Can a nursing homes or Medicaid take your home in Florida?

Attorney Tom Olsen: Robert, you had mentioned about misconceptions about Medicaid, and certainly the biggest misconception is that here in the state of Florida, if you have to go into a nursing home, they're going to take your home away from you. Tell listeners about that.

Attorney Robert Hidock: Almost every single person thinks, "Oh, they're going to take my home," and they're worried about their home. Realistically, the home is not accountable asset for Medicaid. No one can force the sale of the home. No one can make you take the equity value out of your home. No one's going to kick your spouse out of that home. The home is protected, so that should give everybody some reassurance.

However, if the person passes away and their home falls into their estate, then there's a chance for Medicaid to recover from the estate. There's a very simple fix for that, Tom, as you talk about on every show and in your workshop, the Lady Bird Deed. The Lady Bird Deed is the simplest way to make sure that the home will fall outside of the estate, avoid probate, and avoid creditors, and it is perfectly allowable for Medicaid. As many of your listeners know, the Lady Bird Deed, the beneficiaries of that are just getting an expectancy. If it was that traditional life estate where they were passing little bits of ownership, Medicaid frowns upon that. The Lady Bird Deed is the perfect tool for the transfer.

Tom: Here in the state of Florida, your home, the home you live in, is absolutely protected from the cost of a nursing home, period. It doesn't require planning. It doesn't require a will or a living trust. It's just automatically exempted from nursing home claims. What we do want to make sure is that you avoid probate on it because although it's protected during your lifetime, Medicaid may file a claim against it once you pass away. If we take steps to avoid probate, then that's not going to be an issue as well. We'd love to talk to you about that some more here at the Olsen Law Group.