I am in a live in caregiving role for a lady who was my neighbor for 7 years before i moved in 4 years ago. We have known each other for 11 years total. I did some things for her before I lived here such as shopping, cleaning, yard work and some meals. Nearly 4 years ago she asked me to move in as she began to need more help. My son was still a teen at the time and moved in as well.
Back then I was working full time making a good salary. About 2 years ago it became clear that she needed more help and supervision and is adamantly against going to AL. She offered to leave me her home and had an attorney write her will to that effect if I agreed to care for her in her home until the end. At that time she also gave me POA for everything and named me as executor. She has no family at all. No one. My son and i worked opposite shifts to make sure she isnt ever alone. About a year ago she had a bad fall and we realized that she needs me here even more so I quit my job and now only work part time. This is causing me to be at a deficit every month and I'm going into debt providing for her increasing needs. I have tried to have conversations with her about the reality of the situation and that it is not sustainable. I have tried to explain inflation, cost of living increases, all the little expenses that have crept up and added up over the last 3 years. She meanwhile has a surplus of income every month due to me paying more than my fair share as well as fixing some things in her budget to save her money. She doesn't spend it on anything, it just grows in her bank account while I struggle to make ends meet. I have tried to explain that we are in this together until the end and that I need her to pitch in more. Also the house needs repairs that she refuses to spend money on but I can't in good faith spend MY money on when it's not yet my house so its becoming increasingly shabby and in disrepair. Her response to any difficult conversation is to tell me that I can find a new place to live if I don't like it. As if she is doing me a favor by letting me live here. She thinks the 2 rooms my son and I occupy at no cost make up for everything else I spend on her care and that of maintaining her household and property, not to mention all the hours of unpaid labor and lost wages from reducing to part time work. I have tried to explain the excellent deal she is getting on care by comparing what an actual paid caregiver would cost her but now she is saying I am not a caregiver, but rather a tenant. She says a real caregiver would be 24/7 by her side which is not humanly possible nor legal. Even professional paid caregivers get time off.
She also still goes to the bathroom by herself and sponge bathes herself (she refuses to let me help her shower) so insists that I'm not providing the duties of a caregiver although I do literally everything else because she cant.
I can't get her to budge on this, but I do have POA for all things- health care, legal, and financial. My question is at what point am I able to pay bills with her money instead of mine? Of course only things for her care, household, and property would apply. It adds a layer to this situation that the money in her account will also become mine once she passes, but I need the help NOW. What are my rights in this situation? What should I avoid doing?
that bank account needs to - MUST- be paying ALL costs on her property. Whether it’s by doing a ACH from the checking account or she writes a check and you mail it for her.
If she won’t do it, then either you & your Son plan a move out and forgetabtit on doing any type of financial recovery for all this. If this is it, please get a mail box rented to have all your mail forward to ahead of the move. So that you do NOT have to go back there for anything.
OR
you are ready to go hard ball on this. And if so, you need to find your own attorney to start what’s needed. If so, I’m guessing that you are:
- paying the utilities. correct? Figure out how long it takes for each of them to be shut off. Precisely the time frame on this. Those dates are your cut off dates on dealing with her.
- Have you paid the property taxes? If so find those checks. You are going to take them with you when you see an attorney. Why? Because you want the attorney to put this as a lein onto the property.
- have attorney do a personal services contract between her & you to pay you for some of your time to be her caregiver and manage her household affairs. A good lawyer will know what is considered appropriate market rates for this. Atty will also downstream this to have the tax filing needed set up with whatever CPA to tax pro their firm uses so that you & her are all good for IRS and any state tax reporting. The. The battle axe has got to realize either this is done or you are out & right before utilities are off.
as a side note, I cannot stress how important being paid something is for YOU, yes YOU, not her. By her paying you, it is giving you income & adding into your own FICA for your own future retirement and also to have enough quarters for your own Medicare. Perhaps something you have not really thought of but will be way waaaaaay important. Inheriting a house is all fabulous but if ya can’t afford it as you have crushing medical debt that’s not good.
Also
- attorney reviews the existing will. So find it and make a copy. If you don’t have it or cannot find it, I’d be real concerned that either it doesn’t exists or she’s changed it once she got you as free help. Honestly she can have it so that the attorney goes and changes the title right now to have it done to you fully as a TOD while still in her name. And she can do this on all her bank accounts as well. I’d try to have these both done. Just provides for a way for you to transfer title after death or get to use $ in those bank accounts to pay for fine and any after death costs.
