Medicaid application Tag

Could this be you? You’re in your thirties or forties, with several active children and a busy social and business life. You’ve got volunteer activities and school programs to keep track of. Your parents are in their seventies or eighties, have their own home, and appear to pay all their bills when due. You have no idea what your parents’ income or assets are because they don’t want to bother...

Some 2021 numbers are now published for New Jersey Medicaid’s MLTSS program. These apply to people who are applying for benefits under the MLTSS/ Medicaid program for long-term care services. These numbers relate to the resource limit for a married applicant and spouse, the income “cap” that would trigger a need to set up a...

New Jersey FamilyCare’s Medicaid program has many components that serve different population groups of people who are aged, disabled or poor. Did you know that there is a Medical Assistance Advisory Committee (MACC) which meets regularly and is required to hold quarterly public forums? On February 5th, along with other members of New Jersey NAELA, I attended the first MAAC (Medical...

Earlier this year I wrote about problems that are cropping up for Medicaid applicants who purchased irrevocable funeral trusts. The problem is that certain County Boards of Social Services were/are counting some of the dollars in the irrevocable funeral trust as if they are available resources (assets). The theory was that the items are ‘for the living,” and not “for the...

Here is a recent case that is interesting because of its detailed description of the prolonged delay in the processing of an application for MLTSS Medicaid benefits, which was followed by the agency’s failure to really look at the information submitted and an abrupt denial of benefits that could have caused horrendous consequences. The Appellate Division reversed, in a decision that is...

Sale or transfer of a primary residence is often a major consideration in elder care planning. Property may be transferred from an infirm spouse to the “healthy spouse.” Property may be sold because the homeowner has to move into a nursing home or other care facility. Property may be transferred to the “caregiver child” in connection with a Medicaid application. A...

When a person applies for Medicaid to pay for home care or nursing home care, a penalty will be imposed if assets were given away during the preceding five year “look-back” period. There are numerous regulations in federal and state law  concerning “uncompensated transfers,” which are gifts.  A “gift” is distinguished by law from a “payment for goods...

Followers of this blog know that when a person applies for Medicaid under the New Jersey MLTSS program or other state programs that pay for nursing homes, assisted living or home health care services, there is a 5-year look-back that is done by the agency to determine if a transfer penalty should be imposed for gifts made during the 5 years preceding the application. The penalty is a period of...

When I first started filing Medicaid applications for my clients back in 1995, a person who needed long-term care services in the home or assisted living but had run out of money could not even apply for Medicaid if their gross monthly income was higher than the “income cap.” Of course, the income cap was well below the amount that was needed to pay for care, which meant that a lot...

When a person applies for Medicaid under the NJ MLTSS program after having made gift transfers during the most recent 5 years, there will likely be a penalty period in which Medicaid will not pay for the care that this person needs (unless the transfers were exempt, such as transfers to a spouse or disabled child). This transfer penalty is mandated by federal law, and the greater the amount...