Clear Money Guide
What this guide covers
A quick view of the questions and evidence developed below.
Updated August 3, 2026. Quick answer: the community spouse resource allowance is the amount of the couple’s countable savings the at-home spouse keeps. It is broadly half the couple’s countable resources as measured at the snapshot date, subject to a floor and a ceiling that are set federally and adjusted every year.
The formula, from the statute
the greatest of—(i) $12,000 (subject to adjustment under subsection (g)), or, if greater (but not to exceed the amount specified in clause (ii)(II)) an amount specified under the State plan, (ii) the lesser of (I) the spousal share computed under subsection (c)(1), or (II) $60,000 (subject to adjustment under subsection (g)), (iii) the amount established under subsection (e)(2); or (iv) the amount transferred under a court order under paragraph (3); exceeds (B) the amount of the resources otherwise available to the community spouse (determined without regard to such an allowance) … For services furnished during a calendar year after 1989, the dollar amounts specified in subsections (d)(3)(C), (f)(2)(A)(i), and (f)(2)(A)(ii)(II) shall be increased by the same percentage as the percentage increase in…
— 42 U.S.C. 1396r-5(f)(2)(A); (c)(1)(A)(ii) (spousal share definition); (g) (indexing)
Unpacking that: the allowance is the greatest of a floor amount (or a higher amount your state’s plan sets, up to the ceiling), or the lesser of the spousal share — one half of the couple’s total countable resources at the snapshot — or the ceiling.
So for most couples it works out as half, bounded at both ends. Below the floor, the at-home spouse keeps more than half. Above the ceiling, they keep less.
The figures
We are not printing this year’s figures. The amounts in the statute are 1988 base amounts, and the law requires them to be increased every year by the change in the consumer price index. The current published figures are much higher. CMS publishes them annually and CMS blocked every request from us this session, so rather than print a number that would send someone to the wrong conclusion, we publish the mechanism and tell you to get the current figure from your state Medicaid agency.
The mechanism is what stays stable: a floor, a ceiling, and a half-share between them, all indexed annually to the consumer price index from a September 1988 base. Some states set a higher floor than the federal minimum, which the statute expressly permits, so the state matters as well as the year.
What counts, and what does not
Countable resources are broadly savings, investments, and second properties. Normally not counted while a spouse lives there: the home, one vehicle, household goods and personal effects. That last point is the one that most often surprises people, because the fear is almost always about the house.
The house is protected during the stay. Estate recovery is a separate question that arrives later — and it is a real one, with rules that differ sharply between states. Protection now is not protection forever, and being told otherwise is how families are caught out.
If the allowance is not enough to live on
If either such spouse establishes that the community spouse resource allowance (in relation to the amount of income generated by such an allowance) is inadequate to raise the community spouse’s income to the minimum monthly maintenance needs allowance, there shall be substituted, for the community spouse resource allowance under subsection (f)(2), an amount adequate to provide such a minimum monthly maintenance needs allowance.
— 42 U.S.C. 1396r-5(e)(2)(C)
There is a route: if the resource allowance produces too little income to bring the at-home spouse up to their monthly needs allowance, a fair hearing can substitute a larger resource allowance. It is a real remedy and it is under-used, because it requires knowing it exists and asking for it.
What we could not confirm. The statute does not settle the ‘income-first versus resource-first’ question. We looked for a general rule requiring income to be shifted before extra resources may be protected, and the U.S. Code does not contain one — the only sequencing language governs the fair-hearing remedy quoted above. How that ambiguity is resolved comes from CMS guidance and state practice, and CMS blocked every request this session. We are not publishing a state-by-state classification we could not verify. Ask your state Medicaid agency which approach it applies.
Related: the overview · when resources are counted · the income allowance · the personal needs allowance.
General information drawn from federal statute and regulation, not legal advice. Medicaid long-term-care eligibility is administered by each STATE within federal rules, and states differ materially – on the resource allowance, on how income is counted, and on whether some strategies are recognised at all. Federal figures are adjusted annually; every figure here is labelled with what it is and when it applied. Decisions in this area are hard to reverse and often need a qualified elder-law attorney in your own state. We sell nothing on these pages and we do not refer you anywhere for a fee.
A different programme with far stricter limits sits underneath Medicaid — SSI at 65, where age alone qualifies.
