If you need nursing home care in Texas and have not engaged in Medicaid planning, you could be forced to privately pay for care. At a cost of more than $100,000 a year in most cases, nursing home care could result in the loss of a life savings in a matter of months.
A spouse who stays in the community while his or her husband or wife goes into nursing home care could experience a diminished quality of life. Family heirlooms could be lost due to the need to sell those assets to pay for nursing home care, and a lifetime of work could be wasted.
This does not have to happen. The Bond Law Firm provides assistance using a wide variety of legal tools that can allow you to qualify for Medicaid so Medicaid can pay for your nursing home care. Medicaid can also cover other costs, including helping to pay for Medicare copays and services not covered by Medicare. The Bond Law Firm can help you to determine if Medicaid can pay for the services you require and can help you to get qualified for Medicaid coverage.
Give us a call at (218) 448-4100 as soon as possible, because time is of the essence when it comes to Medicaid planning. Our legal team can assist you in the creation of a personalized Medicaid planning and can answers questions about the Medicaid planning process including:
- Why do I need Medicaid planning?
- What is involved in Medicaid planning?
- How can a Houston Medicaid planning lawyer help?
Why Do I Need Medicaid Planning?
You need Medicaid planning because if you do not qualify for Medicaid and you need to go into nursing home care, you’ll likely have to pay for nursing home care out of your personal assets. Medicare and private insurers pay for nursing home care for a limited time duration and only if there is a need for skilled services. Routine care, as most nursing home residents need, receives no coverage at all.
Unless you have long term care insurance, which few people do, the only way you can get any coverage for nursing home care is through veterans benefits (if you qualify) or Medicaid… and veterans benefits don’t provide full payments for care or coverage in all circumstances. For most people, this leaves Medicaid alone as the best or only source of coverage for nursing home care.
The problem is, you aren’t eligible for Medicaid unless you have limited income and few assets. If you own more than $2,000 in resources (or $3,000 if both spouses receive Medicaid), you cannot get covered. Most seniors have too many resources and so are forced to spend down their assets until they have less than $2,000 in countable wealth and can finally qualify for benefits. Medicaid planning allows for assets to be kept and the spend down to be avoided, if the right plans are made.
Medicaid planning also provides protection from estate recovery, which occurs after death and which involves the state making claims on an estate to try to recover money spent on certain types of Medicaid payouts. If Medicaid paid for nursing home care, for example, Medicaid estate recovery could mean the state puts in a claim during probate and tries to take property left behind for heirs to recoup nursing home care expenditures.
You don’t want this to happen, so you need to make a plan. Since Medicaid looks back at five years of transactions to see if you transferred assets, you need that plan to be made at least five years prior to the time you try to qualify for Medicaid coverage. If you have not made your plans in advance, you could be disqualified for a period of time, and forced to spend your personal wealth and assets until you can get covered. Don’t put your assets at risk- let The Bond Law Firm help with Medicaid planning today.
What is Involved in Medicaid Planning?
The Medicaid planning process can vary depending upon whether you are married; whether only one spouse is going into nursing home care; what your income is; how many assets you own and resources you have; and when you need Medicaid to pay for your nursing home care or other bills.
- If you have begun your planning process early on and no care will be needed for at least five years, you have a wide variety of options for Medicaid planning including making various types of irrevocable trusts and transferring assets through inter vivos gifts to your loved ones.
- If you are married and concerned that only one spouse may need nursing home care, you can use a partition agreement to transfer the community property interest of the spouse seeking care to the spouse who will continue living independently.
- If your primary concern is that your income is too high to qualify for Medicaid, a Miller trust could provide the answer by making it possible to qualify for Medicaid even if income is above the normal limits for coverage.
- If you want to protect real estate, a lady bird deed could be the answer. A lady bird deed is a conveyance of property after the owner (the grantor) dies, but only if the grantor doesn’t change his mind. Since the conveyance isn’t a completed gift, it does not count as a transfer that prompts disqualification from Medicaid.
The Bond Law Firm can assist you in determining the best approach to take to making a Medicaid plan that addresses your specific concerns and that preserves as much of your wealth and property as possible, given the specifics of your situation.
How can a Houston Medicaid Planning Lawyer Help?
The Bond Law Firm has saved many family fortunes through providing Medicaid planning assistance. You do not have to have millions of dollars in the bank to want to protect what you have worked for so you can leave a legacy. In fact, it is the average person who has worked hard to acquire assets over his life who often suffers the most due to an inability to qualify for Medicaid coverage. The Bond Law Firm wants to help make sure that your family is not one of the many who faces losses due to a need for nursing home care or other costly medical services.
The Bond Law Firm can assist you in determining if Medicaid planning is needed in your situation and can help make a comprehensive plan that protects the maximum in assets given the specifics of your situation. Give us a call at (218) 448-4100 or contact us online to find out more about the Medicaid planning process and how our legal team can assist you in using this process to keep your wealth safe and secure.