On the she has no family, I wouldn’t bet on that. I could well be that the attitude she displays towards you, she has done to her family. They are all estranged. Once she dies and there are assets, someone will notice and they will come around to claim heirship. That you a total outsider did undue influence to steal their inheritance. Litigation like this is nothing but $ to attorneys. They will find an attorney willing to do this as she will have a house as an asset of her estate to pay for the bills.
How much of a Nancy Drew or Veronica Mars can you be in the house without her knowing? I’d really try to go thru things to see old photos, old letter, yearbook, old bills, as to possible family. Google is your friend on finding the past.
best of luck in making these hard decisions.
if so, are you paying that as well?
of so take all those cancelled checks to your meeting with YOUR attorney- not the one she used!
Just so you understand, there are labor laws and tax implications on what’s going on here for your “work environment”. This whole work for free room & board is a taxable fringe benefit as far as the IRS is concerned. IRS has a publication on this: IRS PUB 15-B. The labor laws revolve around wage theft as there are laws on # of hours worked still in this country. You cannot be “on call” 24/7, subject to work for her….. that’s illegal. There’s a whole cottage industry of attorneys who do nothing but wage theft types of litigation. It would be the nuclear option you could possibly use against her of she gets really ugly and vindictive with you.
But you have to, HAVE TO, have documentation. Cancelled checks, old calendar entries, old doctor appointments scheduling, receipts on errands you run and things you paid for. You need to be able to do your own forensics to establish your work time and responsibilities. You cannot just complain about being taken advantage of but establish how you were. Just to have if needed.
Hopefully once she realized you mean business and will exit, she will do what’s needed. So it never gets to that point. But to me you do want to be somewhat prepared to go more nuclear.
Now if ya cannot do this, that’s understandable. Not everyone is cut out for being hard ball. But if you exit, you do need to do things to totally CYA in advance of your leaving. You don’t want it so that she finds herself in a panic and calls the police / fire department who contact APS and she tells them this lady & her Son moved in with her and took advantage of her the poor sweet widow, type of nonsense.
Either way you need to get the hell out of there. Calling the lady's bluff and seeing the look on her face when you actually move out would be worth all the backpay in the world.
I learned over 10 yrs ago not to get involved with others problems. It started out helping GFs Mom with driving to appts. Then my GF, amputee, needed rides to appts. Then her 20 something DD needed rides to appts because GF could not drive her and DD didn't have a license. Yes, we were retired but 3x out of one week we were taking someone over the bridge to another state to an appt. At one point I asked they coordinate their appts because we were taking them to the same complex only different Doctors. What saved me is I agreed to take care of my infant grandson. So, I could no longer drive. Then, I had the care of my Mom. I would see GFs Mom and she would say "come visit" but I knew what that meant. My GF had passed and her DH 2yrs later. Leaving the Mother alone. She was an only child as was my GF. DH had died at 87 and he was the youngest of 8 children. I just knew she would start to lean on me for help. I had just got over that with my own Mom and just couldn't do it again. I also have a disabled nephew I oversee.
Having a house left to you is not worth it.
A will can be changed easily. Do you know if she's changed hers?
Your POA should work unless it requires doctors' assessment to determine that she is no longer capable of managing her own affairs.
Read the POA. Then take it to a lawyer - not her lawyer - and find out your rights.
You are POA. You need to see an Elder Law Attorney to get together a shared living expenses contract. You may need to seek guardianship. He may suggest that you need some guardianship by the state. I can't know. But this needs to be legally done and should have been LONG AGO done as far as her bills.
Now, you say you have lived and do live in her home and have lived there I am assuming FREE all this time. So you worked and had the opportunity to save I would think buckets of money. So you must have your own money? And her bills are what they are. Mortgage if there is one, taxes, her food and etc. And as POA you can pay those. So I am not quite getting the problem. But I DO think that you and an elder law attorney can work out how this should be handled. And as POA you know that her funds pay for this attorney financial support.
It may never happen, how do you know that you will get her vast fortune? You don't, anything can be easily changed. My mother changed her will 3 times in the matter of 2 years.
My mother is 98, her house was sold to pay for AL, she has enough money to last another 2 years, that is it. There most likely will be nothing left.
Take control of your life back, you may end up with nothing.
When it comes to inheritances, you can't count on them anymore.
Today.
Read this:
https://www.agingcare.com/discussions/if-you-are-going-to-become-a-caregiver-480769.htm?orderby=oldest