The VA allegedly has this benefit, but they don't want you to have it, no matter how badly it is needed. Typical of the government, i.e., Indian givers. You can try the VA office but they are worthless.

So in the meantime.....an elder in need is caught between a rock and a hard spot while they make up their minds what the new rules will be????
What kind of timeframe are we talking here?????

How can the VA impose the 3 year lookback on its own. Or implement any of these changes in regulations without congressional approval. There is currently legislation pending in our do-nothing congress whether to impose the 3 year lookback. It is up to congress. What if they don't pass it. The VA cannot do this on their own if it is a matter before congress

Can anything be done financially for veterans who served but not during wartime? This has to be such a small population compared to those who have in the past and present.

I applied for Aid & Attendance in 2011, my husband is 84 yrs of age, retired Air Force with 100% disabilities from Agent Orange Exposure in Vietnam, I am his caregiver (his spouse) and have been for 20 years, at first we managed quite well, but now need assistance to help pay for our helper. We have applied # times for A/A and each time have been told we qualify but have yet to receive anything, I should add we are currently waiting for notification of our most recent evaluation. My husband is completely wheelchair bound requires mine or our helpers assistance in the most menial tasks. I am unable to be away because our funds will not cover overnight help, I promised my husband when he was dx that I would see to it that he would cared for in our home until the Lord called him to his heavenly home. I have had to fight for every bit of help he has, even his 100% after he spent his lifetime serving and loving his country. Do I have a ? yes where will we fit in all these rules???. Silverthreads.

My mom does get this. We went through an agency. What I would like to know is how to keep her in compliance so I can handle the hiring of a caregiver myself. Over half of what she receives goes to this agency and I would like to stop using them, but cannot find out how to keep her in compliance and they keep telling me if she falls out of complliance she will loose her benefits. It's very frustrating knowing over half her benefits are not being used for her personally, but for 'paperwork'.

Oh and what I was going to say, and since we cannot edit..sigh.. I am thrilled she had the 23k because with her income, which she only gets 1266 a mo true income from her Soc. Sec. The other is piddling interest and a RMD from an inherited IRA from Dad that is almost gone. With the cost of the caregiver being around 1500 a month, her prepaying her funeral from those funds as well as hearing aids to the tune of 4200, the money was reduced to around 15k and you know how long that will last at 1500 a month, maintaining her home along with paying for the caregiver. We cannot wait for them forever, so I am going to the senators office if we have not gotten a decision by another month. I have to.

While i did do the application myself, I did get some information from the companies that will do them for you first, and you may qualify when you think you will not. As I stated earlier, when I went to the DAV office, while the lady was very nice, she also was not well informed. My mom had like 23k in the bank and her total income per year was around 14k. In my app I was able to include the cost of gas to get to the tons of Dr. appts the year preceeding, the costs of her medical expenses, I included her prepaid funeral expense, and etc. While some of this will be paid in another way, it is still available for recovery. I even included the cost of their lots in the cemetary, and my dads funeral costs from 2007. Not sure if there will be recovery on his funeral but there well could be. We had been having the in home caregiver for only one month but I was able to show the cost and establish what we are looking at going forward. There is SOOOO much to that application and SOOOO much to dig up and so much you can forget, or that they are not REAL clear about. It is a torture test. And if my mom says one more time "we won't get it, I feel sure. NO one gets it, the VA does not pay that". I will hang myself. For reals.

'I had several people tell me to go to the VA to get help, well if you parents saved and have anything forget any help.' that's exactly right. They don't even have to have a fortune, and the cost of their care so exorbitant--the whole system is bent on impounding everybody in a nursing home. Another irony is that nursing homes cost the government much, much more than VA A&A. On the average, for a double room (not private), it costs about $70,000 to care for a single nursing home patient per year. The government would rather spend that instead of $12,000 a year on A&A. Even a thousand a month would be enough for a lot of families to keep their loved one out of a nursing home. But they have another ulterior motive: They rather put people in nursing homes so they will DIE a lot quicker due to the neglect and abuse so typical of those places.

"It's confusing and there are people who need and deserve the help and can't figure out how to get it!" That's their modus operandi: They do not want you to get it.

Yes thanks for your service, thanks for nothing that is.

Janee, hit the nail on the head.

I had several people tell me to go to the VA to get help, well if you parents saved and have anything forget any help.

The application process is grueling hence ppl do walk away. There are companies that offer their help 'free' with an attorney on staff that confers with you for a fee. It all has to be worded just so as it is illegal to charge to help file. But honest to God, what I sent in was 2 " thick. You cannot overlook the smallest thing. That 1.25 she earned in her checking last year? You leave it out of income and it comes out of fast track and goes into the other pile. If they have to ask you for proof of one thing, if you leave some small detail out, they take you out. And do trust, we are going into the fifth month of waiting in flipping fast track. I plan to go to our state senator soon. We did get a letter last week apologizing for taking so long but assuring us they were working on it. Right.

