There are many issues that you have to deal with as you get older. Two of these issues are long term care and estate planning. Both of these issues need to be dealt with ahead of time, according to the PA Elder State Fiduciary Blogspot, however, you may be surprised to learn that you need to address your long term care financing in your estate planning activities.
When you plan out your estate you are basically determining how to set up who gets what, how your final expenses will be covered and how your assets will be handled. One of the final expenses that you need to plan ahead for is your long term care expenses. If you rely on Medicare or Medicaid to cover your long term care expenses your home and other assets may be assumed by these programs to help reimburse them for the money they invest in your long term care. If you want to protect your home from being sold by Medicare or Medicaid programs, then you will need to work with your estate planner or legal representative to figure out if giving your home to your heirs before you pass away will preserve this asset.
It is important to plan ahead for assigning the ownership of your home to your kids or heir before you need long term care because the government sets limitations on how many years the transfer of ownership can occur before you pass away. If you wait too long to transfer the title to your heirs, then they can still assume the property and sell it to recapture their expenses. Because this is such a complicated topic, and because laws and procedures for these programs change regularly, you need to talk to an attorney about what you need to do to protect your assets from Medicare.
Earlier than AMA started its shameless campaign (described later) I wrote the following word and mailed it to AMA, the President and varied HCR gamers on the Hill