4 Situations Where You Don’t Need Me

18 Aug 2022 · 1 min

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1:00

In this advisory video, Jerry Taylor explains that while Medicaid asset‑protection planning is often essential, there are specific circumstances where establishing a Medicaid Asset Protection Trust (MAPT) is unnecessary. He outlines four scenarios: (1) when an estate exceeds roughly $3 million, making private payment for long‑term care feasible; (2) when a family will never consent to a nursing‑home placement, rendering a trust moot; (3) when a couple’s assets are such that the community spouse can receive the allowable $128,000 transfer, allowing care without a trust; and (4) when the individual is within five years of needing care, meaning the five‑year look‑back period required for trust protection cannot be met. The speaker emphasizes practical decision‑making based on estate size, family preferences, spousal asset rules, and timing.

Chapters

Usually I'm on here telling you about how it's important to protect your assets from Medicaid, from the nursing home, Medicaid liens, Medicaid recovery. But for some people, it's just not the right thing to do. First situation would be where your estate's just too large. For instance, if you had an estate of over $3 million, even as a couple, if you both needed long-term care, you could privately pay for that care. And my suggestion to you, if you needed long-term care, would be to find one that serves cocktails at 5 o'clock. That's the one you want to be in. Not a Medicaid nursing home. Second situation would be if you're in a family where they would never allow you to go into a nursing home. There's no point in doing a Medicaid asset protection trust. The third situation would be if your estate is the size where you would already qualify anyway. If you're a couple and only one of you is going into the nursing home, the regulations allow you to shift about $128,000 over to the spouse that's not going to be in the home. And the fourth situation would be if you don't have 5 years before you're going to need the care. If you're already in bad medical shape, there's no point in creating a trust where you're going to need 5 years before it provides Uh, just exemption from Medicaid.