While cleaning out my mom's house in order to sell it, we ended up needing a storage unit because she refused to get rid of lots of large items and we couldn't move them into our home (no room). So this out-of-state storage unit is in my name (I'm her caregiving daughter) and being paid by her credit card each month. We're preparing for Medicaid look-back, and I'm afraid they may see this monthly charge and dig deep enough to see that the storage unit is technically in MY name (although it's all her stuff) although she's paying for it. Will this be a problem? I can't seem to find a clear answer as to what is allowed to be charged on the credit card of a person dealing with look-back...verses what will count as gifting. It's obviously not a gift, but maybe that could be contested? Thanks for any help!!
For my mom, she wrote checks for car repairs out to the name of the guy who did the work. Not the name of his long-standing business. They were asked about by the caseworker. Found a couple of receipts of his that matched up to checks. All good, no worries.
If your elder has a home or a car, there’s a pretty good chance that over the past 5, they got repairs or regular maintenance done with payments made out to the worker’s name. Could be for significant dollar amounts. It’s something to keep in mind when clearing out & jettisoning stuff out of their home/apt.
Also if they had/have a home or car, they may have gotten $ from an insurance claim. You want to keep any payout paperwork on those too. It might can look like “income”. Easy peasy to explain if you have the insurance info.
HOWeVER
Please pls pls be aware that if the plan is for her to move into a NH or MC and she goes onto LTC Medicaid program to pay for this, Medicaid does NOT give a rats butt on her debts. Or that she has any ability to ever pay on her existing debts. LTC Medicaid has a required copay of basically almost all her income to become a SOC aka Share of Cost paid to the facility. AGAIN is Required compliance by Medicaid.
All they get to keep is a smallish personal needs allowance that avg’s $50 or $60 a month for most states. A few states pay the federally required minimum of $30, yes only $30.00 a month. PNA $ is supposed to be used for basic items needed to augment what the State / NH provides. So it’s ok for clothing, shoes, beauty shoppe, toiletries. Or in room cable and phone if not included. Paying for a storage unit doesn’t fall under this AND imho you really don’t want a caseworker asking if the items in it have “value” that might could be sold and that $ is income the month they are sold as far as LTC Medicaid is concerned if they want to be a real stickler on rules. So think about getting whatever in it gone and get her CC monthly bill killed. OR the CC on file changes to one you have and now that monthly bill of $120 is all yours till whenever.
She will default on her CC or any other debts once on LTC Medicaid as the PNA usually gets used up completely just in paying for the at the NH beauty shoppe and a couple of clothing replacements. The copay starts being required the day she files the application. If you are expecting her to pay on her CC, forgetabtit. Either it’s going to be you personally pay off on her CCs or she closed them out and defaults on the balance. It will go to collections but really nothing debt collectors can do.
im guessing it’s not at all easy for you to go and get this done in the near future? Are there zero friends or family who could do this & live there? You may either have to get over there & do this or find a charity who will do this and they get the contents. This is so much why units go up for seizure and auction.
Yes, I was afraid we may need to just ask an elder law attorney to get a solid answer...but I feel like we have other details figured out, just this one loose end we're wondering about. I haven't seen much about how much Medicaid application workers dig into the types of charges on credit cards.
I would see an elder law attorney with your Mom to get good paperwork done, and if you are willing to be her POA and she competent enough to appoint you, find out how to keep the records you will need to keep on this sort of thing.
Good luck.