college expenses for 2 kids are looming. my son is graduating from high school in 2009, and my daughter graduates in 2011
i refinanced my mortgage last year, taking out enough extra cash to be able to pay for their colleges, and i was in good shape. but then i got blown out of the water ...
medicaid has this rule that in order to qualify for medicaid to pay for your nursing home expenses, you have to have run out of money, and you also have to have not given away anything valuable (like a beach house) in the last 5 years. otherwise, they will not pay for the nursing home.
my in-laws gave us their beach house about a year ago, so we have about 4 years to go before they will be eligible for medicaid.
at the time, they did not need nursing homes, and they had enough savings to pay for 5 or more years of assisted living, about $5000 per month because they could live together in assisted living.
a couple of months ago, my mother in law took a turn for the worse, and she now needs to be in a nursing home, which costs a little less than $10,000 PER MONTH. tacking that on to my father in law's $4,000 per month assisted living cost (he is still there), and all of a sudden, i am looking at closer to $15,000 per month. at this new rate, their savings will only last about 2 years.
my father in law is ok, for now, but who knows if (or when) he will need a nursing home.
so it looks like they are going to run out of money probably 2 years before medicaid will pay their expenses. so in order for my wife and i to be able to keep the beach house, we will have to pay her parent's healthcare expenses for about 2 years.
that is probably going to run about $250,000, and maybe more if her father has to go into a nursing home.
i have no idea how to swing that ... we are thinking about taking out a second loan, which would suck, or sell our home and buy one that costs about $250K less than whatever we get for our home. my wife does not at all want to sell the beach house. another option is to take the money out of my 401K retirement plan, but that is obviously not something i want to do either.
and i guess i could use the college money and go the student loan route. at least that would make the second loan amount lower ...
any money wizards out there?
i refinanced my mortgage last year, taking out enough extra cash to be able to pay for their colleges, and i was in good shape. but then i got blown out of the water ...
medicaid has this rule that in order to qualify for medicaid to pay for your nursing home expenses, you have to have run out of money, and you also have to have not given away anything valuable (like a beach house) in the last 5 years. otherwise, they will not pay for the nursing home.
my in-laws gave us their beach house about a year ago, so we have about 4 years to go before they will be eligible for medicaid.
at the time, they did not need nursing homes, and they had enough savings to pay for 5 or more years of assisted living, about $5000 per month because they could live together in assisted living.
a couple of months ago, my mother in law took a turn for the worse, and she now needs to be in a nursing home, which costs a little less than $10,000 PER MONTH. tacking that on to my father in law's $4,000 per month assisted living cost (he is still there), and all of a sudden, i am looking at closer to $15,000 per month. at this new rate, their savings will only last about 2 years.
my father in law is ok, for now, but who knows if (or when) he will need a nursing home.
so it looks like they are going to run out of money probably 2 years before medicaid will pay their expenses. so in order for my wife and i to be able to keep the beach house, we will have to pay her parent's healthcare expenses for about 2 years.
that is probably going to run about $250,000, and maybe more if her father has to go into a nursing home.
i have no idea how to swing that ... we are thinking about taking out a second loan, which would suck, or sell our home and buy one that costs about $250K less than whatever we get for our home. my wife does not at all want to sell the beach house. another option is to take the money out of my 401K retirement plan, but that is obviously not something i want to do either.
and i guess i could use the college money and go the student loan route. at least that would make the second loan amount lower ...
any money wizards out there?