What To Do With Your Stimulus Check if You Are a Medicaid recipient in a Nursing Home

As the second round of stimulus checks go out, it is important to know that nursing home residents are not required to turn their stimulus checks over to their nursing home. In December 2020, Congress approved $600 stimulus checks, and another $1,400 for individuals making less than $75,000 a year is coming soon. Stimulus checks should definitely not be placed in a Miller’s Trust account either. Instead, stimulus checks should be placed into the recipients separate account. Medicaid recipients need only to spend the cash within a year if it puts them over Medicaid’s resource limit of $2,000 to avoid risk losing benefits. Stimulus payments are therefore excluded from a Medicaid recipient’s resources for 12 months, and are intended for the benefit of the Medicaid recipient and not the nursing home. The Social Security Administration has said that it will not consider stimulus payments as income either.