Would you lie to preserve your money?

[flowerseverywhere]

So, I was talking to a fellow at the food bank today (volunteer, not customer). He gets VA care and just got out of the hospital. He’s in his 80’s. He and his wife apparently have almost no assets because they sold their house to the kids cheaply when the real estate market crashed, helped put the grandkids through college, and now they pay the kids rent. You’d have to really trust your kids!

so true. One of the things in my friends plan was that if all the assets were in one spouses name, the ex spouse with no assets could be in trouble. What if the one with the assets started having mental issues, or dementia. They could do something crazy like change the will to someone else, or leave all their money to a cat shelter and the assetless (kind of a crazy word) spouse could have little recourse, if any and would be screwed if the ex spouse died if they needed the house to live in, say. Would require trust and luck.

[jp1]

so true. One of the things in my friends plan was that if all the assets were in one spouses name, the ex spouse with no assets could be in trouble. What if the one with the assets started having mental issues, or dementia. They could do something crazy like change the will to someone else, or leave all their money to a cat shelter and the assetless (kind of a crazy word) spouse could have little recourse, if any and would be screwed if the ex spouse died if they needed the house to live in, say. Would require trust and luck.

Yes, the risk for the one with no assets just seems too great. I can see splitting the assets and going through with this plan as iris lily mentioned, but not the original idea. Radiolab did an interesting episode a while back about a woman with parkinson's disease who developed a crazy gambling addiction as a result of the way a drug she was taking screwed up her brain. Imagine if that happened to the spouse who had all the assets in their name.

[Teacher Terry]

Flowers, you have to be able to account for where the $ was spent.It sounds like your question would be one for a lawyer. If the home you choose has other Medicaid patients they can't dump you. If they take Medicaid they must keep you once you go on it. I was careful to place Diane in one that did because I knew as her care increased we would not have the extra $. As a past SW my advice is to trust no one and never put all your $ into anyone else's hands. Things can and do go wrong.

[iris lilies]

Catherine asks about long term care i surance.

At your age, 66, the ship has sailed to buy it. It is very expensive now at your age, and besides there are not a lot of financial gurus recommending it for various reasons. Limited availability, sky high costs, and decreasing benefits are the main reasons.

It served my mother well, but she bought it in the ?1980’s. It paid for half of her nursing home costs for five years. Her income covered the other half, and she didnt have to spend assets until the last year before she died.

[ApatheticNoMore]

Catherine asks about long term care insurance.

At your age, 66, the ship has sailed to buy it. It is very expensive now at your age, and besides there are not a lot of financial gurus recommending it for various reasons. Limited availability, sky high costs, and decreasing benefits are the main reasons.

as I understand it it is not a practical answer for most people, it's often notoriously hard to collect (so that you hear of people who paid for years and years and can't collect when they need it), you have to steadily pay into it for years and it is doubtful most people's incomes will be that steady etc.. So getting fake divorces to pass down an inheritance is a practical answer for most people? Well no, not really.

[Rachel]

This is exactly why my partner and I will not marry. Too risky at our age.

[Teacher Terry]

It actually was a benefit for my husband and I to marry 15 years ago as we now are entitled to each other’s pension.

[Yppej]

Would you steal to preserve your money?

As a child I remember my mother complaining that a colleague and her husband, both working in professional jobs, were deliberately not repaying their student loans because at the time there were no consequences. She said that this debt burden fell on the taxpayers.

Later the government changed this. First they allowed garnishment of income tax refunds. When that didn't work well enough they passed additional laws. For instance, now student loan debt cannot be discharged in bankruptcy.

Did this make people pay? Not enough, so along came loan forgiveness programs and our deficit looms. I care because I do have a child who will inherit this mess.

Would you not repay a loan if you could get away with it?

Suze Orman really impressed me because she paid back loans she legally did not have to, and well before she was rich or famous.

[jp1]

Personally I'd vote out any politician I could that gave mega tax breaks to the wealthiest among us and do everything I could to point out how they try to pit everyone against each other with faux outrage over minor differences in the style of "mommy, his piece of cake is bigger than mine!" argument.

[Yppej]

Comparing cake to cake is one thing, but this is more like apples and gorillas.

$170,000 is more than I paid for my house and every car I have ever owned combined.