My mom and I are both on the title of her home she recently purchased. She is 70. If she needs Medicaid in the future, can Medicaid take her house if I'm on the title? Should the title of the house just be in my name? I do not live in her house. I have my own house.
If it’s Mary Smith and Anne Smith Jones then you each are 50% owner. For Medicaid her 50% share house is an exempt asset for her lifetime in most states. She can keep it but due to Medicaid copay or SOC requirement she will have realistically no money to pay anything on her 50% - that’s what Jo Ann is getting at. So to keep house you end up paying all property costs.
If mom applies for Medicaid, Medicaid is required to attempt a recovery of all cost paid from any after death assets of her estate. The house - at whatever it’s 50% value - becomes an asset of her estate & subject to MERP Estate Recovery.
The shared ownership is going to be a real clusterF - to me - to get through as in theory she needs to pay just 50% and you the other 50% and someone must keep strict documentation on this from day 1 of ownership.
So did you each contribute 50/50 on buying it? If not was there some type of legal done delineating how to deal with this?
If there is a mortgage (horrors!), is it in both names & paying 50/50?
How is insurance on property written? Just her name? Or both?
If she filed homestead exemption, does assessor have it for just her 50%?
If she were to go onto Medicaid, could you realistically pay all property costs for possibly years & years? If not could you deal with renting it?
If your state allows for a lien to be placed upon being on Medicaid, that lien will be a problem if you ever want to get lending on a the property or use it as collateral . Even though your 50 is outside of Medicaid, the lien is there.
Mom cannot simply QCD her share over to you as it would be considered gifting with a transfer penalty placed on her eligibility for Medicaid should she apply before summer 2023.......
Before months go by, I’d suggest you have mom & you meet with an NAELA or CELA level elder law atty. Like before summer. You know everything in this scenario is complicated as there’s tax implications, Medicaid penalty & exemption possibilities, shared costs.
Also please please please do NOT do anything that would increase the value of the property. No renovations, no additions, no pulling permits for new work. Needed or Required maintenance is ok. So “yes” on replacing the bad leaking gas lines but “no” on whole house new plumbing. Why? Cause a lot of states have a hardship exclusion for MERP. Property that’s under a certain value (could be under 100k or under 65/75k) may not have a recovery attempt if heirs open probate and themselves have debts against the estate to file. Those debts could be the list of whatever you have paid for mom’s 50% once she goes onto Medicaid & might be able to be entered into probate, this is something again to discuss with the attorney. Feds have the cost benefit threshold at 10k but some states have it higher via the hardship exemption. The attorney will be key in this as each state management of Medicaid is unique. Really imo until you have a better, clearer idea of what the long view for the house is, do not do anything substantial to it. If mom just needs to do something cause it’s new, keep it to gardening is my suggestion.