Some Interesting Facts about Medicaid Planning
Like the other people, you think that your good health means there’s no need to plan for the long-term care. But, the main thing is that your health status can be changed in the long run. Not even a single person can predict his or her health in the future. People above the age of 65 will need long-term care at a point. Eventually, if you are a healthy person, you must take into account Medicaid Planning. For this, you can take the assistance of an experienced Medicaid attorney.
The Need to Plan for the Long-Term Care
Most of the people never think about the fact that the long-term care need is not only because of neither the illness, nor it only provides the medical treatment. You might suffer from injury because of some incident happened to you. This signifies that a long-term care is important at some point of time in life. A few of the people require long-term care simply because they require assistance for their daily activities, for instance, dressing and grooming.
The Health Insurance Don’t Always Cover the Costs of Long-Term Care
Unfortunately, some of the people underestimate the exact cost of long-term care, that’s really very costly. People have the wrong perception that Medicare and health insurance are adequate for covering the long-term care cost. In actual, these resources rarely cover those costs.
How Medicaid Planning Helps You to Remain Prepared?
The benefits of Medicaid are designed to help the low-income group to pay for the medical services. Since Medicaid is a need-based program, you require certain assets for getting eligible for this. Though assets like home are excluded, still, it’s easy to reduce your savings before Medicaid will initiate covering your long-term care costs. Though, the objective of Medicaid Planning is to protect you from exhausting all the resources, while still getting qualified for the benefits.
Medicaid Planning Helps You to Avoid Fraud
The Medicaid is the ‘payer of the last resort,’ which implies that Medicaid doesn’t begin paying for the long-term care till the other payment sources get completely exhausted. Hence, if the Medicaid applicant gives away the assets or property before applying, such property transfers might result in benefits being denied or delayed. Hence, with careful Medicaid Planning, you can keep a control over your assets while getting qualified for the Medicaid benefits, when necessary.
What’s the Purpose of Medicaid Trust?
A Medicaid Trust enables you to protect your assets from the Medicaid spend-down, for retaining a limited income from the trust and leave the remaining funds to your heirs. Most importantly, a Medicaid Trust enables you to get qualified for Medicaid long-term care benefits. That way, you can leave some money for your beneficiaries, even when the high expense of the long-term care. Once you transfer your assets to the trust, the waiting period of applicable gets passed, and those assets will not be continued in determining your Medicaid eligibility.
Is Maintenance of Control is Possible
An irrevocable Medicaid Trust cannot be revoked. Though there are some kinds of methods for maintaining some control over your assets, particularly if you discover that you don’t want the trust. These are the situations where people make Medicaid Trusts. But, after this, they never have the need for applying for the long-term benefits of Medicaid. In such situations, there are some changes which you can make that will enable you to regain control over your assets. If you hold the right for changing the trustee of the Medicaid Trust, this means that you have some control.
You Are Entitled To the Income from the Trust
The other way of dealing with the fact that irrevocable Medicaid Trust is to utilize the income from the trust. You are entitled to this for your lifetime. Also, such income is accessible to your spouse. Another way is directing how the gifts from the principal get distributed to the children. The only restriction is that such distributions are not done directly to you. Or else, your children can freely use their distributions in any manner, they selected, involving spending them on you.
Final Words
Medicaid Attorney is of great help in making a Medicaid Plan for you. You will be able to structure the ownership of your assets. Also, the wealth that is protected with this planning is not considered as an asset or a resource for the purpose of qualifying for the Medicaid.
Author Bio
John Barret is a blogger with the Elder Law Center of Wisconsin from the past four years. He is a law graduate in the US and enjoys writing about different legal processes, aspects of the laws, and the significance of having an attorney.
