Legal Question in Elder Law in New York

Re: shared cds on bank account in mother and daughter name

The answer to your question needs a clarification as to when the CDs were placed in this joint ownership. As you probably are aware Medicaid has different requirements that are affected by gifting assets to family members. I would suggest you e-mail me your phone number and the dates the transfers as well as who owned the asset.(mom 100% etc.). This would give me the information necessary to begin to evaluate your situation. If you're interested my e-mail address is posted on my profile. It is important that you further review the Medicaid plan with myself or another lawyer soon. I look forward to hearing from you. robert roemer

Re: shared cds on bank account in mother and daughter name

Good question.

The answer is 'maybe.' Most importantly, you have to disclose everything on the Medicaid application and the Department of Social Services (DSS) will ask you questions about the account, and you can argue with them as to whether the CD's are a countable resource of mom's and have to be spent down. Who put up the money in the first place to buy the CD's? Mom or daughter? You had best start getting records together now. At the end of the day, it is what it is. The local Medicaid folks are fair and reasonable people who apply the law and rules correctly. When there are disagreements, you have to then make the call as to whether there's enough money on the table to spend the time and effort to appeal and/or go to court. Is it a $5,000 CD or $5,000,000?

Good luck, and god bless your mom.

Rick Bryan

New York, NY