I just got back from visiting with my parents. My parents are in their 80's. My mother is extremely healthy and will no doubt live to be 100. My father is frail. He has alzheimers. The reason I went to visit was to check into their financial affairs and see if they were covered for the future. Long story short, they don't have even close to enough money in my estimation to make it through. They do have a nice house (paid for) and it's filled to the rafters with nice stuff (it's like a museum!), but bottom line if there is an issue with my father's illness or my mother gets sick, do they have enough? I don't think so.

I'm trying to research medicare. My folks do not have supplemental coverage. They have some savings and they received $1600/mo in social security. They have no other income. I want to make sure my mother is protected in case my dad takes ill and needs hospitalization. Any suggestions: books or websites I can check out? What's really sad, in checking their records I found out one of my siblings, who has more money than my parents, has been asking for and receiving large sums of money from my father (my mother was unaware) for years. The last amount was $4000 so my sister and her kids could take a trip to Jamaica. My other sister and I were flabbergasted my dad sent the money (btw this sister also lives in a nice new house, drives a mercedes and sends her kids to private school). Of course that has got to stop and I wonder if there is some way a stop can be put on checks to someone if my dad keeps writing them checks for money. My dad's mind has not been sound for at least 10 - 15 years.

Anyway was a sad trip. My mother had a rude awakening and I hope she will now watch what my dad's does with their money. Before this week, my dad was handling all the finances. My mother knows he is sick, but since he always handled everything she didn't think about it. It was also a rude awakening for me as well. I wish I had sat down with my parents 10 years ago and talked to them about money. It may be too little too late. Just something for us all to think about. No one likes to talk about it but it is something so necessary to do. My dad thought they had alot of money. Yes, maybe in 1970 it was alot but not now. Anyone else been through this with their elderly parents???

and will live to be 100 ......... never tell your plans to God. However there is a good lesson in this for 50+ about couples and money. How many of our parents had one or the other handle everything financial and when the accountant in the family dies or is sick, chaos ensues? We own a small biz and I made my wife come in one day a week for 2 years so she would have some idea what we do if anything happened to me.
Not here cup of tea but I think she knows enough to not get hozed if she had to sell the business.

My wife has MS, I'm going blind....we are facing the same difficult situation
though further down the road. My options are: go insurance poor trying to
protect my assets which in my case would eventually drain my assets, or
just live my life and deal with the future when it happens. We may or may
not need protection from Health Care expenditures. Insurance is a crap shoot
at best. I hope some good answers show up in this thread, perhaps it would
help me through some of those restless nights.

Thanks for opening this subject up here on the forum. I believe many of us
could learn a few things here as a result of your questions.

Pam, before this thread gets too crowded with answers and people talking about declaratory hearings of non mentis compos (sic) for your father, you should review your states medicaid qualifications and exempt assets for a surviving spouse living in the home. When the funds run out this is a last resort for someone needing long term care. And dependent upon the asset base, start thinking about trusts. If their savings are over $100M, you need to get legal advise from a competent estate planner familiar with Medicare and state medicaid.

Consider a government guaranteed "reverse mortgage."

Never have to pay it off until the home is sold, it can provide significant income.

https://www.aarp.org/money/revmort/

It is very common for parents to give money and other considerations to their children disregarding that they cannot afford to do so. It may be blind love, Alzheimer's, Dementia or lack of common sense which is in short supply anyway.

My wife and I are 66 and healthy of mind and body as far as we can tell. We are not assuming this state will remain so forever. The solution is estate planning with a trust account. We are setting this up with a Financial Adviser, Lawyer and our son as equal partners. This way I or my wife cannot deplete our estate due to Dementia or other mentioned factors.
Problem is that most people do not like to give up control and most people do not know whom to trust.

Reverse mortgage is a suggestion I know of and there are Government programs which need to be researched.
I would worry that this father will mortgage the house in a fit of compassion for this favored child. That is tough to stop unless you can declare him mentally incompetent. That cost money too.

I know of a case where such a man gave that kind of money to a Mistress. It was called a business investment to make designers candles.

You should consider funding long term care insurance for your mother. Otherwise, she will have to deplete all assets and go on medicaid. I am not an expert in this area at all. In my minimal understanding in this, there are just two groups of people that don't need long term care insurance, the rich (they have enough assets to easily fund their needs, no one thinks Bill Gates will run out of money) and the broke (they go on welfare/medicaid). Everyone else needs it. Don't know you can get it for your dad given his current situation, but at least get it for mom. And at least at this point, mom can take care of dad. Who will take care of mom at some point in the future?

