Caretakers Rights

[kveene]

We live with my elderly father-in-law (88) in his house that he deeded over to his children 6 years ago. We own 1/4 of the home. We moved in a year and a half ago because he was lonely after loosing his wife of 50 plus years. Since then his health has deteriorated more and he requires more care. We are now becoming primary caregivers however the other children demanded all the rent be paid to them when we moved in. We are now primary caregivers paying them to live in this house and they do not help in the care of my father-in-law. We would like to stop paying rent but not sure how to do this. We do have a month to month lease with them and they say in the lease they have the right to evict us if we stop paying rent. Any suggestion on how to handle this?

[sharone]

I don't think you can force them to help pay for your father-in-law's care and that is what refusing to pay rent actually is. I would contact your local Senior Citizen group to find out what help he can get with his Medicare such as home health and things like that.

[kellarlln]

sounds hinkey what your siblings are doing.

this is from the State of MA, SD probably has something you could look into:
Co-Ownership of Real Property

Whenever one or more person(s) purchase real property together they are considered co-owners of the property.

There are three main types of co-ownership:
(1) tenancy in common
(2) joint tenancy
(3) tenancy by the entirety

Each type of co-ownership has distinct requirements necessary to be created and provides different rights and obligations on the property owners. Although the type of co-ownership need not necessarily be specified in the offer to purchase or the purchase and sale agreement, it must be contained in the deed giving ownership of the real property to the co-owners.

Understanding the types of co-ownership will allow brokers to better prepare potential co-owners to determine what type of co-ownership is best for them. Since each type of co-ownership has different rights and obligations, choosing the wrong type of co-ownership may be a costly mistake. Legal counsel should be consulted to ensure that the best type of co-ownership is selected.

Co-ownership of Real Property

A concurrent estate or co-tenancy is a concept in property law which describes the various ways in which property is owned by more than one person at a time. If more than one person own the same property, they are referred to as co-owners, co-tenants or joint tenants. Most common law jurisdictions recognize tenancies in common and joint tenancies, and some also recognize tenancies by the entirety. Many jurisdictions refer to a joint tenancy as a joint tenancy with right of survivorship, and a few U.S. States treat the phrase joint tenancy as synonymous with a tenancy in common.

and follow up with senior advocacy groups as Sharone suggested.