick I worried I would die before mom. Think of yourself first.

[2177V]

Quote:

Originally Posted by rodi Agreeing with this point. We built an ADU for my in-laws in 2007/2008. By 2013, FIL had passed away and MIL was in need of memory care. We built the ADU for the in-laws' needs (wheelchair friendly, etc.) but it now serves as a rental unit and stream of retirement income. But... if we had known that it would be used for so few years we probably wouldn't have built it. Additionally, like your parents, there was a bias to home ownership - MIL was never really comfortable living there full time, and returned to her owned home each year... I don't regret building the granny flat - but it ended up not serving the intended purpose for as long as we would have liked.

I like ADU but for another reason. If I get old and frail, I prefer not to live in a nursing home because a nursing home can cost between $6K to $8K a month.

I prefer to live my remaining life at home and hire a live-in care taker. I will let the care taker live in the ADU rent free so that I can pay the care taker about $4K to $5K a month.

This assume the care taker is not a highly skilled nurse which would cost much more. Most of the time, you will need help going to the bathroom, changing out your adult diaper, taking a bath, helping you out of bed, cooking for you, driving you to the doctor/hospital, and going shopping for you. These tasks do not required a highly trained professional nurse.

BTW I married a woman 20 years younger than me so she will be my care taker when I get old. In the meantime I have to be nice to my young wife. Therefore marrying someone 20 years younger is also an option.

[Amethyst]

Who will be her caretaker when she gets old?

Quote:

Originally Posted by vchan2177 BTW I married a woman 20 years younger than me so she will be my care taker when I get old. .

[Calico]

Quote:

Originally Posted by vchan2177 I like ADU but for another reason. If I get old and frail, I prefer not to live in a nursing home because a nursing home can cost between $6K to $8K a month. I prefer to live my remaining life at home and hire a live-in care taker. I will let the care taker live in the ADU rent free so that I can pay the care taker about $4K to $5K a month. This assume the care taker is not a highly skilled nurse which would cost much more. Most of the time, you will need help going to the bathroom, changing out your adult diaper, taking a bath, helping you out of bed, cooking for you, driving you to the doctor/hospital, and going shopping for you. These tasks do not required a highly trained professional nurse. BTW I married a woman 20 years younger than me so she will be my care taker when I get old. In the meantime I have to be nice to my young wife. Therefore marrying someone 20 years younger is also an option.

Fortunately most women (and all the women I know) have wised up to this.

[aja8888]

Quote:

Originally Posted by vchan2177 BTW I married a woman 20 years younger than me so she will be my care taker when I get old. In the meantime I have to be nice to my young wife. Therefore marrying someone 20 years younger is also an option.

have you had this conversation with her yet? I hope that was not the only reason you married someone much younger!