Care Homes help themselves

[stewamax]

The Telegraph reported on Saturday 20th January that some Care Homes are “selling residents' possessions and keeping the cash” and that their contracts specifically allow for this sale “without providing adequate notice to the estate of its intention to do so … and without setting out that any monies received from the sale … should be returned to the estate or personal representatives with a reasonable timeframe”

If my Aunt Mabel - who liked to wear one or two pieces of valuable jewellery at visiting time when passing her last few weeks of life in bed in such a Care Home - dies, leaves a Will with me as sole executor (a role which I accept), and the Care Home bill is paid up to date, am I not from her moment of her death personally and legally responsible as a sort of ‘bare trustee’ for managing all her assets and liabilities – and after probate – delivering them to the beneficiaries?

It is difficult to see how any contract Aunt Mabel has made with the Care Home can override this (unless she died intestate and with no known next of kin, in which case I assume the Care Home itself or whoever has been responsible for determining her care becomes a default executor).