Estate recovery is the process whereby MassHealth gets reimbursed for its expenditures on behalf of a MassHealth recipient. In effect, MassHealth is a loan if the MassHealth recipient has any assets that are held in a form that can be attacked by MassHealth. If there is a lien on a MassHealth recipient’s home and it is sold during the MassHealth recipient’s lifetime, MassHealth will assert a claim for reimbursement at the real estate closing.
All of the estate recovery claims occur after the MassHealth recipient’s death, and at present only against the deceased recipient’s probate estate. (During the first two years of Mitt Romney’s term as Governor of Massachusetts, the Massachusetts legislature gave his administration unbridled power to change the Medicaid laws in Massachusetts and he expanded estate recovery greatly, but once the members of the legislature woke up and learned what they had voted for, they almost unanimously repealed the expanded estate recovery law).
The federal law continues to give states the option to expand estate recovery laws, so it is possible that estate recovery will be expanded in Massachusetts in the near future.
MassHealth: Medicaid in Massachusetts 
Comments
what happens if fiduciary refuses to reimburst estate recovery bill. what are the penaltys?
The fiduciary is personally liable for failure to pay the legitimate debts of the estate.
Trackbacks
[…] 28. Estate Recovery. After you have established eligibility, MassHealth is usually treated as a gift to you that you do not have to repay. If, however, you end up dying and having any assets go through probate, MassHealth can end up being a loan repayable to the Estate Recovery Unit at MassHealth. Any assets that you were allowed to keep during the MassHealth application process, including your home, can get scooped up by estate recovery. (See What Is Estate Recovery by MassHealth?) […]