What the allowance looks like state by state
The federal minimum and maximum are the same everywhere. What each state chooses inside them is not, and the differences are larger than families expect: some states protect one half of the couple’s resources, some protect the whole combined total up to a cap, some name it something other than “CSRA” entirely, and some print a banded schedule with the dollar figures written in. Each row below is excerpted from that state’s own detail page.
| State | What this state does |
|---|---|
| Alabama | Alabama calls the protected figure the Spousal Share, and its administrative code states the test in one sentence: “The Spousal Share is the greater of the Minimum Protected Resource Amount or one-half of the total value of the married couple’s combined countable resources, not to exceed the Maximum Protected Resource Amount.” The rule deliberately does not print the floor and the ceiling. |
| Alaska | Alaska’s regulation allocates to the spouse at home an amount “not to exceed the maximum community spouse resource allowance” authorized by federal law, and then works from that maximum: “The amount of combined resources, less the maximum community spouse resource allowance and any additional allowance ordered or authorized under (e) of this section, is considered available to the long-term care spouse when determining the amount of countable resources under 7 AAC 100.502 (a)(2), regardless of which spouse owns the remaining unallocated resources.” The half calculation most states run does not appear in the text of these sections at all. |
| Arizona | Arizona uses the letters CSRA to mean something different from every other state in this series, and reading them the usual way will give you the wrong answer. |
| Arkansas | Arkansas states its rule as four explicit bands rather than a formula, and it uses two terms where most states use one: “The Community Spouse Maximum Resources (CSMR – the maximum amount of resources that a CS is allowed to retain) and the Community Spouse Resource Allowance (CSRA – the amount of resources that an IS may transfer to the CS in order to give the CS the maximum allowed) are computed on Form DCO-713.” Reading CSRA the way other states use it will give you the wrong quantity. |
| California | California’s CSRA is not a standing protection the way most states describe theirs. |
| Colorado | Colorado does not run a half-of-resources calculation. Its regulation sets the CSRA as “the largest of” three amounts: the couple’s full resources up to the federal maximum, an income-first “increased CSRA,” or a court-ordered figure, so most Colorado couples below the federal ceiling protect all of their resources, not half. |
| Connecticut | Connecticut does not use the phrase community spouse resource allowance at all. |
| Delaware | Delaware runs the familiar half-of-resources calculation, but its manual writes a $25,000 flat floor directly into the rule: a figure fixed by a 1993 state law, higher than the lower federal minimum most states default to, so a Delaware couple with modest savings protects more than a half-share state’s own floor would give them. |
| District of Columbia | The District of Columbia runs the plain federal half-of-resources formula: no flat figure or automatic-maximum shortcut of its own, but its own Medicaid applicant resource limit is $4,000, double the $2,000 figure most states use, and DC’s own regulation does not print the federal minimum and maximum dollar figures; it points to CMS’s published table instead. |
| Florida | Florida subtracts a set figure rather than computing a share. Its manual provides that applicants with a spouse at home “Applicants who have spouses residing in the community or spouses who are not enrolled in HCBS, have a Community Spouse Resource Allowance (CSRA) subtracted from the couple’s total countable assets before comparing the institutionalized spouse’s countable assets to the $2,000 or $5,000 asset limit.” and describes that figure in four words: “The CSRA is an established amount that increases annually.” |
| Georgia | Georgia does not compute a per-couple half-share at all. Its manual sets one combined ceiling for the couple: the federal maximum plus the applicant’s own $2,000, and requires the applicant to transfer everything above their own $2,000 individual limit to the community spouse, which in practice hands the community spouse up to the full federal maximum rather than a calculated half. |
| Hawaii | Hawaii’s administrative rule does not describe a half-of-resources calculation at all. |
| Idaho | Idaho computes the spousal share the simple way: “The spousal share is one-half (1/2) of the couple’s total combined resources on the assessment date.” and then “The CSRA is determined by subtracting the greater of the minimum resource allowance or the spousal share from the couple’s total combined resources as of the first day of the application month.” What sets Idaho apart is not the arithmetic but the paperwork around it: “The couple must sign the assessment form under penalty of perjury.” |
