Will Hoilday Inn allow you to bring in your most cherished furniture? My grandmother just moved into an 'assisted living home' and it is just like an upscale hotel with all the services and amenities they provide. Besides the services listed above, they also have a hair and nail salon, 24-7 nurses, mail boxes, and an on-site pharmacy. They also have frequent outings and activites. More services are available when extra care becomes necessary, and you don't even have to switch facilities. I'm not sure of the daily cost, but it is a beautiful place and she has decorated her own room with her most lovely furniture and artwork. I don't mean to sound defensive, but not all 'retirement homes' are like an extended stay hospital room.

Asking questions isn't a problem. But be careful you're not 'putting the cart before the horse'. When positing questions about hypothetical situations, the problem is that the answer is not always placed in context. There are way too many people who do not understand the difference between state laws and federal laws concerning the elderly and inheritance issues, in addition to the separate issues of Medicare vs Medicaid. Because of this, a public forum is only going to be of very general use, which may or may not be applicable in a real-life situation. One important thing most people don't realize is that there is a variety of different types of licensed and unlicensed facilities. True, they fall into certain specific categories - but the legal agreement you sign to get into one facility may be quite different than the legal agreement used by another facility down the street. You can only say that **generally** X follows W, or Y happens before Z, but neither may be true for everyone, depending upon where they live, what their assets are and how they are legally held, whether they have a living spouse or not, etc. Collecting separate little 'factlets' doesn't actually build a correct picture of the complex issues that can surround the elderly. That's the real danger in the hypothetical situations you're trying out - it's glossing over the individual details, but it's the details that are actually are the most important in determining what happens next, or what the available options are. What I'd suggest is that anyone dealing with the elderly should know first of all what the inheritance and estate tax laws are IN THEIR OWN STATE. And they need to stay on top of any changes passed by their State Legislature right up to the day they die. A lot of estate tax law changes are made retroactive to one year prior to the new law's passage date. Then there is the issue of a living spouse. Is it worth doing a division of assets? What if there are children from a previous marriage? Who's got the power of attorney? Who's the agent for the durable healthcare and POLST? How are the assets held - jointly or separately? Is there a formal or informal agreement between siblings to take care of the parents? Is it strong enough a case to be taken to court if necessary? Most importantly, does the person needing care live in a state where the family can be FORCED to pay the facility care costs (22 states in the US have such laws and some are beginning to enforce them)? All this is personal, individualized data that can affect the seemingly simple question of "who pays/who inherits what?" HTH.

My Grandmother had a massive stroke 11 years ago. She was far, far too well off to qualify for medicare. So the house was sold, the assets were liquified and my Aunt has had to use Grammys money to pay for the nursing home...for the last 11 years. The first place she was in was nice, a private home converted to a small place, she had a private room. It was very expensive, but no one really expected her to survive too long. About 3 years ago she was moved to another place, shared room in another facility that is not nearly as nice. I hate that she's there, but no one is equipped to keep her at their home (she needs 24 hour medical attention). The place is your sterotypical nursing home, and she's just gone downhill so much, yet she still lives. She told my cousin last year that she just wanted to die, but she's got those damned genes...longevity is in her system. Sorry to be such a bummer, but this is a situation that really bugs me. I hope your coworker can find some respite care...is there an Alzheimers support group? They might have some options or suggestions. My next door neighbor's mother has alzheimers, and she's finally gotten to the point where she's basically bed ridden now, so he can finally get out of the house on occasion. But it's really, really tough on the caretakers in the meantime.

Your costs are almost opposite here. With some differences. Independent living which depends on if you have a down payment or on a month to month with no down payment can range from $800, no meals, to $2,500, with two meals. No one seems to have three meals. Assisted living base cost is about $5,000 plus attendant care which can run from $800 up to about $4,000. Once a person needs the $4,000 range many Assisted living places will no longer care for them. Nursing homes seem to use the Medicare/Medicaid unwritten guidelines, means I have not found it in writing, of mid $5,000. Niece wanted us to move to Minneapolis and the range for assisted living there was between $8,000 to $11,000. If like my husband you need two attendants to care for family member or they are over 250 pounds you must use a nursing home as assisted living places will not accept. I was initially looking at assisted living places for him. He has some form of dementia then developed a UTI. Unexplained consequence he could not stand or walk for months afterward. Should have no connection but it happened. Since he was 318 at that time the hospital doctors would only release him to a nursing home. He is down to 246 in the nine months he has been there. After that explanation his nursing home costs $5,548.61 a month with extra charge for medicine. This is in the mid range of nursing home costs in this area. A suggestion for anyone looking for a nursing home is to look at ones that accept Medicaid patients. They are inspected at least once a year and are generally better at record keeping and seemed cleaner when I was looking. We are lucky??? that we will not have to worry about Medicaid for at least ten years or so.