Fair deal or nursing home support loan

R

Rhodeboy

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Hi everyone, Could some body please explain difference between the above. My wife's mother, 86 years old suffering from severe dementia plus heart issues, is moving from hospital to nursing home.
She has income of 2500 eur per month
House in her sole name as husband is dead valued at 320000 eur
Savings of 110000 eur
My wife applied for fair deal but was told yesterday by HSE she does not qualify as she is above threshold. HSE are now suggesting she applies for nursing home loan instead.
Surely criteria are the same?? Any advice greatly appreciated.
 
One is an assessed subvention; the other is a loan which is repaid on death of the recipient. As the max payable is 22.5% of the house valuation, it's worth considering.

The expectation is to use savings towards the nursing home cost.
 
Rhodeboy said:
My wife applied for fair deal but was told yesterday by HSE she does not qualify as she is above threshold. HSE are now suggesting she applies for nursing home loan instead.
Surely criteria are the same?? Any advice greatly appreciated.
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From what you posted your MIL’s assessed contribution would be a bit over €53K annually or just over €1K weekly. Many nursing homes, particularly outside of Dublin would charge less than this amount, so she could be above the threshold.

Check with whoever said she did not qualify. I thought even if you were over the threshold, one could still be in under Fair Deal, without applying for the optional loan. It just meant initially anyway you were paying the full cost. If this can be done, once in you can apply to be reassessed every year, with savings reducing you might get some benefit after a year or two. Also after year 3, the €460 weekly assessed on the house would be disregarded, reducing your contribution substantially and indefinitely.

If you have to apply for the loan to get in under Fair Deal when over the threshold, it might be better to pay privately for 1, 2 or 3 years and then apply for Fair Deal, crunch the numbers. Any time paid privately counts towards the 3 year disregard on the family home. So say applying for Fair Deal after 3 years, you would then only be assessed on 80% of income and 7.5% of whatever savings are left (Allowing for the €36K disregard). Your MIL’s payment would then be substantially less than the actual cost indefinitely.
 
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