The spouse not living in the nursing home (known as the “community spouse”) is usually allowed to preserve up to half of the couple's assets. Known as the community spouse resource allowance (CSRA), this regulation allows the community spouse to receive up to $148,620 from the couple's assets in 2023.
Can a Nursing Home Take Your House? Nursing homes cannot take a person's home or require them to sell it to pay for care. However, people who use Medicaid to cover nursing home costs are at risk of their home being seized by the government upon their death to reimburse the expenses.
Use a Medicaid Compliant Annuity
The more basic use of a Medicaid Compliant Annuity is a spousal annuity to protect assets for the spouse above the spousal limit. A more sophisticated use of Medicaid Compliant Annuities is for strategic gifting.
The nursing home will not seize your property. They will require your husband's social security and pension. You may have to make payments to the nursing home. Consult Area Agency on Aging to find out if there are state or local resources. Another option may be a small board and care home.
To protect your house from nursing home care costs, consider transferring it to an irrevocable trust or creating a life estate. An irrevocable trust removes your ownership, and a life estate allows you to transfer the house to a family member while keeping the right to live there.
A similar question is whether the nursing home will take all of their assets. These questions result from significant misconceptions about paying for nursing home care. The “government” never takes your assets to pay for your nursing home care costs.
Nursing homes do not take assets from people who move into them. But nursing care can be expensive, and paying the costs can require spending your income, drawing from savings, and even liquidating assets. Neither the nursing home nor the government will seize your home to cover expenses while you are living in care.
Guardianship and Conservatorship
To obtain guardianship or conservatorship, you must prove that the elderly person is unable to make decisions for themselves and that placement in a nursing home is in their best interest. This typically requires a medical evaluation and court hearing.
A revocable living trust will not protect your assets from a nursing home. This is because the assets in a revocable trust are still under the control of the owner. To shield your assets from the spend-down before you qualify for Medicaid, you will need to create an irrevocable trust.
If you have existing unpaid medical bills, and go into a nursing home and receive Medicaid, the program may allow you to use some or all of your current monthly income to pay the old bills, rather than just to be paid over to the nursing home, providing you still owe these old medical bills and you meet a few other ...
Can Medicare take your home to cover nursing home expenses? Medicare can't take your home and doesn't cover nursing home room and board. However, a Medicaid lien can be placed on your home, and they can sell it once you pass to recover the funds.
A nursing home itself does not directly take assets from residents.
And while a nursing home itself cannot take your home, those relying on Medicaid may have their home seized by the federal government after passing away as the government's means of recouping their investment in your care.
A durable power of attorney for finances names someone who will make financial decisions for you when you are not able. A living trust names and instructs someone, called the trustee, to hold and distribute property and funds on your behalf when you are no longer able to manage your affairs.
As couples age, they plan to stay together as long as possible, even sharing a room in a nursing home. Many assisted living facilities and nursing homes do allow couples to share space in the facility.
A medical POA allows you to make health care decisions, including selecting the appropriate nursing home, while a financial POA lets you manage funds and pay for care. However, if you are only the financial POA, you may not be able to make health-related decisions once your loved one loses decision-making capacity.
Medicare and most health insurance plans don't pay for long-term care. in a nursing home. Even if Medicare doesn't cover your nursing home care, you'll still need Medicare to cover your hospital care, doctor's services, drugs and medical supplies while you're in a nursing home.
Injuries and complex health conditions requiring consistent medical care are good indicators a nursing home may be a great option for a loved one. Frequent falls, mobility issues, and requiring assistance with several activities of daily living (ADLs) also may necessitate staying at a nursing home.
The monthly average for a semi-private room in a nursing home is $7,908, while a private room will cost seniors $9,034. This means Social Security benefits, on average, would only cover about 21% of nursing costs for seniors who opt for a shared room and roughly 18% for those in a solo space.
Transfer assets to an Irrevocable Trust
If you want to protect assets from nursing home costs, consider establishing an irrevocable Trust. Setting up a Trust will transfer ownership of the cash to the Trust account, which is managed by a trustee.
According to Genworth's estimates, the median cost of a private room in a nursing home is $330 per day or $10,025 per month in 2024. Semiprivate rooms are more affordable, with a median cost of $294 per day or $8,929 month1.
The federal government has legal protections that ensure that you, as a healthy spouse, do not go broke or are left without a place to live after your spouse enters a nursing facility. Usually referred to as “Spousal Impoverishment Protection,” or Division of Assets.
If you are in a nursing home for more than 90 days and Medicaid pays for more than half of your nursing home costs, your SSI benefits may be reduced. The amount of your reduction will depend on how much money you have in countable assets.
For those who are eligible, Medicaid will pay for nursing home care, including room and board, on an ongoing, long-term basis as long as the eligibility criteria continues to be met. In many cases, this is for the remainder of one's life. Medicaid should not be confused with Medicare.