| Illinois | Illinois does not divide the couple’s resources in half. Its rule sets the allowance as “The CSRA is the difference between the amount of resources otherwise available to the community spouse and the greatest of: 1) Effective July 1, 2012, the greater of the minimum amount permitted under section 1924(f)(2) of the Social Security Act (42 USC 1396r-5(f)(2)) or $109,560; 2) the amount established through a fair hearing under subsection (f)(3) of this Section; or 3) the amount transferred under a court order against an institutionalized spouse for the support of the community spouse.” There is no half-of-resources branch and no reference to the federal maximum; the state names one figure, $109,560, and protects the greater of that or the federal minimum. |
| Indiana | Indiana runs the ordinary half calculation: “The resource assessment is a very important process whereby the combined countable resources of the couple are determined as of the beginning (date of admission) of the institutionalized spouse’s first continuous period of institutionalization which began on or after September 30, 1989.80 From this information, a “spousal share” for the community spouse, equaling one-half of the couple’s combined countable resources, is then established for use in determining the institutionalized spouse’s resource eligibility.” but it removes a whole category from the pool before halving. |
| Iowa | Iowa halves the couple’s resources on a precise instant: “The resources attributed to the institutionalized spouse shall be one-half of the documented resources of both the institutionalized spouse and the community spouse as of the first moment of the first day of the month of the spouse’s first entry to a medical facility.” The rule then floors the result at “the greater of $24,000 or the federally established minimum”, and because the federal minimum is now well above $24,000, Iowa’s own figure no longer decides anything. |
| Kansas | Kansas states the ordinary half rule and then adds two provisions that most state manuals leave out. |
| Kentucky | Kentucky calls it the spousal protected resource amount, and its regulation states “The spousal protected resource amount shall be the greater of: a. The spousal share which shall not exceed a maximum of $60,000 to be increased for each calendar year in accordance with 42 U.S.C. 1396r-5(g); or b. The state spousal resource standard.” Both figures in that text are the original 1988 statutory bases. |
| Louisiana | Louisiana’s spousal impoverishment section states the method and then points elsewhere for the figure: “The maximum amount of the couple’s combined countable resources that may be allocated to the community spouse can be found at Table Z-800 Spousal Impoverishment Maintenance Needs and Resource Standards.” The subtraction itself is simple: “Subtract the appropriate spousal impoverishment maximum protected resource amount from countable couple resources to determine the countable resources of the LTC/HCBS/ACH institutionalized spouse.” but the amount that goes into it lives in a separate published table. |
| Maine | Maine’s eligibility charts state the spousal impoverishment standards as indexing formulas rather than as dollar amounts. |
| Maryland | Maryland’s regulation runs a greatest-of test and states its own base figures: “The community spouse resource allowance is the amount by which the greatest of the following amounts exceeds the amount of resources otherwise available to the community spouse: (a) $12,000, subject to adjustment under §G of this regulation ;” and “(b) The lesser of the spousal share computed under §D(1)(ii) of this regulation or $60,000, subject to adjustment under §G of this regulation ;” Both $12,000 and $60,000 are the original 1988 amounts, and both carry the same instruction: each is made subject to adjustment under §G of the same regulation. |
| Massachusetts | MassHealth does not divide the couple’s assets. Its regulation says the allowance is “The community spouse’s asset allowance is the greatest of the following amounts: 1. the combined total countable assets of the institutionalized spouse and the community spouse, not to exceed $109,560; 2. a court-ordered amount; or 3. an amount determined after a fair hearing in accordance with 130 CMR 520.017.” Read the first branch carefully: it is the combined total up to a cap, not half of it. |
| Michigan | Michigan does not call it a CSRA in its manual. It calls it the protected spousal amount, and “protected spousal amount is the amount of the couple’s assets protected for use by the community spouse. It is the greatest of the amounts in 1-3 below.” Those amounts are a minimum resource standard of “$32,532 effective January 1, 2026.” , one half of the assessed total capped at “$162,660 effective January 1, 2026.” , and a court order. |
| Minnesota | Minnesota is unusual in putting the number in its statute rather than adopting the federal one by reference. |
| Mississippi | Mississippi does not halve a couple’s resources either. Its manual directs the worker to “• Subtract the CS’ spousal share which is referred to as the “federal resource maximum” under Spousal Impoverishment Maximums in the Appendix Chart of Institutional Limits & Transfer of Assets Divisors.” and states the rule plainly: “The CS share of total countable resources is the maximum allowed under federal law.” The applicant’s own limit is also higher than the usual figure: $4,000, not $2,000. |
| Missouri | Missouri runs a Division of Assets process that sets aside a share of a married couple’s assets for the spouse who stays home: the state’s own current chart states a minimum spousal share of $32,532 and a maximum of $162,660, and the assessment, once completed on a signed form, stays fixed for the whole period of institutionalization. |
