ROOF Blog

A government Green Paper on care for the elderly suggests that people may have to pay up to £20,000 to insure themselves against the cost of being cared for at the end of their lives. The number of old people requiring care will be swelled by another 1.7 million by 2026 and the cost is expected to skyrocket.

A group of care homes is planning legal action over fees they are paid by councils for looking after residents. As many as 250 care home owners are joining together to form the Fairer Fees Forum and are demanding a judicial review into what councils pay for residents funded by the state. They argue that currently the fees are ‘far below’ the cost of providing the care.

More than 60,000 homeowners are being forced to sell up each year to pay for a place in a care home, Counsel and Care reports. It says that as many as many as half of those needing care were being forced to pay the £500 a week costs from their own pocket. Anyone with savings or property worth more than £22,250 must pay their own bills, and councils have legal powers to force those in care homes to sell their houses to meet the fees. The cost of care for the elderly last year was £12 billion.

Vast differences in the cost of long-term care for the elderly have been revealed by research from Saga. Fees vary by almost 50 per cent across the UK and typically cost three times more than the average annual mortgage payment. Northern Ireland is the cheapest region for residential and nursing care, while the Home Counties is the most expensive for nursing care and London the most expensive for residential care. On average someone who requires care in a residential home will pay around £25,000 per annum. In the past decade care home fees have risen faster than inflation.

The fall-out from the credit crisis has caused problems for elderly people who are unable to release enough equity in their houses to pay for care home fees. As annual fees rise to an average of £24,500, the credit crunch has created a big problem for those struggling to sell their house to pay their fees.