Housing
Hi there im currently at a loss. my little boy has cp and ive three older girls. We have been told we have to move to a more suitable house (council property), but most property's are out of our area so we have decided to look for a exchange. The problem im having is the only house we have found in our area that can be modified is in quiet a state . There are no carpets and every room is in need of decoration and new skirting boards through-out. As for the garden a mess but do able. My looking into finding out if there is any funding avalible out there to help me get my son into a more suitale home. I no od the disalitities grant for the major works im looking for help with the home inside, i understand people my think ive got a cheak but ive spent 1000's on my home over the years making it into my home and as you can imagin the cost of starting again scares me
Any advice greatfully recieved good or bad
Thanks for your time
lesley
Hi Dom
Might the Disabled Living Foundation have some info on this? I'm sure they could advise on building design.
Just as a suggestion you might want to put an en suite bathroom in Philip's room and have a ceiling mounted hoist fitted so that if he's not able to get to the bathroom himself when he's bigger he will be easier to assist. Also that would mean you could have all his bathroom equipment in one place and a separate family bathroom so you can relax in a bath unimpeded by hoists, rails and special seats. Definitely fit a good sized downstairs loo if you're building a house rather than a bungalow. I think a through floor lift is better than a stairlift if he's going to be a wheelchair user so make sure to plan enough space to accommodate that. An open plan design will give more circulation space for mobility aids/wheelchairs. And when you get the kitchen designed make sure they make a place for the bin! When we got our kitchen done they didn't make a place for the bin and I have to keep moving it around so I can get at cupboards - it's the little things that can drive you mad! I'm sure others will have suggestions too. I think you're right to consider all this sooner rather than later. I'd love to know how you get on as we're thinking our next move might be a self-build to accommodate my needs as a wheelchair using mum to a child with mild CP. My stairlift is struggling with the combined weight of the two of us and my husband's back is giving out from carrying her up and down stairs - ironically she can't manage stairs first thing in the morning as she's too stiff, or last thing at night because she's too tired! Anyway good luck and keep us posted on the building plans.
astra
sorry Dom can't be any help to your plans. But just wanted to say thanks to Astra for pointing out the obvious about stairs.
I was starting to wonder why I was finding the stairs at work difficult to go up and more difficult than usual to come down, and it never occured to me it could be because I'm tired untill I read your reply about your daughter in the mornings and evenings.
Its amazing how the most obvious things we just don't registered sometimes until its pointed out. Thanks you've certainly given me something to think about.
Good luck Dom with your plans.
love Panther x
Have made an appt for OT to come out on Friday to set ball rolling - think we will have to move too as we have very little room to make changes to our property - glad to hear that forms for once are easy to fill out.
Hi Lenny256
It is worth finding out whether you may qualify for the disabled facilities grant available from the council check with the OT when they visit you. Please see the enclosed link
http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/DisabledPeople/HomeAndHousingOptions/YourHom...
It may also be useful to see if your local council has a stock of accessible houses, that maybe able to accomadate the extra space you need, although I am not sure how up to date their information maybe, still its worth asking.
You may also wish to check out the accessible property registar website
http://accessible-property.org.uk
good luck, If you need more advice let me know.
Andrew
We got Disabled Facilities Grant (£25K which is available to all with children with disabilities, not means tested) which added a bathroom extension (with bath that goes up and down, toilet and sink) onto our daughters room - also got hoist from bedroom to bathroom, ramps front and back, widened front door and extended width of driveway. This all came to more than £25K but told me additional funds were available on discretionary basis, and OT paid for bath from her budget.
We got it all kicked off by a referral from our OT and had to complete some forms (very simple ones for a change!). They then came out to fill in further forms and surveyor came out with OT to make decision as to what they would fund. Unfortunately we were in a similar position to you - had Conservatory at back of house that they wanted to knock down to build on a bedroom and bathroom. After consideration we decided it would be better to move to a Bungalow as not keen on us being upstairs and daughter down, felt too far as she has tendancy to be sick in bed on occasions.
May be worth getting ball rolling and getting Surveyor out to see what adaptions they would fund - I got told they only do what is most cost effective, not what is your wish or best for rest of family! - then at least you can make an informed decision. Definitely better to start sooner rather than later, from initial referral to end of build took us around 2 years. It was a huge wrench to move (we used to live next door to my Mum) but living on one level is definitely the best thing that we ever did.
Am sure I have read on here previously that someone got the £25K towards the cost of moving house rather than adaptions, but when I enquired with our Local Authority they did not do this - believe it is up to Local Authority if they want to offer this and some do and others don't. If you do a search it should bring up previous posts.
