My mom passed away and her supplemental health insurance took their premium from her bank account in the amount of $400 before I could get her account closed. I just received her death certificate. The bank said my mom had me listed as a beneficiary on her account, so all they needed was a copy of her death certificate and they closed her account and transferred her money to a new account in my name so I can write checks on it.
She already transferred the house to me in a Life Estate back in 2008 and a lawyer told me I should be able to complete the transfer of ownership with just my mom's death certificate.
The only thing left is her car which is in her name only. She Was only in the nursing home for about 2 months. We had applied for nursing home Medicaid, her bank account was spent down to $4,000 and we were still waiting on a determination from Medicaid when she passed. I have not yet received any bill from the nursing home.
What her will does is makes me Executor of her estate and leaves me the remainder of the estate which would be her car. We are talking about a 1997 Buick with 100,000 miles and needs work. I will need to pay a lawyer to explain to me what I need to do with her will and what I need to do about her car. I really don't want to sell it if I don't have to.
I spent $1,200 on her funeral over what she pre-paid, then if I have to see a lawyer he will take a chunk of what's left and I have to pay a plumbing bill, after that, most of the $4,000 will be gone.
My big fear now is that I will get a $12,000 bill from the nursing home and/or a $50,000 bill from MERP. How do I prove there is no more money in my mom's bank account since her account was closed and the money in now in an account in my name? I had to close the account to stop her auto payments.
Her lawyer can't see me until Friday.
George has a lot going on here. He now needs to take his questions to a lawyer. Nothing with Medicaid is cut and dry.
Also, don't forget as the executor of the estate, you are responsible for having her final tax return prepared. If I were you, I would get that done as soon as possible, and use the remainder of the money in her estate to pay for that.
I have to think that MERP is already aware of what her estate is worth. I can't imagine they take the word of the family regarding what someone/someone's estate has - or doesn't have - without doing their own due diligence. If the nursing home sends you a bill, then I would just send them a copy of her final bank statement, as well as copies of the cancelled checks that you used to pay her final expenses, with a short note that the estate no longer has any value.
As Barb said, you are not responsible for your mom's estate's debts.
If she was admitted to the Nursing Home "Medicaid pending", there is no reason to think that Medicaid won't pay the bill back to the first day she was there.
Google " small estate administration" and the name of your state. You should get some detailed instructions on how to proceed.
Remember, YOU are not responsible for mom's debts.
If you have not been getting bills from the nursing home, your mom was being paid for by Medicaid. If Medicaid is not sending you statements saying that your mom owes for a 'spend-down' period, then don't worry about it.
You can prove there's no money in what was your shared account with your mom by making copies of the last bank statements that had her name on them.
Truly, the nursing home has no business with you. Tell them to go pound sand. Medicaid might, but I don't think so. Not if you as her POA weren't getting any periodical statements from them stating what times were not paid for. This is easy enough to check though. Find out who her Medicaid caseworker was. She had to have had one if she was on Medicaid or being applied for it. Then talk to them. Show them what bills were paid and currently being paid and it should be fine.
You also need to find out where Moms application stands. If you had the NH help with the application, then find out who the caseworker was and call the caseworker. Same if you filled out the app, call the caseworker. Ask where the application stands. Does the caseworker have everything needed to finish the application. Make sure they know Mom died. When I called concerning the lean on Moms house, that Medicaid Dept had not been informed of her death yet.
In my State you only have 90days to place a person, spend down and get info to the caseworker that is needed.
I would do nothing, even pay bills, until you talk to that lawyer.
Make a list of questions you need to ask.
Nursing homes always try to question something like this. They're so greedy that even if a resident was approved and paid for by Medicaid, they have to see if they can squeeze out a little more from a family.
Second, sad to tell you, but you probably won't own her car. Since she did not have a TOD (Transfer on Death) on her car to you, you'd have to go through Probate to get the title transferred into your name, after all debts are satisfied.
The creditors were have a certain amount of time (30 days I believe) to file a claim against the Estate. Even though the car may not be worth much, it is still considered an asset, so if not enough money in the Estate to pay the bills, then it would need to be sold, unless you would want to use your own money.
We went through this with my late uncle. He had a car he wanted to give to my mom, but he didn't have TOD. so, Probate was opened. Only debt that he had was an over $8 owed on it Credit card. Because the car was in an accident and deemed as scrap (which it wasn't the dealer wanted to get it free of charge which they did), the dealer kept it to either fix it up and sell it, (which they did) or scrap it. The Credit card company was alerted there was no money in the Estate to pay the bill so they stopped contacting him. Mom was upset she was not able to get the car, because it was something that belonged to him, and they were really close.
Medicaid and/or the nursing home are worthy of their hire, you know. It's not like they're asking for money for nothing. I doubt if they will spend much time chasing it, but morally speaking the value of that car is now due to the public purse which funded your mother's care. If you closed an account that had $4K in it, do you not feel you could reimburse them for the car's list price? - i.e. sell the car to yourself. Have you found out what it's worth in theory?
The local dealer offered me $500 for the car. I think the book shows around $1,000. It needs work.
I fully intend to pay the funeral home, lawyer and a couple other bills, but that will use up the full $4,000. I hope people understand the nursing home might get $1,000 instead of $3,000 because I had to pay a lawyer $2,000 to explain to them why they are only getting $1,000.
I had nothing to do with putting my mom's house into a Life Estate, I had no idea she did it or even what a Life Estate was until I found the papers a year ago and somebody explained them to me. Had she not done that, MERP could have just 'taken' the house. This way I have to go to all the trouble of having the house transferred to my name. Morally, I should sell the house and satisfy ALL the bills including the nursing home and MERP.
I'm just not sure it was correct to allow the bank to close my mom's account before I could get in to talk to the lawyer but I didn't want more money coming out of her account, we already lost $400 before I could get the account closed.