If My Father Moves to a Nursing Home, will Medicaid Take his House Where I also Live?

 In Long-Term Care Planning

Question:

I’ve lived with my dad since 2011 but we never got a chance to put his house in my name. I moved in to help out because my mom passed! Recently my dad got sick, now he’s in rehab and soon he may have to go into a nursing home, in which case we’ll have to apply for Medicaid. Is it too late? Can they take the house?

Medicaid-nursing-home-caretaker-child-exception-Wellesley-MA

Response:

Fortunately, it sounds like you qualify for the so-called “caretaker child” exception to the Medicaid transfer rules. This means that your father should be able to transfer the house to you without affecting his eligibility for Medicaid coverage of his care.

Here’s how this works. If your father has no other assets, he should be eligible for Medicaid even though he owns a house. However, if he still owns the house when he passes away, the state will have a claim for reimbursement to recover its expenses on his behalf from his estate. You could avoid this claim, known as “estate recovery,” by your father transferring the house to you during his life. Normally, however, such a transfer would be penalized (since Medicaid doesn’t want to lose it’s estate recovery claim) by making your father ineligible for benefits for up to five years after the transfer.

However, it sounds like you qualify for an exception to this transfer penalty. To qualify for this exception, you must have lived with your father for at least two years before he moved to a nursing home and during that time you must have provide him with care that delayed his move to the nursing home for at least two years. There’s no question that you lived with your father for two years, but you would have to show that for at least two years your father needed your assistance to stay at home. Generally, Medicaid agencies accept a letter from a doctor stating that the care the child provided was necessary for the parent to stay at home.

Since these rules are applied somewhat differently from state to state and you have so much at stake, I recommend that you consult with a local elder law attorney before asserting your right to the caretaker child exception and transferring the house.

Related Articles:

Can My Parents Give Me Their Home as Compensation for Care I Provide Them?

Can I Avoid a Medicaid Lien on My Mother’s House?

Does Caretaker Child Exception Apply to Estate Recovery?

Showing 2 comments
  • D Ma
    Reply

    Parents had community home care (XHX)for 5 years. They own a coop in NYC. Prior to CHC I lived with them and took care of them.

    They went to a Elder Estate Lawyer just before receiving CHC the lawyer didn’t advise to place in a trust keep saying there is a look back and coops don’t transfer.

    Medicaid Recovery wants the coop because it is in probate. Is there anything we can do?

    Did the lawyer give correct advice?

    • Harry Margolis
      Reply

      I don’t practice in New York, so I can’t tell you for sure. But this sounds right. Most transfers cause up to five years of ineligibility for benefits. Coops are difficult because you need the approval of the coop board for any transfer. To be sure, you will need to get a second opinion from a New York elder law attorney. You can find one at http://www.elderlawanswers.com.
      Harry

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