Paying Your Children to Care for You? Put it in Writing.

As they need more help with daily tasks, many parents prefer to have their kids helping them rather than hiring an aide. And many children want to be helping their parents, if only they could afford to quit their job.

One solution is for the parent to hire the child. I discuss some of the nuts and bolts of how to draft a caregiver contract in another post. I also previously discussed the advantages of caregiver contract in a down economy.

The message for this post is that if you plan to hire your child, or if you plan to work for your parents, everything must be in writing. If the parent eventually needs to apply for MassHealth, your chances of having the application approved significantly increase if the agreement was in writing during all those years that the child provided care. If it is not in writing, MassHealth may well declare that any money passing from the parent to the child was a gift – and a gift disqualifies a person from receiving MassHealth assistance.

Working with an elder law attorney will improve your chances of having the agreement approved by MassHealth, because an elder law attorney understands what needs to be in the contract not only to satisfy MassHealth, but also to help you comply with Social Security laws, income tax regulations, and employment laws.