Blog # 14 Fact #13 Can Aged Care Plans affect Will and Estate Plans?

There are many circumstances where any aged care planning could disturb the original intentions of a person’s will. The impact of the changes made by government in 2014 have generated a consequence that the two functions of Will and Estate Planning and Aged Care Finances should be considered together, or future problems could arise. Here is one example and there are several others:

A couple had completed their aged care planning some five years earlier and one of the couple now had to enter an aged care facility. The member of the couple that stayed at home was tragically killed in a motor vehicle accident some months later. As the home they had lived in was in joint names- the home automatically passed to the member who was residing in aged care. As the home was no longer exempt, new Centrelink figures had to be calculated. After reassessment (due to an increase in assets) the aged care resident now was asked to pay substantially more fees than what had been previously planned. This situation could have been avoided.