Would you sell your house & downsize to help your sibling?

Elegran, your last paragraph sounds exactly what I was thinking.

The relative hasn’t died yet so the will is irrelevant.
Do not put yourself in this position, it is a recipe for disaster.
Just give advice, not money.
Put your own future first.

Your sibling could challenge the will and stay in the house pro tem.

No. Buying a house won’t solve their financial problems-rates, utilities etc. but having a house may make it difficult to get some benefits that it sounds as if they desperately need.
The organising and financing of selling your house and buying another two with one at the other end of the country would take time during which they will have had chance to find out what help is available. Also it would seriously deplete any money you would make.
If you have the finance, offering temporary help with rent until they’re sorted could be a way to offer support.

If you did, I would put the property in your name

My reaction to your question is - don't do it! If you go ahead, you too will end up in financial disaster and be just as much a victim as your sibling is of the criminal relative who conned your sibling into spending money and time looking after them while selling the promised house over their head.

The local authority has an obligation to house your sibling, and they will get some money to tide them over for the short time that they believe it will take until they are earning again. Meanwhile, if you go ahead with your idea, you will have lost your home - and half your future pension. You are NOT deserting them by sending them to their council offices for assistance, and keeping your own money fto offer practical help in smaller things.

Forgive me if I am wrong, but this does read very much like a what-if plot for a novel or a magazine article, as I have thought that other threads of yours have done in the past. Why ask strangers on a social media site, when advice from the Citizens' Advice Bureau, AgeUK or a legal expert would be much more useful to you and to your sibling?

Your sibling will be in a better place in the long run if you are financially secure. They clearly trusted someone who betrayed them (and this person's character is revealed by their having to go to prison for something else) and it is not your job to put right the ill luck of others by jeopardising your own future.

Others have offered good, practical advice. Your sibling can turn to the local authority for help or you could offer temporary accommodation until your sibling gets back on his/her feet.

You must stay firm and exercise your (superior) judgement to offer advice and support without endangering your own position. Who knows what ill luck or blows you will have to weather in the future and you could not offer support to your sibling if you, too, were impoverished.

Use the hammer of sense here, not the nutcracker of sensibility.

Could you not accommodate them I. Your house until things start to improve?

My advice would be to help your sibling find out what they are entitled to in terms of help from the local authority. They may have to accept a bedsit accommodation initially but that is better than being homeless. They should qualify for Universal Credit, if they need help to claim then the Citizens Advice are very helpful. Please do not sell your own home to help them - firstly it will take some months to sell and get the money and secondly to purchase two suitable properties will also take time. Thirdly it won't help provide your sibling with an income. Helping them get on their feet themselves is the kindest action you can take. If you want to offer to provide the deposit/advance rent on a suitable flat or rental house then, if you can do this without incurring a financial penalty yourself, go ahead... Help is out there for your sibling if they apply for it.

I agree that this action is too drastic. The situation as you describe it shows a lack of wisdom in previous decisions . I see no reason for you to escalate it with such long term consequences.
You said you areN’t able to help with a rental deposit, so how can you afford to sell and buy two properties? It takes money up front to achieve. And where will your sibling live in the meantime? I don’t get it as an immediate solution or as a long term one.
Your sibling needs to get urgent help from CAB to get benefits in place. If you can let Him/her live with you for a short while until these come through that will help., but they won’t get housing benefit until they find a place to rent. Don’t be too fussy about where that is. It is not easy to find a tenancy when on benefits and local authorities have little available for people without children, at best it might be a room in a hostel.

Mary In which case they are entitled to help from the council in obtaining housing; UC, and housing benefit. Depending on their age they should go and discuss their situation with the CAB or Age UK, and probably a solicitor (it may be possible to do this through CAB)

There are many resources they can consult and seek aid from before you need to to even consider the drastic action you propose.

If it does go ahead I would make sure you keep ownership of any property you buy and make sure you have a proper legal letting agreement. It seems, sadly, as happens far too often, that life-changing financial arrangements are made between family members without any proper legal supervision and/or due diligence and when the person benefitting from the agreement proves to be untrustworthy(and it happens so often), the other person in the agreement is, as in this case left up the creek without a paddle. Don't you make the same mistake.

It woukd be a temporary solution to a permanent problem for you. It's no fun, retired with little money.

It's entirely up to you

But I certainly wouldn't

Relative had operation—-

“Sibling had several operations, carted off to prison, bungalow signed over to others.”

