taking out a reverse mortgage "ruined" his life

[arugula]

but no mention of the role he played in developing type II diabetes and having a stent put it.

http://nypost.com/2016/07/23/taking-out ... d-my-life/

people need to know that this kind of thing is self-inflicted. if he ate well, none of this would have happened. i wonder if any of his doctors mentioned that fact.

[Dougalling]

A reverse mortgage is when you receive monthly payments equivalent to a mortgage payment. You still retain equity in your house for many years.
When you get a lump sum amount for your house, you basically remortgaged your house (to be repaid in a lump sum in the future) and have no equity in your house.
Getting a lump sum of money should not be called a reverse mortgage.

[patty]

I like this from Sam Harris "Free Will":

There is a distinction between voluntary and involuntary actions, of course, but it does nothing to support the common idea of free will (nor does it depend upon it). A voluntary action is accompanied by the felt intention to carry it out, whereas an involuntary action isn’t. Needless to say, this difference is reflected at the level of the brain. And what a person consciously intends to do says a lot about him. It makes sense to treat a man who enjoys murdering children differently from one who accidentally hit and killed a child with his car— because the conscious intentions of the former give us a lot of information about how he is likely to behave in the future. But where intentions themselves come from, and what determines their character in every instance, remains perfectly mysterious in subjective terms. Our sense of free will results from a failure to appreciate this : We do not know what we intend to do until the intention itself arises. To understand this is to realize that we are not the authors of our thoughts and actions in the way that people generally suppose.

Of course, this insight does not make social and political freedom any less important. The freedom to do what one intends, and not to do otherwise, is no less valuable than it ever was. Having a gun to your head is still a problem worth rectifying , wherever intentions come from. But the idea that we, as conscious beings, are deeply responsible for the character of our mental lives and subsequent behavior is simply impossible to map onto reality.

Consider what it would take to actually have free will. You would need to be aware of all the factors that determine your thoughts and actions, and you would need to have complete control over those factors. But there is a paradox here that vitiates the very notion of freedom— for what would influence the influences? More influences? None of these adventitious mental states are the real you. You are not controlling the storm, and you are not lost in it. You are the storm.

Harris, Sam (2012-03-06). Free Will (p. 14). Free Press. Kindle Edition.

Once the person in the article http://nypost.com/2016/07/23/taking-out ... d-my-life/ realizes his responsibility of not only the possibility of losing his home but his health to mismanagement to the benefit of others. The disappointment/anger will be the portal, to know he is the whole storm. He will start putting his priorities in place. He will do this in a living body or not. Intellectually it is impossible to understand a storm. That is why "The Starch Solution" Dr. McDougall shares plants survive all seasons starch based. Summer doesn't oppose winter. The addictive dominos stop with food and money. Being starch centered resonates a body, mind and social health at a economic gain to all. It is a game changer. Addiction is a thinking disease. It tells the addict it doesn't have a disease. Vegetables are a condiment, life issues are a condiment. We subconsciously eat the same amount of WEIGHT of food daily. Starch allows us to think it through. The individual collapses, only to take his/her power back. He/she will be the change he/she wants to see.

Aloha, patty

[Jack Monzon]

Financial irresponsibility is not permitted on this program.

[f1jim]

We tend to joke about things like financial irresponsibility but we don't talk much about nutritional irresponsibility.
I bet we would all agree that a person has some responsibility in seeing that he maintains a decent level of health to the best of his abilities. What I am not sure of is given the level of nutritional savvy in our culture how much do we hold people responsible for poor eating habits? I have a feeling there will be little agreement on where that line should be drawn.
f1jim

[wade4veg]

A reverse mortgage is when you receive monthly payments equivalent to a mortgage payment. You still retain equity in your house for many years.
When you get a lump sum amount for your house, you basically remortgaged your house (to be repaid in a lump sum in the future) and have no equity in your house.
Getting a lump sum of money should not be called a reverse mortgage.

You have drawn a incorrect definition of "reverse mortgage".
Yes, there are reverse mortgages where you get a monthly payment to yourself... which can vary with your age and the value of your home. These payments can go on for as long as you live in your home. YOU, need not repay any of it as long as you live in your home. If you leave your home, or die, the payments you received, plus interest, will be repaid out of the value of your home when sold.

A second type of reverse mortgage if getting a line of credit on your home, for which you need not make any payment as long as you remain in your home.
For example, if you have a $500,000 home, with no mortgage, and you were age 70.... (I'm not using real figures)
You might get a line of credit of $250,000 which you could use as you decide to live on, to pay off credit cards, or to repair your home. The money you use and interest it incurs, does not need to be repaid as long as you stay in the home.
If the amount you get in the credit line is only half the value of your home, you STILL have the rest of the equity.
In the above example, that might be as much as $250,000. Far from having "no equity" in your home.

Reverse mortgages can be good or bad... depending on the situation and who you deal with.
In lower priced homes...in much of the nation, the fees and charges can be rather high relative to the amount of money being made available.
The interest rates can also vary GREATLY. Yet there are few resources where naive seniors can find out the true competitive rates they should pay....in terms of interest and in terms of fees.

