Medicaid Planning

Medicaid planning involves a process of restructuring an individual’s assets with the aim of protecting those assets while meeting government requirements to qualify for means tested benefits of medicaid.

The goal of medicaid planning is to help you secure the best available health care while preserving your nest egg to pass on to your spouse, children or other beneficiaries. Schulman Law, PLLC can help you attain both goals with proper and legal medicaid planning.

In order to qualify for medicaid, you can only have a small amount of assets. New York State has different rules for transferring assets based upon family composition and the type of health care necessary. For example, the laws governing medicaid home care benefits are different from the laws governing medicaid nursing home benefits. Often, spouses have more favorable rules that allow for exempt transfers of assets.

When a person applies for medicaid nursing home benefits, there is a “look-back” period. Medicaid is entitled to full disclosure of any transfers made during the five (5) years prior to the application. Medicaid applicants must document all current assets and all transfers made within the disclosure period. It is considered fraud not to make such disclosures, and medicaid will match their records to the IRS to identify unreported gifts.

If any gifts were made during the 5 year disclosure period, medicaid will impose a penalty equal to the amount of the transfer. In the past this penalty was imposed from the date of the gift being made. Now, the penalty period only starts when the applicant is physically in the nursing home and has less than the medicaid financial eligibility amounts.

Medicaid will pay the nursing home bills for people who qualify. The question is all about who qualifies. One of the biggest obstacles to medicaid qualification is financial eligibility. New York has several categories to determine medicaid eligibility, and each category has its own rules.

Schulman Law, PLLC can advise you on effective lifetime gifts either outright to family members or to a trust, thereby assuring your assets will not be spent on your health care or paid to the government. Early planning is crucial to preserving your hard-earned assets.

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