Houston Estate Planning and Elder Law Attorney Blog
When one spouse needs nursing home care and the other is healthy, there are several approaches that can be taken to securing Medicaid coverage. An elder law estate planning attorney should be contacted, since every situation is different. For some couples, a Medicaid-compliant annuity may be a solution.
What happens when one person needs long-term nursing home care, but does not have long-term care insurance and the family cannot afford to pay out of pocket? Applying for Medicaid is difficult if you have too much money to qualify, but not enough to allow the healthy spouse to afford to pay their bills.
Doing a “Medicaid spend down” requires the person to become broke, before they are eligible. What happens to the spouse’s lifestyle? One solution is a Medicaid Annuity, as described in U.S. News and World Report’s recent article, “What Is a Medicaid Annuity?”