Anyone who has a parent or family member who is considering such a financial move, should PM me before they pay much more than they should. I am NOT in the business, nor do I have any connection to the business.
Just happen to have a fair degree of knowledge about the subject.
Bottom line, most people taking out reverse mortgage end up paying for more interest, and far more fees, than they would if they got a very competitive deal. You can get poor deals from big firms and from small firms.
You have to be very careful and willing to bargain, yet there is no place that will tell you what a great deal is.

Buyer beware.... but when used carefully and when getting the most competitive rates, reverse mortgages can be excellent for the right person.

PS, I realize my example of $500,000 is high, unless you live in California, where I live... and it is below average.
BTW, California has some specific safeguards regarding reverse mortgages, not found in some other states.
But they still don't protect you from getting poor interest rates or excessive fees.

[patty]

Living in Hawaii a deal breaker in taking out a reverse mortgage if the resident is out of their home for 4 consecutive months they aren't allowed to return. If the person for some unknown reasons is hospitalized and then sent to rehab there are certain requirements to be met before released. The time element could be crucial in a plan to age in place in your home.

Aloha, patty

[wade4veg]

Living in Hawaii a deal breaker in taking out a reverse mortgage if the resident is out of their home for 4 consecutive months they aren't allowed to return. If the person for some unknown reasons is hospitalized and then sent to rehab there are certain requirements to be met before released. The time element could be crucial in a plan to age in place in your home.

I'd like to see something in print that shows your "4 consecutive months" figure to be true.
Every place I have seen this, the time frame is 12 months.
Very few people who are in the hospital and rehab will end up being able to move back home and live on their own, or even with care. Also the companies seldom know the exact date you leave the property. Its not like they are checking up on you daily, weekly or even monthly.
Technically they could take action after 12 months in which you don't occupy the house.
In practice they don't really know when you leave, say to recuperate at your daughters house.
Plus, you could come back, stay a week, then go away again. No one is coming to your door to check.

Again, if you have that "4 month" clause, I'd like to see the link.

Lots of crazy stories out there passed along over the years. Also, the rules have changed over the past few years.

[patty]

Living in Hawaii a deal breaker in taking out a reverse mortgage if the resident is out of their home for 4 consecutive months they aren't allowed to return. If the person for some unknown reasons is hospitalized and then sent to rehab there are certain requirements to be met before released. The time element could be crucial in a plan to age in place in your home.

I'd like to see something in print that shows your "4 consecutive months" figure to be true.
Every place I have seen this, the time frame is 12 months.
Very few people who are in the hospital and rehab will end up being able to move back home and live on their own, or even with care. Also the companies seldom know the exact date you leave the property. Its not like they are checking up on you daily, weekly or even monthly.
Technically they could take action after 12 months in which you don't occupy the house.
In practice they don't really know when you leave, say to recuperate at your daughters house.
Plus, you could come back, stay a week, then go away again. No one is coming to your door to check.

Again, if you have that "4 month" clause, I'd like to see the link.

Lots of crazy stories out there passed along over the years. Also, the rules have changed over the past few years.

I stand corrected. People in the hospital or rehab their greatest incentive is to go home, and that can even be after 12 months. Guilt kills, suggesting someone could leave, stay a week, and then leave again is the wrong advice because the closer you are to death you understand guilt kills. And you don't want to pass that guilt along.The aging aren't throw away people to obtain their property. That is why the man in the article the OP posted was so angry. He was sucked into someone selling a impossible dream, that someone can take over his mortgage and he would still have it. Just as someone believing doctors when doctors status quo is in getting whatever reimbursement they can for acts of betterment for themselves.

Aloha, patty

[bbq]

Health issues and health care expenses in Canadian bankruptcies and insolvencies.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24684082

Medical bill problems steady for U.S. families, 2007-2010.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22207915

Medical bankruptcy in the United States, 2007: results of a national study.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19501347

The relationship between medical care costs and personal bankruptcy.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18975733

Best Care at Lower Cost: The Path to Continuously Learning Health Care in America
http://www.nap.edu/read/13444/chapter/1
http://books.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=13444
http://libgen.io/book/index.php?md5=E36DBFEF28E133C9880502F53F71D908
http://www.nationalacademies.org/hmd/Reports/2012/Best-Care-at-Lower-Cost-The-Path-to-Continuously-Learning-Health-Care-in-America/Report-Brief.aspx

About 30 percent of health spending in 2009--roughly $750 billion--was wasted on unnecessary services, excessive administrative costs, fraud, and other problems. Moreover, inefficiencies cause needless suffering. By one estimate, roughly 75,000 deaths might have been averted in 2005 if every state had delivered care at the quality level of the best performing state.

US Healthcare Costs - Where is the money going?
http://resources.iom.edu/widgets/vsrt/healthcare-waste.html

Overkill - The New Yorker
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/05/11/overkill-atul-gawande

In 2010, the Institute of Medicine issued a report stating that waste accounted for thirty per cent of health-care spending, or some seven hundred and fifty billion dollars a year, which was more than our nation’s entire budget for K-12 education. The report found that higher prices, administrative expenses, and fraud accounted for almost half of this waste. Bigger than any of those, however, was the amount spent on unnecessary health-care services. Now a far more detailed study confirmed that such waste was pervasive.

Oh well, aren't we losing everything over nothing or what?