Medicaid Trust Provision

Medicaid Trust Provision The following apply to any individual who establishes a trust, and who is an applicant for or recipient of Medicaid: A. An individual is considered to have established a trust if his or her assets (regardless of how little) were used to form part or all the corpus of the trust and if any of the parties described as a grantor established the trust, other than by will; B. When a trust corpus includes assets of another person or persons as well as assets of the individual, the rules apply only to the portion of the trust attributable to the assets of the individual. Thus, in determining countable income and resources in the trust for eligibility and post-eligibility purposes, any amounts of income and resources will be prorated, based on the proportion of the individual's assets in the trust to those of other persons. This general rule, however, is subject to the provisions of Miss. Admin. Code Part 103, Rule 5.7.A. C. This rule applies to trusts without regard to: 1. The purpose for which the trust is established; 2. Whether the trustee(s), has or exercises any discretion under the trust; 3. Any restrictions on when or whether distributions can be made from the trust; or 4. Any restrictions on the use of distributions from the trust. D. Any trust which meets the basic definition of a trust can be counted in determining eligibility for Medicaid. No clause or requirement in the trust, no matter how specifically it applies to Medicaid or other Federal or State programs (i.e., an exculpatory clause), precludes a trust from being considered under these rules. E. Exceptions to the countability of trusts as a resource do exist and are discussed in Rule 5.13. F. Trust assets includes both resources and income the individual or individual’s spouse own or that would have become the individual’s or spouse’s resources or income but for actions taken to direct the assets elsewhere. G. All assets held in a trust must be verified and the value of the assets established.