Illinois Medicaid Eligibility Rules Series: Countable vs. Exempt Assets
In this Elder Law Minute, Wes Coulson begins his new Illinois Medicaid Eligibility Rules series by explaining the laws surrounding what a Medicaid applicant is legally allowed to keep.
Video Transcript:
Greetings! I’m Wes Coulson from Dent Coulson Elder Law and this will be your Elder Law Minute. We’re happy to present these because we think we can help inform you as to the ways in which we can help you and the things that you need to think about, relative to the elder care and estate planning journey. Hope you enjoy.
This video is going to be the introductory one, in a series that we’re going to do, on a subject that is sort of central to the core of one of the main things that we do to help people which is to enable them to qualify for Medicaid, while protecting their life savings to the greatest extent possible.
So what we’re going to talk about in this series are the rules in Illinois, for what a Medicaid applicant can and can’t keep. Exempt assets, are the things that under the rules the Medicaid applicant can keep and those don’t count toward the asset limit, so we’re going to be talking about those in each individual video.
Countable vs. Exempt Assets:
Any asset that isn’t exempt under the rules is countable, so that’s basically going to be money, any kind of financial assets that you have, anything that you can sell and get money to pay for your care, and a widowed or single person only gets to keep two-thousand dollars worth of those assets.
I want to give one important word of caution. When you watch the videos in this series, and you learn what the rules are, please don’t be under the misimpression that I’m making you an expert in this or someone able to do this by yourself. If someone hands you a deck of cards and a rule book for how to play bridge or how to play pinochle or gin rummy or poker, let me assure you that, that’s not going to immediately make you a good card player.
The thing about what we do, is the knowledge, the skill, the experience in knowing how these rules can be applied to your best benefit. So we want you to understand these, but we also want you to understand that you’re going to be a lot better off if you get the professional help that we’re able to provide.
Thanks.
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Dent-Coulson Elder Law is dedicated to providing families in the St. Louis area with their Elder Law needs. Our practice areas include Asset Preservation Planning, Veterans Benefits, Medicaid Eligibility, Alzheimer’s Planning, Special Needs Planning, Estate Planning and more. We understand the financial challenges you may face as you and your loved ones grow older. At Dent-Coulson Elder Law, our clients’ well-being is our number one priority. For immediate help, call (618) 632-7000 (IL) or (314) 567-9292 (MO), or Contact Us and we will get in touch as soon as possible.
