My husband is 15 years older than me. He was terrible with money, gambling problems, pulled out his retirement accounts without me knowing, took out loans and credit cards without me knowing I had no idea how much debt he had until he started having memory issues and I had to take over everything and discovered $1500 of monthly payments to things I had no knowledge of. I never made as much as he did, I was a stay at home mom most of our marriage When he could no longer work I had to dip into my secret savings Secret because any time he found out there was a joint savings, it disappeared. So this year I have wiped out my savings to cover all the bills without his income. I even borrowed against my Inheritance! I had to get his ss, medicare, and supplements started and pay out of pocket for his medical needs so now I'm broke. All we have is the house and one 10 year old car. We still have 20 years on our mortgage and even with his ss, I can't keep up with all his bills and the household expenses. He closed his retirement accounts years ago apparently. If I have to apply for Medicaid for him, what happens to me and our house? I can't afford to "live" without his ss even if I let his gambling debt default and the mortgage is much cheaper than rent. We also have a daughter with autism who still lives at home. I'm not even sure I can afford an elder law attorney at this point!
The sad truth is, given all of this, you may want/need to consider a separation or divorce with division of finances whether you move out of your home or not.
If your husband enters care you are going to fully understand your options as far as joint assets go.
That isn't something we can tell you or help you with.
I am so very sorry for your predicament and I wish you luck, but you need expert advice now. You will just have to add that to the pile of debt.
What imo you should actually be worried about is paying property taxes and paying that mortgage. And absolutely having the $ for this. Neither the tax collector or the bank holding the mortgage has any grace period once an account goes very delinquent. As a suggestion:
- on taxes, go online to Co courthouse website to see what the status is and if current. If not, how delinquent is it?
Also check to see that both your & his names are on the title.
- is current value placed by tax collector on the property accurate? If not, you imo need to start right now taking photos because you are going to file a protest next May with appraisal office to have its value reduced. All sad house photos are to be the condition of the home as of now to Jan 1, 2025.
- on mortgage, is it current? If not how delinquent?
Find mortgage contract. If it’s MIA, call the lender to get them to email you a copy. You have to make sure that you are listed on the documents, not just hubs.
Can you 100% on your own pay both mortgage & property taxes? If not how short are you just on these 2 items? This is what I’d be worried about. & you need to know this figure as you are going to file for CSRA aka Community Spouse Resource Allowance when hubs goes into a Nh and goes onto LTC Medicaid. What CSRA is, it allows for you as wife still living in the community to seek a waiver to have his monthly income paid to you rather than paid to the NH as his required Share of Cost. TX has had a historically high CSRA allowance, like over 3K. But you as CS have to show why ya need his income. If your living costs are such - including costs for dependent child - that you need every penny, then that NH gets zero SOC from him. NH still gets LTC Medicaid daily room&board reimbursement from the State but no SOC.
And that my dear is why it’s mucho importante to know what’s what on taxes and mortgage. You want to get them all current BEfORE ever filing a LTC Medicaid application. So that it lessens your overall nonexempt assets (savings) as a couple so that your joint assets all combined can be under the TX max of - I think- 129K. All $ moves done before ever filing for NH program because otherwise $ gets fixed based on the date of entering the NH.
Say Jim gets $2345 SSA each month as his only income; his wf Anne gets $800 a mo part time job as kids still at home. 95K in savings, $1K mortgage, 6K prop taxes ($500 mo), 4K prop insurance ($333 mo), avg $450 mo utilities. Jim medically needs skilled nursing care and will have to go into a NH. Normally NH would get his $2345 SSA $ less TX $75 a month Personal Needs Allowance. HOWEVER Anne as the community spouse needs all his $ as she only has $800 but with $2,283 a mo in cost just from the mortgage, taxes, insurance and utilities. Add in other living & kid costs… Anne will file a CSRA waiver for all his SSA.
Sticky part is this is NOT ever a DIY to do. Couple stuff not straightforward. It’s atty work and best off by CeLA level of atty. All sort of things have to be reviewed, some things perhaps changed, $ btw hubs and wf segregated. Realize that ONLY the NH applicant has to become impoverished for TX LTC Medicaid. Not the CS. But doing this and doing it in a way that is compliant is Medicaid savvy atty work.
Way different than doing LTC Medicaid for a widowed parent.
So Jim @ 2K and Anne the CS at 93K. Anne will end up using her $ 93K to pay for things as needed when she’s short from her own income and the CSRA $ she gets. Anne and the daughter do not themselves need to become impoverished for the hubs to be eligible for LTC Medicaid. Only he does. But doing the whatevers to make this happen not really DIY. It’s atty work. My NAL point in all this is there are paths out there you can take in advance that can secured a better future and still be ok for LTC Medicaid.