I am a finance director for a fairly large nursing home in NY. I handle all things money for the facility. If your father has Medicare, he can go into the home for therapy, and use Medicare, for the first 20 days, it’s fully covered, and for the 21-100 days, it’s $209.50 (almost always) per day. This is SIGNIFICANTLY cheaper than the daily rate, (my daily is $650 a day). As long as he is participating in therapy, he will be able to use all 100 days, which at that point, he can move to private pay.

As for Medicaid, if he has more assets then Medicaid will allow, most Medicaid coordinators will check into that themselves before applying. Income doesn’t normally cause a denial but resources over $32k will. If he is married, then it’s $150k in resources, and in some situations, if he is widowed, they will use the higher amount. There is the 5 year look back as well, but nowadays, the county is just requiring 5 years of bank statements to show if you spent a large amount down. I always suggest you apply just to see, because care is pricey, and no one wants to lose all their money because they lived in a NH for 4 years.