Homestead laws

[caroline00]

In Ca, if your home is under a certain value, you can go to the stationary store and buy a homestead form, fill it out and have it recorded.

then, it prohibits anyone from putting a lien on your home/property without your consent. so for example, if you got a second on your house, a lien could be placed but if you didnt pay your auto mechanic or a hospital bill, a lien couldnt be placed.

I cannot find anything like that in MO at all. When I look up homestead in MO, I get a bunch of tax info...but that isnt what we are looking for. We are looking for the type of protection that we had in CA.

anyone know anything?
thanks

[BamaSuzy]

Here in Alabama the hospitals place a lein on your property AUTOMATICALLY IF YOU"RE in a wreck! It doesn't matter if you have insurance or not, they still place the lein if you're treated in their ER or hospital following a wreck! My former editor found that out when she was hit by another car! Even if it's not your fault they still place a lein on your property to assure they get paid. And it's LEGAL, according to them, here! I think it's a violation of our Constitutional rights.....They take the lein off when the hospital bill is paid!

Different states are different. Just how it is.

In MN I believe they can't take the house & an acre around it, but everything else is fair game. You can't protect it.

--->Paul

[Shrek]

Suzy,
Thats not the norm here in Alabama if you have your home filed as exempt as primary residence and homestead. I was in a wreak in march and am currently paying off my local hospital in $100 installments on my deductable. There was no lein filed against my property. I would find another hospital if I were you.

[Cyngbaeld]

Try searching under bankruptcy laws.

I had a letter from Medicare that said if I had a home when I died and had used Medicare they could take the house and sell it to recoup their costs.

[Jena]

some states are more consumer protection orientated than others. California is pretty high on the list of protectionist states...so it AZ.

i live in illinois and we dont have that protection. we don't have prop.13 either....which i sorely miss!

jena

[Montana Mom]

That sounds like a homestead exemption. Search under that term. I actually very recently filed mine (no lein trouble now, but you never know!)

Here are a few links for Montana, the last being the actual form:

http://www.montana.edu/wwwpb/pubs/mt9815.html
http://www.bankruptcyaction.com/mtexemptions.htm
http://64.233.167.104/search?q=cache...+montana&hl=en

[Jena]

Originally Posted by Cyngbaeld

Try searching under bankruptcy laws.

I had a letter from Medicare that said if I had a home when I died and had used Medicare they could take the house and sell it to recoup their costs.

yes they can and yes they will.

anyone who is approaching the medicare age should go see an attorney before signing up, especially if you own any property that you would like to see passed down to the family. i'd suggest going to the attorney a few years early, at least three.

i found out alot about all this when my MIL got alzheimer's and we were considering placing her in a home. lucky for her she died before things got to that point.

jena

That's why you see all those ads in the papers for "free" seminars on how to protect your assets when it's that time of life. Usually people wind up transferring the home to some relative, but it has to be like 3 years or so in advance of trying to get medicare. Of course then you run the risk of the relative booting you out in the meantime....

The type of attorney you want is someone who specializes in estate planning.