Washington Medicaid Estate Recovery

Quick answer: Washington recovers Medicaid paid for care received at 55 or older from both the probate estate and nonprobate assets. It can also enforce a lien on a life estate or joint tenancy interest in real property.

Washington law calls for recovery of correctly paid medical assistance from a recipient's estate — and from nonprobate assets — once that person was 55 or older when the covered services were provided. What's recoverable spans nursing-facility care, home- and community-based services, related hospital and prescription-drug costs, and other categories the department designates.

That reach makes Washington an expanded-recovery state rather than a probate-only one. The department can also enforce a lien against a decedent's life-estate or joint-tenancy interest in real property, following specific valuation rules the statute lays out for those interests.