Where to Find Financial Help for Aged Care
If a dependent or a spouse continues to live in the family home, you won’t be able to rely on the proceeds of a house sale to fund an accommodation bond and will have to look for funding elsewhere.
It may be that children can help pay the accommodation bond – with a view to recouping the money down the track either from the eventual sale of the home or the return of the bond.
Pensions safe
The good news is that children can make regular or irregular gifts of money to a parent on a pension without affecting their parent’s pension payments.
Louise Biti, director of Strategy Steps which specialises in financial planning strategies, says the proviso is that the money must be spent.
If the money is paid into a bank account and it sits there for longer than a fortnight, Centrelink needs to be advised of the change to the bank balance and the payments will be included as an assessable asset and subject to deeming. This can affect the pension.
Source: Smart: Smart Investor - 16 December 2011
Author: Bina Brown
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