I've asked a few questions on this forum, but I'm going to try to sum it all up.
First of all, let me say that my mother has never been a 'mother' to me or my four siblings. Since I can remember, she has been a hateful, jealous, selfish person who never spent time doing anything for, or with, her children. She only likes people who suck up to her. She has five grandchildren. The only one of them she ever liked was the one who was a con-artist with honey dripping from his forked tongue. Since my father's death almost 20 years ago, she gave this adult grandchild (and his mom) SO much money over the years it is unfathomable.
9 years ago, my mom was giving out inheritances. Everyone got a fairly large sum of cash except me. She asked me if I wanted cash or the 12 acres that remained of the farm I grew up on (since I was 5 y/o) and still live on. I'm now 52 y/o. I definitely wanted the property for sentimental and privacy reasons. She said, "It's yours."
Less than a year later, the fork-tongued grandson decided he wanted to live on the property. She let him put a trailer about 40 yards from my house. He laughed in my face and told me he was going to get the farm from her. He and his pregnant girlfriend terrorized me for several years, even turning my mom against me. I'll leave out the details, but they eventually had to move. My son now lives in the trailer with his family. The F-T grandson moved into his mom's rental property, and my mom moved into his basement. They continued to get money from her, although they did not check on her downstairs or do anything for her.
After my sister and I discovered the conditions my mom was living in (urine-soaked bed, feces on the floor, etc), I brought my mom to my house in January to live. I have lived alone for years, so it is an ongoing adjustment. I'm in college full-time in the nursing program. I will graduate in 1 year. My mom is incontinent, but the feces issue is over due to her eating good food now.
I have asked my siblings to take mom "for a day" to give me a break. I've had her for 6 months and no one has taken her even once. Of course, they all have lots of advice to give. One sister is accusing me of not doing anything for mom, and says that mom is "no problem for you."
I can barely handle mom now. The urine odor has permeated my home. I have to force her to take a shower and change clothes. She's very overweight, but keeps going to the store to buy junk food. She can drive to the store, but she does nothing in the house except make messes for me to clean up. She won't even put her plate in the sink when she gets up from the table. And, I know this sounds trivial, but she makes strange noises (intentionally) all the time, which is very annoying. I have NO peace in my own home. My concern is that one day I won't be able to take any more, and she'll have to go to a nursing home. The property is still not in my name, and I'm afraid I'll lose it to the nursing home. I don't know if I can stand this for 5 years.
All of my siblings have a lot more money than I do, but no one helps in any way. I feel like I have to keep mom here if I want to keep the property that should have been given when she gave everyone else their inheritance. If she were to live with anyone else, they would send her to a nursing home asap and have no problem with selling the property to pay for it. How do I continue to cope AND keep the land I've lived on my entire life? It isn't worth a lot of money, as most of it is flood plain. It's the sentimental value to me.
Ask her if she will quit claim deed the land she promised you so that you can pay the taxes and insurance on it. You need to do this before she is considered incompetant. Do you have POA? If not, you need to get this done as well. Does she have a normal doctor? Can he prescribe home health care. Remember if she gives away property, you will have to wait 5 years before beginning the application for medicaid if that is the future plan. Good luck!
If your mom gave you the house right now, you'd have five years of exposure. If you don't take care of her for those five years, whoever does may will switch everything up and you still won't get it.
There's no accounting for sentimental value. Read your second paragraph and then tell us just what sentimental value this property has. Yikes!
What means the most to you? Your pride and peace of mind? Or the land? When you honestly answer that, you'll know what to do.
My mom gets her mail at the property in question. It borders my property. I'm desperate to save the land. I read somewhere that if a caregiver child lives in the home and takes care of the parent for 2 years, thus preventing the parent from going to a nursing home, the property is exempt from the 5 year look-back period. Has anyone heard of this?
She does not have a doctor, as she refuses to see one. She thinks she will just die here and everything will be taken care of. I'm afraid she'll become an invalid, and I won't be able to take care of her anymore. She has to be over 300 lbs. I'm barely 130 with no other help.
This land thing. Your home for 47 years, so many memories, all your roots…
I do get that. I'm in the process of sorting my mother's things, that she carted with her round the world from one posting to another. Each pile of journals and photographs that I carry out to dump forever is breaking my heart. And, speaking as an army brat, I would SO love to have one place I belong to - it was meant to be here, the house we moved to six years ago, but that's another story…
The thing is. How many of those memories are happy? How much of the sentimental value is hope of happiness, rather than happiness secured and treasured?
The thing is. Based on what you've told us, the one really shining light I see is your training and your path to a secure, fulfilling career. Everything else is so tangled up with your mother, who again I won't presume to comment on, and so fraught with nightmarish difficulties that…
Could you just sit quietly somewhere and think, really deeply and in detail, about how life might go on from here if you were free of that land and its commitments?
CountryMouse, The memories are good ones. Growing up here, hunting & fishing, working the fields, swimming in the pond, chasing fireflies, raising animals, playing in the creeks, catching frogs, etc, etc. It's the only home I know. I look across the field and can see the barn my father built. I raised my children here, and now my son is raising his children here, too. I moved away once, but longed to be back on the farm. I vowed to never leave it again.
The really sad thing is that my father left my mom more than enough money and assets to live very comfortably for the rest of her life, but she has squandered it away and now has less than 10k and only part of the farm left.
She had less than 5k when she moved in with me, but that is growing b/c her grandson doesn't have access to her money now.