Hope all goes well on Friday, let me know how it goes and if you have any more questions will help if I can.
Hi,
Dont know if this will help you as we do not own our own home but 4 years ago we had a brand new house built for us that was built fully adapted with wide doors, downstairs bedroom for my daughter and en-suite wetroom. all of this was funded by our housing association and local social services. I would definately reccommend that you got in touch with your local social services and housing association. Our OT actually sorted all of our housing needs out at the time and we fell really lucky that our housing association were just getting ready to build locally. My friend also has had her house adapted for her son, she does own her home and she was also funded by social services etc after getting the backing of our very helpful local MP.
I would talk to your OT about the matter as even though something has been said already, it is probably not a move that will come until your daughter is a little older but I would say that it is better to cover your options sooner rather than later when the future is involved, it will all come too quickly. I will say lastly that when the time for adaptations does come make sure you look at everything very carefully, once you are funded once it is hard to get again. Although we love the house we are in we now feel as time as gone on that the extension/bedroom that was built for my daughter is not of a suitable size for her and everything that comes with a disabled child but now seem to be left that if we want it extending again this could be something we must pay for ourselves. We have also signed a very long term contract for our house so make sure location etc etc is good for you.
Hope this may help you a little and good luck with it all
S&C x x x
Hi, we have a 1 year old with CP and have just been trying to plan ahead and have been wondering if its worth looking at moving now seeing as we cannot extend or change our house. Thanks for the advise on getting the ball rolling now....Our OT advised us that they do fund moving costs in this case and they will pay stamp duty, moving costs and legal fees. One thing the OT did say though was that they would only pay the fees to move to a similar priced house...this can be difficult if going for a bungalow as prices are higher for them. I am investigating with the "top man" in our authority as have his Email address on what happens if we find a suitable property at a higher price....I'll let you know what happens...
Hi I was wondering if anyone could give me some advice. My daughter is 2 in April and was diagnosed with Quadriplegic Spastic Cerebral Palsy in March of last year. We have recently been told my her physio that her future needs mean we cannot stay in our house in the long term. We own our house (albeit with a mortgage) and are unsure where to go for help - is it somethign we have to sort ourselves or will our local authority be able to help us.
Any advice really appreciated.
Thank you
our son who is 9 has cerebral palsy, we applied about 18 months ago for a DFG Grant and got it, it was very easy and the forms were filled out for us, we are having a wetroom built on the side of the house, building work started 2 weeks ago and I am really pleased with the progress, we have hit obstacles along the way, the boiler had to be moved and we were told we had to fund this as there was no more money in the grant (this should have been spotted in the planning stage), however with a lot a phone calls to the local authority they have agreed to fund the new boiler and fitting. They implemented a new ruling that anything extra that cropped up we had to pay for, but we were the first people that this ruling had applied too, however they have now told us that the extra (boiler) was now at their discretion, it was a relief as we did not have that sort of money to just buy a boiler!
My son is very excited and it will make a huge difference to his life and his independance. He is due to go in hospital again soon to have some more botox treatment so hopefully his bathroom will be finished by then, and he can wheel himself in the bathroom in his wheelchair!
apply, the money is out there for the alterations! :rolleyes:
Hi there im currently at a loss. my little boy has cp and ive three older girls. We have been told we have to move to a more suitable house (council property), but most property's are out of our area so we have decided to look for a exchange. The problem im having is the only house we have found in our area that can be modified is in quiet a state . There are no carpets and every room is in need of decoration and new skirting boards through-out. As for the garden a mess but do able. My looking into finding out if there is any funding avalible out there to help me get my son into a more suitale home. I no od the disalitities grant for the major works im looking for help with the home inside, i understand people my think ive got a cheak but ive spent 1000's on my home over the years making it into my home and as you can imagin the cost of starting again scares me
Any advice greatfully recieved good or bad
Thanks for your time
lesley
At the moment we are toying with the idea of building our own house in order to meet our son's requirements. Does anyone have any experience or advice they can offer.
We are looking at moving to a bigger house anyway as an extention would take up most of the garden. We currently live in a new build property which meets the disabled access requirements (ie wide doors and downstairs toilet). The physio and OT were horrified when we pointed this out to them as there is a large step into the garden!
Also what adaptations have people found really useful either in enabling them to care for a disabled child or to enable them to manage to live more independently? Any advice here would be useful as well as its much easier to incorporate such things in the design stage (if we go down this self build route) rather than thinking I wish I had thought of that earlier.
Thanks
Dom