According to healthcare analysts, residential care costs for patients in the South-East — who can pay up to £1,000 a week or more for residential care — that can add up a bill of nearly £100,000 over two years (the average time a person spends in care. It’s a shocking situation, especially considering those most commonly affected will be the hard-working, tax-paying working and middle classes. As it stands, anyone with property or capital worth £23,250 or more has to pay the full cost of their care. Because of this rule, it is estimated that 40,000 or more, family homes are sold each year to cover the bills.

What the local authority will be looking for is any signs of ‘deliberate deprivation of assets’ - whether it be signing over of a property to a relative or giving away large sums of money.