Here's a long explanation of my dad's situation, but if you don't want to read it, skip to the last paragraph which outlines my real question.

Dad had a stroke last year and his health has been declining more and more every month. We've been giving him as much in home help as possible, but it's starting to not be enough. So it is probably time for a health facility really soon.

Dad has some retirement saved but not a lot for a 67 year old. He didn't really start putting into it until his 40's, and didn't put in very much. He also didn't make very much money, even in the height of his earning power.

He does however have Perci, which is like a public pension. That plus his Social Security, he makes about $2k per month after Medicare takes it's share.

So far he's been almost breaking even, but spending just a little more then that 2k per month on average. He owns his own mobile home, so just has to pay lot rent, utilities, the home care people, and medications.

So the way I understand it, talking to the social people, when I put him in a home, they'll be basically draining his savings, even requiring he sell his property (once savings are gone) in order to pay their bills, which will be in the 5k-5.5k range per month.

But once that is consumed, as long as it lasted a certain amount of time (2 years in the case of the facility I prefer) then the state takes over paying the share he can't once his savings are drained. Currently my dad has enough money that it could drain it for about 7 years before he reaches zero.

Finally onto my question. Is there a way I can legally protect his money, but leave say 2-3 years worth in his bank for the facility to drain? I've heard several random things like bank's don't report anything under 10k to the IRS, and that he can "gift" 16k per family member per year, but I don't know if this is fact. The last thing I want is the IRS digging into his finances and giving me a call for "harboring" his money illegally.

Thanks for the help!