The rules stipulate that the widow cannot have remarried regardless of her current marital status. The paperwork weeds that out. Sorry.

what irks me is we have a little farm house on 6 acres that is not very valuable because its on well and septic so this would disqualify us :(

Does anyone know the answer to this: Will these new regulations, the asset limitations and the 3-year look back, apply to those veterans who are already receiving a health pension benefit?

It's confusing and there are people who need and deserve the help and can't figure out how to get it!

I need to know whether a veterans widow can draw on his service if she had remarried a non-veteran?? My mother draws $1200 a month S.S. and it doesn't pay her rent in a retirement home, much less pay for personal needs. She pays the difference with a few thousand she had in savings, which will be gone before she dies. She has alzhiemers, but is in good health otherwise. Donna

My mother was married to a war veteran for 36 years, widowed, and remarried years later to a non- veteran, who also died in 2013. I was told that she wasn't eligible because she re-married to a non- vet. That seems ridiculas to me! She can draw S.S. based on his income if it's more than hers or her second husbands. (it isnt

And they do target at an age when understanding becomes more challenging, all government agencies. That, to me, is criminal. We have no respect for the elderly in our country. It is as if they forget they will be old one day.

And to further complicate the 'farm' issue, if land or acreage has been in a family for years, and the veteran inherits it, it may be more of a burden financially and morally than landfall. What if they get it and the need for aid occurs in such a way to disqualify them before they could pass the property to their heirs and meet the look back provision? Hey guys, this benefit has already been earned by this vet, EARNED. He or she is not looking for a flipping handout, this is their due and the fact that their forebearers may have passed land or a farm to them has squat to do with them going blind or needing assistance they EARNED. This whole premise is disturbing. Someone needs to be taking this up on the vets behalf, seriously, all these issues. It makes me sick to my stomach.

I think it's about time the VA put their foot down to stop greedy relatives.

Bottom line it disqualifies more people, and they deliberately made it more difficult to understand so you REALLY need a lawyer to sift through this ugly quagmire. Less people will bother with it, which is exactly what THEY WANT. So bottom line there really is no "Aid & Attendance" - only by name only to make them look good. It's propaganda. More government lies.

The VA net worth limit "would not consider a claimant's primary residence, including a residential lot area not to exceed 2 acres, as an asset. So, if your home sits on a farm or a plot of land greater than two acres (87,120 square feet), the extra land would disqualify you," This all sounds wonderful, and in most cases is, but what about state regulations already in place that automatically disqualify you. Here in KY, specifically Hardin county, if a residence is added to a farm, a minimum of a 3 acre plot is required. I don't know how many states, if any, have this same requirement, but this certainly puts a monkey wrench in the works for many veterans and or their surviving spouses. Seems to me, before initiating a decision this big, this little fact should have been addressed and addendum's added, or was this the point! The VA has gotten a lot of bad rap over the past decades and entirely earned. Another not so well thought out government decision. Anyone else?

Cetude. How right you are. My mother at 95 was a widow in her thirties. Raised 3 small children on her own. There was no help in those days plus that generation was to proud to ask for help I was always very close to my mother and the only thing she was afraid of was a nursing home. My sister started having my mom sign things and not telling me anything this past November. She took my mother to nursing home. With out me knowing over nite I had to get a lawyer a judge appointed her a guardian at lightem. She was released Christmas Eve But that month was awful. My mom along me to get her out. Other elderly yelling for help or neglected so sad. My mom was reduced to a wheel chair and diaper. This woman watched chronicle and had a scotch. I still think of the ones that don't have anyone to get them out. Gods. Waiting room. Sad

"If a surviving spouse collects social security, is the social security amount received deducted from the pension amount?" It sounds like you can't have any more than $2,000 a month combined. They don't even account all the bills and expenses of living such as home repairs, dentist, medications, car repairs, and the expenses of the caregiver. IF the caregiver gets a salary from the elderly person you MUST file taxes as income even if it's your own parent. So say you take $1,600 a month to take care of all the food (including the care of your parent) and you take up all the expenses of living (food, electricity, water, health insurance, etc etc etc) you MUST pay taxes, so that's about $400 you must pay in taxes (if not more). So you have to live on $1,200 a month. I think you have to file a self employment tax or something like that. It's horrible.

If a surviving spouse collects social security, is the social security amount received deducted from the pension amount?

Why don't they just do away with Aid & Attendance since they have no intentions of giving it anyway especially with this quagmire of complicated rules. The funny thing is that ONLY the rich can get it because they can hire a LAWYER who can worm their way into getting it regardless of their assets or income.

i totally agree with JoyHill-I agree that all wartime veterans should be covered by Aid and Attendance benefits regardless of income and assets.

cetude: Not so much the government but the money mongers in the medical filed with their "advancements" that forcibly keep us here well after any quality of life is long past. They do this of course at the expense of the taxpayers via Medicare/Medicaid and rake us all over the coals. Add that to most folks inert fear of death and you have a never ending flow of cash into the pockets of the wicked. "First do no harm" is a phrase lost.

I agree that all wartime veterans should be covered by Aid and Attendance benefits regardless of income and assets. They've earned it. What can we do about this? Who do we complain to that can get this corrected so all wartime veterans are covered regardless of income and assets?