Florida Medicaid Planning

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Crisis Medicaid Planning is when an individual will be entering a nursing home within a short period of time or is already in a nursing facility and needs to quality for Medicaid immediately. This is a crucial time to speak with an lawyer at Trusts Creators, Inc. who specializes in Florida Medicaid Law.

There are certain criteria for Medicaid eligibility that fall into three basic categories.

Eligibility

The Florida Medicaid Institutional Care Program (ICP nursing home benefits) looks at three criteria test to determine eligibility, which are medical necessity, income, and assets.

Medical Necessity Test

The first criteria to qualify for nursing home Medicaid benefits is medical necessity. This criteria also includes, age, citizenship, and residency requirement. To obtain nursing home Medicaid benefits, a person must be at least 65 years of age, disabled, or blind, and and have the medical necessity to be in a nursing home.

For someone medically qualified for nursing home care but who is still at home, Florida also has certain pilot programs such as the Diversion Program and the Alzheimer's Initiative, which provide certain specific services.

This test is referred to as a "CARES" Assessment. If the person medically qualifies, the Agency will then look at the individual's income and asset levels.

Income Test

Florida is an Income Cap state which means there is an income limit for Medicaid eligibility.  This includes income receive from Social Security, pensions, IRAs and all other forms of income. In many cases, one can use a particular trust called a Qualified Income Trust (also known as a Miller Trust) to legally solve the problem of too much income. Income for Medicaid purposes is gross income. This means that all deductions are added back into the income before one can determine the total amount. 

Asset Test

To be Medicaid eligible, a nursing home resident must have less than $2,000 of countable assets. However, the community spouse is entitled to keep much more. A married couple's assets are all considered together. It does not matter if all the assets are held jointly or separately in each spouse's name.

Some assets may be exempt, such as a home and its contents, a vehicle, prepaid funerals and cemetery lots, and certain types of trusts. However, it is important to evaluate each asset carefully before one can know if the asset is countable or exempt.

Examples of countable assets are cash in the bank, cash, stocks, annuities, bonds, land, minerals, non homestead property, notes receivable, boats, and certain extra vehicles. The amount of Countable assets change each year.