A financial guide to elderly care

Every year, elderly people who worked hard all their lives so they
would be secure in their retirement are forced to sell their property
to meet care home fees. It's a growing problem, and one that many
families will face - over the past five years, 350 Britons have had to
sell up to pay fees. Currently it costs about £33696 a year for
nursing care (and can easily top £50,000 in expensive parts of the
country). It's not surprising that many have to sell the family home
to pay for fees.

But this shouldn't always be the case. The new Daily Mail Guide
To Paying For long Term Care, written by Money Mail deputy editor
Charlotte Beugge, helps you through the funding maze which can
trap families and their elderly relatives just when they are at their
most vulnerable.

Making the decision to go into residential or nursing care - or helping
and elderly relative make that move - is not one to be taken lightly.
But you can get help.

If your elderly relative needs to go into nursing care because they are just too ill to live on their own, then the NHS should pay their nursing home fees.

However, they will need to go through an assessment with the local health authority first. Many are turned down - because unless the health authority deems that your relative needs 24-hour nursing care (rather than just help with day-to-day living) then it won't pay.

Age Concern estimates that there are more than 5,500 elderly people who are paying for their nursing home fees when they really should be met by the health authority. Unless the NHS pays, then you will have to pay the care home fees. However, if the person needing to go into care has assets of less than £22,250, then their council will pick up the bill.

This means if the elderly person going into care owns their own home, then this will count towards the total. But beware: there are complex rules governing this. For example, if one person needs to go into care but their spouse can remain in the jointly owned family home, then it can't be used when calculating the assets.

How these rules work is covered in depth in a comprehensive questions and answers section in the guide, which is sponsored by Partnership.

For your free guide, call 0800 294 6890, go online to www.thisismoney.co.uk/partnership