What is the Medicaid Waiver Program
Attorney Tom Olsen: Robert, we haven't really focused much today on the Medicaid waiver, but tell the listeners how that could work for them.
Attorney Robert Hidock: Most people when they automatically think Medicaid, they think nursing home. We're very lucky in the state of Florida we have what's called Medicaid's Long-Term Care waiver, same income and asset limits as a nursing home Medicaid. What you're doing, you are waiving the nursing home, so waving goodbye to the nursing home and agreeing to home health care. Unlike a nursing home, though, there's not a spot for you automatically, you have to go through a grading period where you're rated a 1 to 5, 5 means the greatest need, always jokingly say, Tom, it's like getting a FastPass at Disney, gets you to front of the line, and once you get that 5, you have about a month or two month's wait. Once you're called off that waitlist, you'll be starting to get home health care which will be up to 30 hours a week.
It is designed to keep somebody home longer. The beauty of it is you can receive it at your home, they can receive it at their children's home, they can even receive that waiver at a long-term care at a assisted living facility. God forbid that their condition worsens. They don't have to reapply for Medicaid, they've already been approved, so it's just a transfer to a skilled nursing facility.
Tom: Robert, we had had a caller earlier that left a message with the board op here. It was from Rhonda about will a will avoid probate? That's one of the things we cover in our workshop on Easy Ways to Avoid Probate, and that is this. Having a will has nothing to do with avoiding probate. A will simply directs what happens to your assets when they go through probate. People are instant avoiding probate because it's expensive and it takes a long time. Rhonda who called him with that question, having a will will avoid probate, the answer's no. Remember, at Olsen Law Group, we're all about helping people to avoid probate. We do offer a free initial consultation to talk about your estate planning. When you hire us, we put together an action plan that tells you all the steps that we will do and you will do to avoid probate, make things simple, easy, inexpensive for your children when you pass away.
We're all about helping do that. Once we help people to avoid probate, then Robert is going to do the Medicaid planning for them to make sure that their wealth is still there if they have to go into a nursing home.
Robert: That's what we're all about, is preserving wealth, helping the person receive the care that they need while protecting all the assets that they worked so hard for because realistically, Tom, if someone's saved their whole life and they've got $200,000 and if they're needing long-term care, that money is going to be gone at $12,000 in a month, year and a half, it's gone. Then, what's going to happen? Either their kids are going to have to pay for them, but I don't know many people that can pay $12,000 a month, or they're going to apply for Medicaid. In this respect, if we know Medicaid is the end result, let's protect the assets and honor the estate plan.
Tom: Hey, folks, I want to remind you that we have booklets available to you, Easy Ways to Avoid Probate and How to Protect Your Life Savings From The Cost of a Nursing Home. We have free workshops on those topics as well. If you want free booklets or attend the workshops, call the Olsen Law Group anytime at 407-423-5561. If nobody picks up, just leave your name and phone number, we'll call you back, or check us out through our website at olsenlawgroup.com.
[00:03:30] [END OF AUDIO]