Should I feel guilty?
Mom's been living with me for a year. She has late stage congestive heart failure. She left her home where she was living with her 'boyfriend' of 47 years. He moved in with her 10 years ago. He'd never been married. Lived in his family home with his mom/dad/brother/sister. His brother is now in a nursing home. His sister has passed away.
I'm his HCPOA and POA. His brother's same if John dies. My mom's HCPOA and POA, and, of course, taking care of her. He controls his brother's $1 million and his own $600K. Until two weeks ago, I paid all the house bills and then gave John the bills and he paid me. I've since put all the utilities in his name. He also gives mom $500 for living in her house. I have to remind him to pay her. He still hasn't paid for August. I'm fairly certain it's because he resents having to pay anything at all. He told me, by rights, she should be paying half the bills -- after all, he says, it's her home.
I want to sell the house. John doesn't want to buy it. I just had it appraised, figuring Medicaid is going to demand a fair sale, and it appraised for $145K. If he doesn't buy the house, I want to give him notice to move -- 60 days maybe -- and put the house on the market.
I'm just not emotionally ready to handle mom's care, shoulder the responsibility of her home, and take care of my own stuff. I've had two cancers: bladder and breast. I always feel like I have one foot on a banana peel. I think many can relate to that. Every ache . . . every pain. You know the drill. My cousin is my HCPOA. We're like sisters. The idea that I could get good and sick and burden HER with mom, mom's finances, mom's home, a tenant (John), my health, my finances, etc., etc., makes me ill to think about. She is a wonderful person and says, "Maggie!! I don't care!!" But it bothers me immensely. She owns three homes herself and travels quite a lot. It would be very burdensome for her.
I'm going to tell him in the next few days what the appraisal came in at (he's expecting it), and if he doesn't want to buy it (he's 85 years old...I told him the RIGHT move is into assisted living--he won't do that), I'm prepared to tell him he has to move so I can sell the house.
Am I being unreasonable?
You are wise to get everything in order now so you can enjoy the time you have with your Mother. Best wishes!
And while I'd agree that getting a new mortgage may not make sense at age 84, if he has that much cash and savings, he could buy a small house with the fenced yard, or go into a condo (if he can find one allowing animals - they would at least do more maintenance and yardwork) for himself outright.
Just don't let the guilt get in the way of doing what needs to be done. Sounds like you are on the right track.
You're right. Letting him rent at market is an option. I thought about letting him do that, but I'm having a hard time getting him to pay just $500 on time. He's just being obstinate, though, since he has plenty of $$. The last thing I would ever do is to rent out a single family home for income. I don't want to be a landlord.
If I absolutely had to, though, that's probably my fallback position. I just don't think I'd look really "good" in landlord-tenant court trying to evict an 86-year-old man. Ha!
Is he living in Mom's house with or w/o a lease? If there's no lease, I would doublecheck your state's statutes (or a real estate or landlord tenant attorney) to confirm what you have to do to properly evict him.
I assume though that you're going to discuss voluntarily moving out with him first? I think it would just be common courtesy, but you've already developed fallback plans if he doesn't go voluntarily.
And honestly, it's not your responsibility whether he goes into assisted living or rents somewhere else. It's thoughtful of you to be concerned about his living arrangements, but that's his responsibility.
However, at his age and if I'm correct in remembering his temperament, uprooting could be unsettling and traumatic for him, so he may need some time to accept that he needs to make a change.
If he does get stubborn and you become uncomfortable about evicting him, there are some laws that deal with tenant's rights during a sale. All I can remember right now is the phrase "subject to the rights of the existing tenant" which would be in the purchase agreement.
It wouldn't hurt to doublecheck what rights he has, with or without a lease, with an attorney just to cover all bases.
As to guilt, I think you're taking a proactive, reasonable, wise and considerate position. The guilt would come later if you failed to maximize the value of your mother's assets, especially if it precluded her qualification for Medicaid if it were to be considered an income producing asset.
If I read your 2d paragraph correctly, John has enough to purchase the house for cash. But if he didn't, he might not be able to get a mortgage at his age.
I can see you don't want the responsibility of mom's house but have you thought of john becoming a legal tenent and paying a fair rent. That way he would be responsible for the ulities and Mom would just pay the taxes and repairs. have a lease drawn up so everyone knows where they stand. You would probably have a difficult time evicting him and it would be expensive if you had to take him to court and formally evict. Maybe it is also time for him to select someone else to be his POA. if he has no one a lawyer could do it. Given your precarious health that would be one less thing on your plate. I am assuming at this point you are not married and have no children. If John does agree to buy the house you could make the purchase more attractive by deducting any realtors fees you will other wise have to pay. Reall in his case he has two choices either buy it or rent it. laving things as they are are very satisfactory for him because giving Mom $500 is probably cheaper than the rent he would have to pay at fair market value.
There is absolutely no reason for you to feel guilty you will be giving him two very fair choices especially as he is not keen on assisted living and mom is not begging you to let him move in with you. just giving him notice i think is probably not the right way to go for ease of problem solving.
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