| Montana | Montana calls the protected amount the Community Spouse Resource Maintenance Allowance, and its manual is explicit about a point families often get wrong: “Pre- and post-nuptial agreements do not change the resource assessment process, as all resources the couple owns, whether individually or jointly, must be considered when completing a resource assessment.” |
| Nebraska | Nebraska runs the familiar half-with-a-floor-and-ceiling calculation: “The community spouse may reserve up to half of the couple’s combined resources, subject to a minimum and maximum reserved amount.” but the provision that decides real cases is a different one: the assessment is taken once, and what was not on it cannot be added later. |
| Nevada | Nevada does not make the spouse at home argue for a larger share, and in the ordinary case it does not run the half calculation to a result at all. |
| New Hampshire | New Hampshire calls its version of this rule the “protected resource amount” and sets it as the highest of four figures: the spousal share up to a ceiling, a fixed minimum standard, a court-ordered transfer, or an amount an administrative appeals officer sets, not a single half-of-resources formula stated on its own. |
| New Jersey | New Jersey runs the plain federal formula: the community spouse keeps the greater of a fixed floor or half the couple’s combined resources, capped at a ceiling, and its 2026 dollar figures are printed directly in the amended regulation: $32,532 to $162,660, effective January 1, 2026. |
| New Mexico | New Mexico halves the couple’s resources: “When the amount of the couple’s total countable resources has been determined, the resulting amount is divided by two to determine the spousal shares.” and then applies a state floor and a federal ceiling. |
| New York | New York protects far more at the bottom than federal law requires. Its 2026 levels notice states “The Minimum State Community Spouse Resource Allowance is $74,820.00” against a federal minimum of $32,532, and “The Maximum Federal Community Spouse Resource Allowance is $162,660.00”. |
| North Carolina | North Carolina is one of the few states that publishes the whole schedule as a table rather than as a formula. |
| North Dakota | North Dakota computes a spousal share: “A spousal share, which is equal to one-half of all countable assets, but not less than the minimum amount permitted under section 1924(f)(2)(A)(i) of the Act [42 U.S.C. 1396r-5(f)(2)(A)(i)], as adjusted pursuant to section 1924(g) of the Act [42 U.S.C. 1396r-5(g)], and not more than the maximum amount permitted under section 1924(f)(2)(A)(ii)(II) of the Act [42 U.S.C. 1396r-5(f)(2)(A)(ii)(II)], as adjusted pursuant to section 1924(g) of the Act [42 U.S.C. 1396r-5(g)].” and then builds the allowance on top of it. |
| Ohio | Ohio does not run a single formula. Its rule says “The CSRA is the greatest of the following: (i) One half of the total of the couple’s combined countable resources or the community spouse maximum resource standard established annually by the centers for medicare and medicaid services (CMS), whichever is less; (ii) The community spouse minimum resource standard established annually by CMS; (iii) The amount established by a state hearing decision from a hearing requested under paragraphs (E)(11) and (E)(12) of this rule; or (iv) The amount established under a court order.” So the half-of-resources calculation is only the first of four candidates, and whichever produces the largest number wins. |
| Oklahoma | Oklahoma computes a half share in the ordinary way: “(ii) The community spouse’s share is equal to one-half of the total resources of the couple not to exceed the maximum amount of resource value that can be protected for the community spouse, as shown on OKDHS Form 08AX001E (Appendix C-1), Schedule XI.” and then freezes it permanently. |
| Oregon | Oregon takes the largest of four amounts rather than the greater of two, and two of the four carry something extra that is easy to miss. |
| Pennsylvania | Pennsylvania’s rule is short and two things in it matter. First the arithmetic: “The spousal share is one half of the total countable verified resources owned by the couple when one of them is admitted to an institution for NFC including services in an ICF/MR facility and is set within minimum and maximum limits as specified by section 303(a) of the MCCA” (42 U.S.C.). |
| Rhode Island | Rhode Island calls it an allocation rather than an allowance, and two of its features are genuinely its own. |
| South Carolina | South Carolina does not run the half-of-resources calculation that consumer guides describe. |
| South Dakota | South Dakota’s chapter on community spouses puts a deadline on the state rather than on the family: “The department must complete the assessment within 45 days of the request unless delay is due to nonreceipt of documentation or verification from the requesting party or a third party.” The chapter’s own rule on determining the spousal share has been repealed, and the work is done by the general resource rules instead. |
| Tennessee | Tennessee calls it the CSRMA, and it is the only state page in this series whose manual prints the whole history. |
| Texas | Texas calls it the SPRA. “The SPRA is the greater of: one-half of the couple’s combined countable resources, not to exceed the maximum resource amount set by federal law; or the minimum resource amount set by federal law.” The handbook states the mechanism precisely and states no dollar amount anywhere in the section; it points at “the maximum and minimum SPRA amount set by federal law” instead, which is why this page quotes a calculation and not a number. |