There is a lot more very bad stuff associated with this situation and you may not know the full story, a lot of bad decisions have been made. The relative despite ill health was doing something very illegal to be jailed in that condition.

Stay away from it and let social services sort it out, your caring sibling would have known what illegal activity was going on!.

This is getting very dramatic mary
Why did your sibling have to use their life savings to support this person ? If this person owned their own home why couldn’t they ‘keep’ themself financially
If the house owner has now been put in prison why can’t your sibling carry on living in the house at least ‘for now’ ?
Because of covid there is no work right now in my siblings field unfortunately many people have had to diversify and get something temporary that’s not in their field Grab a supermarket job or better still a ‘live in’ carers job, that would solve two problems at one go
I don’t I understand why your sibling can’t live with you temporarily

I cannot help with a deposit because I physically don't have it & they have no income to get a loan against. My sibling gave up their career for the last 9yrs to act as a fulltime carer whilst our relative in poor health had many operations. A will was made that they would inherit the bungalow to continue living in -in return for my sibling using their life savings to support the person they were caring for. Unfortunately, said relative was carted off to prison a few months ago & will likely die there before too long due to ill health. It has recently come out the bungalow was actually signed over to someone else. Because of covid there is no work right no in my sibling's field, they've lost their home & life savings. The fallout of this is horrific.

I know you say you don’t want to talk about the situation, but can you say whether or not you feel in any way responsible for it?

I ask because I know of someone who is likely to be homeless soon because they have been looking after an elderly relative who has recently gone into care and us unlikely to live much longer. The relative has left the house where my friend has been living with them jointly to my friend and their sibling, and it is unlikely that there will be enough in my friend’s share to buy somewhere to live.

The sibling has done nothing to help the relative, but the will was written before my friend gave up work to act as carer, and can’t be changed now that the relative has lost mental capacity. It’s a tricky situation, and in circumstances like those, if I were the sibling I like to think that I would feel responsible for my friend’s possible homelessness and would not insist on my share of the inheritance, but might ask for the house to be left to my children on my friend’s death.

I hope that makes sense, as I have tried not to give enough detail to make anyone identifiable.

If you are not in similar circumstances. Mary, and your own sibling’s situation is entirely independent of you, then I think I would try to help them without jeopardising my own retirement. When you are retired it can be very difficult to change your circumstances and add to your income, so security becomes more important than when you are earning (or I found this to be so anyway).

Could you help them with a deposit so that they can rent somewhere until their circumstances change, or could they take out a loan on the strength of the impending change in their situation?

It could take 6 months or more to sell and then buy 2 new places so where are they going to live 'in agony' in the meantime. Their situation could change by then too. Invite them to stay with you for a few months while they sort themselves out, as others have suggested, or at least purchase a property in your name for them. If people can't afford to buy themselves then they have to be content with renting, surely.

If you’re ready to downsize and move and could then live comfortably then MOnica’s suggestion offers you some safety. There would be increased stamp duty to buy the home your sibling would live in and potentially tax implications when/if it’s sold but the house would be yours. A proper tenancy agreement would also be sensible. Why not seek advice? A telephone call with the CAB should be possible, check out other options on their behalf, think very carefully before doing anything. If you offer to share your home or buy one for your sibling to live in do take care over a clear and understood agreement. People here are concerned for you and your future, please don’t leave your own security out of your thinking.

This plan has lots of holes.

Selling your home will take some time so it is not going to fix them being homeless and without income right now.
Buying a place for them to live will also take time.

What would be the plan for them in the meantime? Where are they going to live? When are they going to have income again?

There have to be other solutions than putting your financial future in danger.
What you suggest seems very drastic and last resource.

What they have been doing to fix their situation?

"Could you bear to see your sibling in agony & having a terrible time without a home to call their own?"
Are you doing this for you, to alleviate your pain, or for them?

It isn't something I would do. Bluebell's suggestion is well worth considering.

Why not invite them to live with you
You obviously feel greatly for this sibling so perhaps that would be wisest whist they get back in their feet or you could both be out on the street

If you give this money to your sibling then you will not get pension credit if you need it when you retire. If you need to go into care in the future the local authority may demand the money back to pay for your care. Please do nothing before taking expert financial advice.

Let us say you go with your plan. The fact that you buy your sibling somewhere to live does not mean that they have to own the property. You could own the house and they could live in it until such time they could stand on their own two feet and then they could pay you rent. You would thus still own all your current assets.

Having said that, with the range of benefits available to help the homeless and penniless, I cannot see why you should need to be responsible for their housing.