My mother is 81 and is very ill. Thankfully she still has a very bright mind and no memory loss. She has not presented a POA to anyone. I am very concerned for I sold my home to move in with my mother and am worried that if she passes I would be homeless. She still owes a mortgage but I need to know what needs to be done to be able to keep the home? Not sure if Mississippi has different rules or not?
If your Mom isn't on Medicaid [different from Medicare] then you shouldn't worry about the house.... unless the mortgage company has a due on death clause... otherwise the mortgage company doesn't care who is paying the mortgage. Would paying the mortgage be in your budget, especially if you went back to work?
Now if in the future Mom does need the help of Medicaid, then Medicaid can place a lien on Mom's house.
Now if Mom has a Reverse Mortgage, then that is a whole different ballgame, lot of different rules.
Oh why does getting older get so darn complicated :P
Does she have a will and is there a provision in the will for who will inherit the home.
Check out the following comments by these two attorney's as well: Expert John L. Roberts Certified Elder Law Attorney is an Estate Planning, Elder Law and Disability Law Attorney, serving clients in Hampden County, Massachusetts and....
K. Gabriel Heiser, J.D., has focused exclusively on estate planning and Medicaid eligibility planning—including trusts, estates, gifts, and related tax issues—since graduating from Boston University
Is there any benefit for putting the house in my name now, before my mother passes?
His response: If you continue to care for your mother for the two years before she enters a nursing home, and such care can be documented to show that it prevented her from going into a nursing home, then the transfer to you will NOT be deemed a gift under Medicaid rules. To avoid getting her basis in the house upon a later sale, should she gift the house to you, the deed should reserve for her the right to live in it for her lifetime. Such reserved power will cause inclusion of the house in your mother's taxable estate, giving it a tax basis equal to its value on the date of her death.
As you can see, this stuff is complicated and the rules must be carefully followed. Show the above information to a good local elder lawyer, and they can advise and
Someone on here mentioned getting older is complicated, but I must say it doesn't have to be if you prepare early. Early preparation is key to success later. I've also noticed that paying attention to things you're gifted can pay off even if you don't need them right now and I'll explain why:
You may receive a random gift of something someone else may need right now but you don't necessarily. Someone else out there could probably use it but no one around you needs it. It can be anything and if you get rid of it, it's odd how you're faced with a situation later where you wish you would've kept that item and that regret may come sooner or later. Sometimes it's best to pay attention when you get a hold of a bunch of stuff you receive by the bundle because you never know when you may need it even if it's not now. I've been practicing paying attention to stuff I receive as part of my early prep because there's sometimes a silent message from the bundle with clues we often overlook and even ignore until something happens. Your mom is very ill right now. Pay attention to what people have given her over the past months or even years. What among those gifts can she use now to help her through what she's going through? I'll give you a hint. Quite a while before I broke my ankle I received a bedside toilet. At the time I didn't need a bedside toilet and I'm glad I had the room to just put it up somewhere. Then came the night I broke my ankle and a bedside toilet came in handy. However, had it not been for the power chair, I probably would have had that bedside toilet in use. I'll probably save it for if I ever fall very ill myself and actually need it as part of in-home healthcare since I would be more mobile than I was after breaking my ankle since someone will definitely have to empty and clean it. There's no way I would've been able with a broken ankle and I'm so glad for that power chair to this day since there was no way I was going to be able to put my foot down and maintain a bedside toilet. Getting older doesn't necessarily have to be complicated if you make smart choices early on and pay close attention to silent clues around you. It's when you ignore those clothes that you run into trouble at times you can least handle it, and you never know when those times may strike. When life deals a rough hand, it's up to you to be able to properly deal with it, and sometimes having the right tools not only saves money, but it can also make your life so much easier when illness or injury hit. Another thing to consider is having plenty of money in the bank when those hard times it because you never know when you'll need that money since emergencies happen. In your mom's case, you all are concerned about the mortgage. Setting up online auto bill pay from her and will keep that mortgage paid as long as you know to pay your shelter first. Only one time in my life that I overspend to the point of accidentally spending the rent money, and didn't know what I was going to do by time I went to pay the rent. I was just a few dollars short and ended up having to take something I really didn't need back to the store so I could pay the rent. I was also paying cash for everything back then but now since that incident my rent comes first. Now I have online auto bill pay and my rent still comes first to this day. Whether you rent or own, make sure your shelter cost such as your rent, mortgage or taxes, utilities and other important expenses come first so you can guarantee a roof over your head especially during times of serious illness or injury.
Someone on here mentioned visiting an eldercare lawyer and getting POA and a will drawn up. You better find out if she has a will. If so, see if she updated it but don't coerce her. I don't know what kind of POA is sought after, but I seriously frown on financial POA, I saw what happened when a POA took over my dad's money and ended up almost causing him to lose his house as I recently found out, he owed taxes on his home. Had online auto bill pay been set up from his end, it would've been harder to cause him to get behind on his taxes because his money would've come out automatically when those taxes were due. His POA lived with him and ended up taking advantage of him because she was in not only a perfect position to do so but now we are finding clues no one else spotted when he was living. Giving someone else financial POA is actually asking for trouble, I'm currently dealing with the aftermath of that very thing right now and I can't recommend online auto bill pay enough especially after having been put into a situation of dealing with my own case of elder financial abuse against my bio dad who eventually developed Alzheimer's and had it for years before eventually dying. I can't tell you enough how I wish I could've been there and taught him some things before he developed Alzheimer's but now I'll just have to use dad's experience to warn others how important it is to protect one's own self well in advance. That way, if anything does happen you're already doing the right thing and getting those bills paid automatically
To me the biggest issue is the mortgage. If this is a traditional mortgage (not a reverse mortgage) and your mom does not right now have the $ to pay it off in full, OR does not have a big enough life insurance policy to pay it off, OR you cannot pay it off, then house will have to revert to mortgage company. It is like Pamstegma write..... mortgage co does not care about your homeless situation. But they will need to work with you or someone in the family to clear the post- death paperwork. So you might be able to work out a tenancy agreement where you live there & ensure property not vandalized while it's clearing legal and then on the market to be sold.
Now if there's $$$ & mom is competent & cognitve, she imo should do 3 things:
-Name you dpoa with document done by an atty
-Have all her banking done asap to be POD (pay on death) to you & while there she gives bank a copy of the dpoa
-Have a will done or a codicil to old will done & within names you executor and heir.
Then when she dies, $ in bank used to pay off the mortgage (your it's POD so you can do a cashiers check for mortgage pay off amount), & then you do whatever (probate, muniment of title) paperwork allowed in your state to transfer ownership to you via the terms of her will or codicil & file paperwork at th courthouse.