Multi-generational living is becoming a more common response to the uncomfortable realities facing ageing parents and their adult children.

With traditional aged-care pathways increasingly expensive, emotionally fraught, and often poorly understood, families are weighing up alternatives — staying at home, moving into residential care, or reshaping the family home through shared living arrangements and granny flats.

In this episode, we look under the hood of multi-generational living to explore what’s actually involved. From legal ownership and estate outcomes to pension eligibility, Centrelink rules, and family dynamics, we unpack the decisions families are making — and the risks they often don’t see until they’re already committed.

Our guest, Adriana Care, is Managing Partner at Coutts Legal and works at the coalface with families navigating these choices under pressure. She’s seeing a clear shift among the so-called sandwich generation toward property-based solutions for ageing parents — raising complex questions around money, fairness, control, and what can go wrong when good intentions meet poor planning.

This episode isn’t about whether multi-generational living is right or wrong. It’s about understanding the legal, financial, and practical realities behind these decisions before they become permanent.

01:18 — Meet Adriana Care of Coutts Legal

02:08 — Is Aged Care Failing Modern Families?

03:47 — The Legal and Financial Risks Families Miss

05:25 — Why Families Choose Multi-Generational Living

15:31 — Retirement Living vs Staying at Home

20:50 — How Retirement Village Contracts Really Work

25:40 — What to Know Before Making a Family Move

28:10 — Inside Retirement Village Agreements

28:55 — Disclosure Documents Explained

29:40 — Rules and Regulations That Catch Families Out

30:52 — How Family Dynamics Shape Care Decisions

32:21 — Financial Elder Abuse: Legal Warning Signs

35:29 — Binding Financial Agreements Explained

37:46 — Pensions, Gifting, and Centrelink Rules

40:21 — Why Downsizing Isn’t Always the Answer

44:02 — Granny Flat Arrangements: Legal Traps

49:42 — A Real Case That Shows What Can Go Wrong

Adriana Care is the Managing Partner at Coutts Legal, where she specialises in aged care and elder law. She works closely with families navigating some of the most complex and emotionally charged decisions around ageing, care, and family living arrangements.

Adriana advises clients on the legal and financial realities of home care, residential aged care, granny flats, and multi-generational living, with particular expertise in Centrelink rules, pension eligibility, and intergenerational asset arrangements. Working at the coalface, she sees first-hand how well-intentioned plans can unravel without clear structures, proper advice, and early conversations — especially for the sandwich generation balancing parents, children, and property decisions at the same time.

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