Updated September 6, 2026. Quick answer: In Michigan, a Medicaid nursing-facility resident’s Personal Needs Allowance (the state uses different terminology; see below) is $60.00/Month; the amount of their own income they keep for personal use each month, with the rest going to the facility as the patient-pay amount toward the cost of care. That is well above the $30/month federal floor set in 1988 and never raised since. Bridges Eligibility Manual (BEM) 546: Post-Eligibility Patient-Pay Amounts, Michigan Department of Health & Human Services states the figure directly.
Why Michigan’s figure isn’t the federal floor
Federal Medicaid law requires only a $30-a-month personal needs allowance as a floor; a state is free to set its own, higher figure by statute, regulation, or agency policy. Michigan has done exactly that, setting $60.00/Month, as stated in Bridges Eligibility Manual item 546 (current transmittal BPB 2026-026, dated October 1, 2026).
What the allowance covers, and what it doesn’t
The personal needs allowance pays for the things a facility’s daily rate doesn’t cover: clothing, haircuts, snacks, a phone or television, small personal purchases. It is deducted before the rest of a resident’s income is applied to the facility bill as the patient-pay (or post-eligibility treatment of income, PETI) amount. It is not extra money on top of what Medicaid already pays the facility; it is the one slice of a resident’s own income that Medicaid rules guarantee the resident, not the facility, keeps.
A note on the name
Michigan calls this the “patient allowance,” not “personal needs allowance”; the same functional concept.
One exception or caveat worth knowing
Under BEM 546, the patient allowance for a veteran is $90 per month instead of $60.
| Citation | Bridges Eligibility Manual (BEM) 546: Post-Eligibility Patient-Pay Amounts, Michigan Department of Health & Human Services |
| What it says | “The patient allowance for clients who are in, or are expected to be in, LTC and/or a hospital for the entire L/H month is $60. Deduct $60 as a need item for the client in the nursing home. Exception: The patient allowance for a veteran is $90 per month.” |
Figures verified against Michigan BEM 546 (BPB 2026-026) and 42 U.S.C. 1396a(q); the 1988 date of the federal $30 floor was not re-checked on September 30, 2026.
Every citation on this page was read directly from the state’s own Medicaid agency, administrative code, or official eligibility manual this session. General information, not legal or financial advice; a figure this specific can change with a budget cycle or a rule amendment, and a facility or state caseworker has the final say on any individual case.
Related: use the Medicaid spend-down calculator to estimate how much you would need to spend down to qualify for long-term-care Medicaid in your state.