| Utah | Utah computes the assessed share as one half of the couple’s total countable assets as of the beginning of the first continuous period of institutionalization; the manual then makes two points a family can act on: the share does not move afterwards, and an assessment done in another state is accepted. |
| Vermont | Vermont deducts the CSRA maximum outright rather than working out half of the couple’s resources. |
| Virginia | Virginia protects the greatest of four amounts: a fixed spousal resource standard, half the couple’s resources, a DMAS hearing officer’s figure, or a court order, but the dollar standards its own manual prints are dated January 1, 2024, at least one annual cycle behind the 2026 figures other states in this family report. |
| Washington | Washington writes three different rules and picks between them by date. |
| West Virginia | West Virginia runs the calculation as five numbered steps. |
| Wisconsin | Wisconsin runs its own three-tier table, and the bottom tier is the story. |
| Wyoming | Wyoming’s policy states the mechanism as two steps and a comparison: “Subtract the spousal resource allowance (refer to Medicaid Table 7 ) from the couple’s total countable resources.” “The remainder must be equal to or less than the $2,000 single resource standard.” The allowance figure itself lives in a separate table. |
The applicant’s own asset limit, by state (12 states that differ from the $2,000 federal default)
The table above is the community spouse’s protected resource allowance. The applicant’s own countable-asset limit is a separate, usually much smaller number. Most states use the plain $2,000 federal default; the states below do not. Each row is that state’s own quick answer, excerpted from its own detail page.
| State | Applicant’s own Medicaid asset limit |
|---|---|
| California | California’s Medi-Cal nursing-home asset limit is $130,000 for a single applicant, reinstated January 1, 2026 under DHCS All County Welfare Directors Letter 25-14. From January 1, 2024 through December 31, 2025, California ran no asset test at all under AB 133. If you were told California has no asset limit, that was true for exactly two years and is not true anymore. |
| Connecticut | Connecticut’s individual Medicaid asset limit, including for nursing-home eligibility (HUSKY C), is $1,600, below the $2,000 federal default most states use. A 2026 legislative bill would raise it to $5,000, but it had not been confirmed enacted as of this session. |
| District of Columbia | The District of Columbia’s Aged, Blind and Disabled Medicaid resource limit is $4,000 for one person, double the $2,000 federal default most states still use. |
| Illinois | Illinois’s Medicaid asset limit for Aged, Blind and Disabled applicants is $17,500, effective May 12, 2023, nearly nine times the $2,000 federal default most states still use. |
| Maryland | Maryland’s Medicaid manual sets the individual resource amount for an institutionalized Medicaid applicant at $2,500, above the $2,000 federal default. The primary document confirming this figure is dated 2014, and no newer official restatement was located this session, so treat this as the best primary-sourced figure available, not a guarantee it has never changed since. |
| Michigan | Michigan’s asset limit for its enumerated long-term-care and waiver Medicaid categories, including the MA Waiver for the elderly and disabled, is $9,950 effective January 1, 2026, up from $9,660 in 2025. Other SSI-related Medicaid categories in Michigan still use the plain $2,000/$3,000 federal default, so which category covers a given applicant matters. |
| Mississippi | Mississippi’s individual Medicaid asset limit for nursing-home and home-and-community-based-waiver applicants is $4,000, twice the $2,000 federal default, and it has been $4,000 since July 1, 2000. |
| Missouri | Missouri’s individual asset limit for nursing-facility Medicaid is $6,220.50, an unusual non-round figure that points to periodic indexing rather than a flat number set once and left alone. |
| Nebraska | Nebraska’s individual resource limit for Aged, Blind and Disabled Medicaid, including nursing-home eligibility, is $4,000, double the $2,000 federal default, effective January 1, 2026. |
| New York | New York’s Medicaid resource limit for a single nursing-home applicant is $33,038 as of January 1, 2026, not $2,000. New York’s own eligibility bulletins also print “$2,000” every year, but that figure is the federal SSI cash-assistance program’s limit, printed for an unrelated calculation on the same page, not New York’s Medicaid figure. |
| North Dakota | North Dakota’s individual asset limit for categorically- or medically-needy Aged, Blind and Disabled Medicaid, including nursing-home eligibility, is $3,000, higher than the $2,000 federal default, even though North Dakota otherwise applies more restrictive eligibility criteria than the SSI program. |
| Rhode Island | Rhode Island’s Medicaid Long-Term Services and Supports (LTSS) resource limit is a flat $4,000, twice the $2,000 federal default used by most states. |
Coverage, stated honestly: 12 states researched and confirmed to differ from the federal default. Every other state uses the plain $2,000/$3,000 federal figure.