Some legal declaration for your father seems in order. Better to do while your mother enjoys good health. You never know when that can change. And such a change can come quick! In my case, both of my parents suffered from dementia. Not many good choices at that point....

As far as stuff, at some point, it can/should be converted to cash. Perhaps one of the "good" siblings could help them on ebay, or whatever, to start selling stuff off. I have started to use the rule: "have I touched the item in the last two years?" No matter how emotionally "attached" I think I am to some item, some trinket, the fact that I had stuff in a box, untouched since I left for college (a long time ago), is a clear signal that this stuff is just not that damn important. Better to have fewer, important (to you) items, than a house full of stuff that you never look at, never touch. And what a gift to the next generation, if each of us deals with most of our stuff, rather than force the next generation to deal with it.

Be careful on reverse mortgages. Unfortunately, a large percentage of reverse mortgage recipients immediately flip the money into high cost/low benefit financial instruments (like some annuities). +1 on AARP has some good info in this area.

Again a very superficial analysis on my part.

I take care of my 92 yo mother. She has good insurance but Medicare really takes care of almost everything. As far as giving away money goes, I have fairly clear feelings about parents and their money. If it seems appropriate for you to ask for Power of Attorney, then do so. If they don't want you to have POA, then you are off the hook as far as the money goes. This is a decision they make and, imo, you needn't agonize over the decision they make.

Thanks all for your responses. I have alot to research. No doubt I will be going back home (to Mississippi) in the near future to address some of these issues. I do need to do some research about Medicare and mediaid. My understanding is that medicare will force my parents to delete all their money for it to kick in. That would be devastating, at least to my mother.

Alot of tough things to address. All I really want to do is take care of myself and ride my bike...

Does Medicare or Medicaid differ from state to state? I am pretty sure my parents and uncle take advantage of it, but certainly idd not have to give up all their money.

Get in some good rides, BCIpam... a nice ride is good therapy!

You might consider getting a power of attorney. Then you can go to the bank and get yourself signed onto your folks accounts, thus enabling you to pay bills/monitor spending via internet wherever you are. I found myself in a similar situation after my dad passed away, and soon discovered my nephew had bilked my mom out of nearly $60K, and that mom was co-signed on his new truck, which he promptly defaulted on. So she ended up doing the reverse mortgage thing and there isn't really much down side to that deal for the older home-owner. The only people who might get shorted are the heirs (you) because when she passes the house goes right to the lender. Or you can sell it for more than the loan and keep the difference. Anyway - good luck to you and your folks.

I think you have medicare and medicaid mixed up a bit (or maybe I do). Medicare is the medical care provided to senior citizens. Medicaid is basically welfare medical care. To qualify for that, you basically have to be broke, lots of rules to prevent hiding assets, etc... Medicaid provides for long term care, at select nursing homes (select does not mean good, select means those that choose to accept government payment).

+1 would seriously consider a reverse mortgage. Do some research, it may help.

Agree: look into reerse mortgage.
Remove dad's name form checking account and let mom/you handle finances. Keep your sister out of it.

My heart goes out to you.

With your dad's alzheimers it seems that it would be easy to close the account and open a new one in your mother's and your names for their protection. Let the pampered sister know that she will be receiving bad checks from an empty account if he writes another one from that checkbook, and let her know you and Mom are wise to her. I wonder if there is any legal action you could take to protect your dad from doing that.

Hang in there; focus your energy on looking for the best solution to protect your parents.

Medicare is for old people. Medicaid is for poor people. Medicare is run by the federal government, but Medicaid is administered by the state governments. https://www.cms.hhs.gov/

Medicare, I believe, is Federal Government run health insurance paid
for in part from deductions from each participants (anyone 65 and over)
Social Security. The Medicare part D is the tricky part, run by private
insurance companies under Federal regulations and whos costs vary
from carrier to carrier and state to state. For fund D, it's all about
what meds you're taking.

A lot of good info on-line.

Medicare Part B is partly funded through premiums paid by the participants, but there's no charge to them for Part A.

Part D is still a federal program, rather than state run. The charges to the participants vary wildly, though, depending on which insurance company and which plan they choose.

Much better explaination. Thank you.

It might also be a good idea to see if the place where you parents bank offers some free advice on estate planning, medicaid/medicare etc. Also, some senior centers have programs that help retired folks understand their options. Finally, I my grandmothers case, I scheduled an appointment with the local medicaid administrator (we have one in a town of 20,000) and she was very helpful in going through the rules etc.

Hope everything works out okay.