What you are going to apply for is called the MMNA - Monthly Maintenance Needs Allowance. What MMNA does is enable the "community spouse" (that is you and it means living in the community) to be able to continue to live on their own without themselves becoming impoverished. Hubby is the only one who needs to become impoverished to meet Medicaid's financial requirements.
How MMNA works is 2 ways: Hubby once in a NH on Medicaid, will be required to do a co-pay or his "SOC" (his share of cost in Medicaidspeak) of all HIS monthly income to the NH less whatever your state has as it's personal needs allowance. The PNA ranges from $ 35 - 90 a month and the amount varies by state. Like for TX the PNA is $ 60 a month that they get to keep. Now the PNA is totally different from the MMNA. Yeah, it's confusing to keep all this straight…….!!!
Now if you need some of hubby's income to make ends meet or to continue to maintain your standard of living, then you apply for MMNA. So Whatever income he is supposed to pay the NH as his SOC will then be diverted to pay you a MMNA. Understand? Now the MMNA seems to vary by state and there seems to a baseline formula that most states use.
Some states have the MMNA high. Like for TX the MMNA is about $ 2,300.00. Other states have it lower. Now if you have unusual expenses, like you still have children at home (could happen if you are much younger 2nd or 3rd wife); or you still have a mortgage to pay or you yourself have super expensive medication bills, you can appeal the MMNA amount if it's not enough. In a way the MMNA is kinda like an alimony payment to enable the spouse to continue living as they were when hubby was at home and she had full use of all his income.
There was someone on this site, who's mom was the CS and it ended up that hubby's co-pay to the NH ended up being just $ 40.00 a month and all the rest of his income went to his wife's MMNA.
Personally, I think the whole Community Spouse issues are pretty complicated. And you probably are distracted in dealing with hubby's needs to concentrate on your CS situation. Really having an elder law attorney who can go over your CS situation and your finances is probably best. Also there are a lot of issues for CS that can be a problem for the Medicaid NH spouse if something should happen to the CS spouse. Like most couples have each other as their beneficiary on their life insurance policies. That is OK for you for him. But NOT for him for you. Because if you should die before him and get gets the life insurance money it will make him ineligible for Medicaid. And who will be there to deal with this for him? You want to change the insurance and this is just the sort of thing the elder law attorney can work with you to do. Somewhere I read where spouses who do not have dementia outlive their NH spouse by 12 years and that is a long time. You want to do whatever to keep as much of the $ as you will likely need it. Good luck.
How MMNA works is 2 ways:
Hubby once in a NH on Medicaid, will be required to do a co-pay or his "SOC" (his share of cost in Medicaidspeak) of all HIS monthly income to the NH less whatever your state has as it's personal needs allowance. The PNA ranges from $ 35 - 90 a month and the amount varies by state. Like for TX the PNA is $ 60 a month that they get to keep. Now the PNA is totally different from the MMNA. Yeah, it's confusing to keep all this straight…….!!!
Now if you need some of hubby's income to make ends meet or to continue to maintain your standard of living, then you apply for MMNA. So Whatever income he is supposed to pay the NH as his SOC will then be diverted to pay you a MMNA. Understand? Now the MMNA seems to vary by state and there seems to a baseline formula that most states use.
Some states have the MMNA high. Like for TX the MMNA is about $ 2,300.00. Other states have it lower. Now if you have unusual expenses, like you still have children at home (could happen if you are much younger 2nd or 3rd wife); or you still have a mortgage to pay or you yourself have super expensive medication bills, you can appeal the MMNA amount if it's not enough. In a way the MMNA is kinda like an alimony payment to enable the spouse to continue living as they were when hubby was at home and she had full use of all his income.
There was someone on this site, who's mom was the CS and it ended up that hubby's co-pay to the NH ended up being just $ 40.00 a month and all the rest of his income went to his wife's MMNA.
Personally, I think the whole Community Spouse issues are pretty complicated. And you probably are distracted in dealing with hubby's needs to concentrate on your CS situation. Really having an elder law attorney who can go over your CS situation and your finances is probably best. Also there are a lot of issues for CS that can be a problem for the Medicaid NH spouse if something should happen to the CS spouse. Like most couples have each other as their beneficiary on their life insurance policies. That is OK for you for him. But NOT for him for you. Because if you should die before him and get gets the life insurance money it will make him ineligible for Medicaid. And who will be there to deal with this for him?
You want to change the insurance and this is just the sort of thing the elder law attorney can work with you to do. Somewhere I read where spouses who do not have dementia outlive their NH spouse by 12 years and that is a long time. You want to do whatever to keep as much of the $ as you will likely need it. Good luck.