Your Home and Estate Recovery
For most families, the home is the most important thing they own. The good news is that Long-Term Care Medicaid usually lets a person keep their home while they qualify. The harder news is that the home may be at risk later, through estate recovery after death. This section explains both sides.
Figures change periodically. Double-check current amounts before relying on them.
The short version
- The home is usually exempt while the applicant lives there, intends to return, or a spouse or certain relatives live there.
- If no spouse or protected relative lives there, the applicant’s home equity must be under the state’s limit: $752,000 in most states and up to $1,130,000 in others in 2026. From January 1, 2028, no state may use a limit above $1,000,000 (with some exceptions for farm property).
- After a Medicaid recipient aged 55 or older dies, the state must try to recover what it paid for long-term care from their estate, which often includes the home. Recovery is delayed while a surviving spouse, a child under 21, or a blind or disabled child is living.
- Some tools and exemptions, such as transfers to a caregiver child or, in a few states, a Lady Bird deed, can affect what happens to the home.
Guides in this section
| Guide | What it covers |
|---|---|
| Your home and Medicaid | The big picture: eligibility, equity, liens and estate recovery |
| When the home is exempt | The conditions that keep the home from counting |
| Home equity limits by state | Every state’s 2026 equity limit, and the 2028 cap |
| Intent to return home | How a nursing home resident keeps the home exempt |
| Estate recovery, explained | What the state can recover after death, and the protections |
| Lady Bird deeds | How an enhanced life estate deed works, and where it is used |
| Child caregiver exemption | Transferring the home to a child who provided care |
| Over the home equity limit | What happens when equity is too high, and the legal ways to reduce it |
| Selling the home | How a sale is treated before applying, during the application and after approval |
| Jointly owned homes | How shared ownership affects counting, transfers and estate recovery |
| Estate recovery rules by state | The federal rules and a state-by-state summary |
| Sibling exemption | Transferring the home to a brother or sister who lived there |
Getting help
Decisions about the home, such as whether to transfer it, sell it, or change the deed, have long-term effects for the whole family. Deeds must be prepared by an attorney, and working with a Certified Medicaid Planner (CMP) can help a family see how the Medicaid rules fit together before anything is signed. Each state guide lists that state’s home equity limit and estate recovery rules.
Last updated for 2026. General information only, not legal or financial advice. Medicaid Answers is a free educational resource published by Medicaid Answers Foundation.