Updated August 27, 2026. Quick answer: Hawaii states the division precisely and prints no amount. HAR § 17-1725.1-57(a) divides the total uncompensated value of the transferred asset by the statewide average monthly cost of nursing facility services assessed to a private patient. The divisor is MONTHLY, and Hawaii is one of the few states whose rule says in terms that a partial month is not forgiven: a penalty period that comes out to part of a month “shall not be rounded down or disregarded.”
What Hawaii publishes
| What the state lists | Figure |
|---|---|
| What the rule divides by | the statewide average monthly cost of nursing facility services assessed to a private patient |
| Divisor period | monthly — the quotient is a number of months, not days |
| Which moment’s figure applies (assets) | the time the individual requests and is determined eligible for coverage of long-term care services |
| Which moment’s figure applies (income) | the time the individual requests coverage of long-term care services — the rule’s wording differs between the two sections |
| The section that states it | Haw. Admin. R. § 17-1725.1-57(a) |
| Partial months | “shall not be rounded down or disregarded” — § 17-1725.1-57(b) |
| Look-back | sixty months for an asset transferred on or after February 8, 2006 — § 17-1725.1-51(a) |
| Multiple transfers | all non-exempt transfers in the look-back are combined into a SINGLE penalty period — § 17-1725.1-57(c)(1) |
| Transfers during an existing penalty | get their own separate penalty period — § 17-1725.1-57(c)(2) |
| Chapter effective date | September 30, 2013 |
| Current 2026 monthly figure | not published in the chapter, and not on Med-QUEST’s rules page — see below |
How the penalty period is calculated
- § 17-1725.1-57(a) is the whole arithmetic in one sentence: a penalty period “shall be calculated by dividing the total uncompensated value of the asset transferred, by the statewide average monthly cost of nursing facility services assessed to a private patient at the time the individual requests and is determined eligible for the coverage of long-term care services.” The closing clause is doing real work: the figure that applies is fixed by a moment in the case, not by the date of the gift.
- Read the two divisor sentences side by side, because Hawaii wrote them differently. For ASSETS, § 17-1725.1-57(a) keys the figure to the time the individual “requests and is determined eligible for” coverage. For INCOME, § 17-1725.1-55(b) keys it to the time the individual “requests” coverage. Those are not the same moment, and the rule does not reconcile them.
- A transferred stream of income is penalised too, and Hawaii says how it is valued: a lump sum counts at “the gross amount of the lump sum income transferred in the month it was received”, and a disclaimed or voluntarily surrendered stream counts at the total gross amount expected over the individual’s lifetime. Both then go through the same monthly divisor.
- Partial months are not a rounding gift here. § 17-1725.1-57(b) says a penalty period resulting in a partial month “shall not be rounded down or disregarded.” In states that do round down, a small remainder disappears; in Hawaii it does not.
- Everything non-exempt inside the sixty-month look-back is combined into one penalty period (§ 17-1725.1-57(c)(1)). A transfer made WHILE a penalty is already running gets a separate period of its own (§ 17-1725.1-57(c)(2)) rather than being folded in.
- The clock starts at the LATEST of three dates under § 17-1725.1-57(c)(3): the date long-term care services are requested; the date the person would otherwise be eligible for coverage but for the penalty; or the date a negative action can be taken where timely notice is required.
Once you have the figure above, the Medicaid penalty period calculator does the arithmetic. This page is the Hawaii rate record; the calculator is the class parent.
What this page does not settle
- This page does not tell you Hawaii’s current dollar divisor, because Hawaii does not publish one in the rule. Chapter 17-1725.1 contains exactly five dollar amounts — $1,000, $2,000, $250 and $750,000 — and every one of them is a resource, burial or home-equity figure. None is the divisor.
- Med-QUEST’s own Rules and Policy page was re-read this session, not inherited from an earlier note. It serves and links exactly seven documents, and all seven are MAGI and MAGI-Excepted Income Standards charts for 2020 through 2026. Every one was downloaded and scanned here: zero of them contains the words divisor, private pay, penalty, transfer, nursing facility or long-term care. The amount is administered, not posted.
- Chapter 17-1714.1 is NOT the transfer rule, despite being the obvious-looking chapter number. It is General Eligibility Requirements: 40,895 characters with no transfer, penalty or divisor language and no dollar amount at all. If you are searching Hawaii’s rules yourself, 17-1725.1 is the one you want.
- A daily rate published for another purpose is not this figure. Hawaii’s rule defines a MONTHLY statewide average of private-pay nursing facility cost; a per-diem drawn from a reimbursement schedule is a different quantity computed for a different reason, and this page will not substitute one for the other.
- The chapter carries a 2013 effective date. That is a stable rule rather than a stale one, precisely because the moving number was deliberately left outside it — but it does mean the rule text alone cannot tell you what applies in 2026.
Eligibility is decided by the state agency on the whole file, not by this one number. Nothing here is legal advice, and no one should transfer, retitle or give away property on the strength of a worksheet.
Sources
- Hawaii Administrative Rules, Title 17, Subtitle 12, Chapter 1725.1, Assets for MAGI-Excepted Individuals — the full chapter as posted by the Department of Human Services
- Hawaii Department of Human Services, Administrative Rules for Programs — the index the chapter is served from
- Hawaii Med-QUEST Division, Rules and Policy — the seven documents the division currently posts
Each source above was retrieved and read against the state text on August 27, 2026. Every figure on this page was checked against those bytes.
Transfers made by an agent are only good if the authority behind them was granted properly, and Hawaii’s power of attorney requirements cover how Hawaii requires the document to be signed and whether durability is the default.
The penalty divisor governs transfers, not eligibility. For the income side, see Hawaii’s Medicaid nursing-home income test, which gives the figure or mechanism and the state regulation it comes from.