Wyoming Medicaid Income Limits 2026: Eligibility & Assets

Wyoming Medicaid income limits sit at a hard $2,982/month for long-term care in 2026, and going one dollar over does not disqualify you. It means you must route the excess through a Miller Trust first: Wyoming's eligibility manual tells the caseworker to hand an applicant whose countable income lands above the standard an income-trust packet.1

This guide walks through the 2026 income and asset rules for Wyoming Medicaid for seniors and people with disabilities who need nursing-facility or home-based long-term care. It covers the income cap and the Qualified Income Trust that goes with it, the $2,000 asset limit, what a nursing-home resident keeps, the protections for a spouse who stays home, and how to apply through the state's eligibility system.

In This Guide

• Which Medicaid income test applies to a senior
• The regular income limit for a working-age adult
• How Wyoming Medicaid income limits work: the income cap
• When the income cap puts you over: the Miller Trust
• The asset limit
• What a nursing-home resident keeps
• Protecting the spouse who stays home
• After death: estate recovery
• How to apply in Wyoming
• Frequently Asked Questions
• Learn More

Which Medicaid income test applies to a senior

Before the numbers, one clarification that trips up most families. The Medicaid income chart a calculator site shows you, usually framed as a percentage of the federal poverty level, is the MAGI test that covers working-age adults and children. Wyoming did not adopt that adult-expansion pathway, so for a senior or a person with a disability seeking long-term care, the MAGI chart is not the operative test at all.

The test that applies is the SSI-related pathway for the aged, blind, and disabled (ABD). It uses a different income standard (the $2,982 long-term-care cap below) and adds a hard asset limit that the MAGI pathway does not have. If you anchored on a poverty-level percentage, set it aside. The figures in this guide are the ones that govern Wyoming long-term-care eligibility.1

The regular Medicaid income limit for a working-age adult in Wyoming

Everything else in this guide is the long-term-care track. If you landed here as an adult under 65 (a 60-year-old between jobs, or someone in their early sixties caring for a parent and wondering about their own coverage), the question is different, and so is the answer.

In the 41 states, including the District of Columbia, that adopted the Affordable Care Act Medicaid expansion, a working-age adult generally qualifies for full Medicaid with income up to 138% of the federal poverty level: roughly $1,835 a month, or about $22,000 a year, for one person in 2026, measured against a poverty guideline of $15,960.4,5 That MAGI pathway applies no asset test and no income disregards, and it counts Social Security in full, including any portion that is not taxable.4,6

Wyoming is not one of those states. It did not adopt the ACA adult expansion, so there is no "new adult group" here.7 A non-disabled, non-elderly adult without dependent children generally cannot get full Wyoming Medicaid on income alone, however low that income is. And because Wyoming is one of the nine non-expansion states with a coverage gap, an adult below the poverty line can be caught in the middle: earning too much for any Wyoming Medicaid pathway, yet, under the coverage-gap rules, too little for the Marketplace premium subsidies meant for higher earners.7

If that describes you, the realistic fallback is the Health Insurance Marketplace rather than Medicaid. Check what Marketplace coverage and any premium subsidy would cost for your income at HealthCare.gov before assuming you have no option, since that is the pathway most Wyoming adults in this position turn to. And apply through the Wyoming Eligibility System anyway: only the state can make the determination, and a different mandatory pathway (as a parent or caretaker relative at Wyoming's frozen standard, or on the basis of a disability) may still reach you.

A second door opens at 65. The aged, blind, and disabled track (the SSI-rate yardstick of $994 a month for an individual, plus the asset test) is the pathway for seniors and people with disabilities.2 What moves you onto it is not your birthday by itself: federal rules set MAGI aside for a person 65 or older only when age is a condition of eligibility for the group being tested, or when the applicant is asking for long-term-care services. So someone 65 or older applying as a parent or caretaker relative is still judged on MAGI, with no asset test.8,4 Still, the pre-Medicare years are the hardest stretch in a non-expansion state, and options widen once the ABD pathway and, for most people, Medicare arrive at 65.

How Wyoming Medicaid income limits work: the income cap

Wyoming applies a hard maximum income standard to long-term-care coverage, often called a "300% limit" because it is set at 300% of the SSI Federal Benefit Rate. That one design choice drives everything below.1,2

For nursing-facility and home-and-community-based waiver coverage, the Wyoming Division of Healthcare Financing, the state's Medicaid agency, sets the 2026 monthly income limit at $2,982, exactly 300% of the 2026 SSI Federal Benefit Rate of $994.1,2

The figure that gets measured is your countable income, not your gross income. Wyoming's eligibility manual directs the caseworker to "require the countable income to be within the maximum income standard per month," and to hand out an income-trust packet only when countable income sits above the standard. Countability is decided by a separate step in the manual, so a household whose gross monthly income is a little over $2,982 can still test under the limit once that step runs. Do not conclude from a gross figure alone that you are over.1

If your countable income does land above the standard, that is where the Miller Trust comes in. And if you are anywhere near the line, ask the Long-Term Care Eligibility Unit which of your income is counted before you pay anyone to draft a trust.

When Wyoming Medicaid income limits put you over the cap: the Miller Trust

When countable income lands above the maximum standard, Wyoming's manual routes the applicant to a trust rather than to a denial. An applicant in that position must establish an irrevocable Qualified Income Trust, almost always called a Miller Trust, and it must be in place at the time of the eligibility determination, before Wyoming Medicaid will pay for long-term-care services.1

Here is the mechanism. Each month, the applicant's excess income (the amount above the $2,982 standard, and often more) is deposited into the trust account. Money sitting in a properly drafted Miller Trust does not count toward the income limit, so on paper the applicant is now under it. Wyoming's manual describes the trust's monthly distribution as paying the cost of the nursing-facility or waiver services furnished to the client, and the resident's $50 Personal Needs Allowance is deducted from income before that.1 Ask the attorney drafting the trust what the document must say about any balance left at death: Wyoming's estate-recovery program can reach a deceased recipient's assets, and the trust's own terms govern the rest.9

Two things to know about the trust. It must be irrevocable, and it must be in place at the time of the eligibility determination, so this is work for an elder-law attorney, not a do-it-yourself form. And it does not shrink the income, it reroutes it. The resident still contributes nearly all of that income toward care; the trust is the legal container that lets Medicaid pay the rest.

The $2,000 asset limit

Income is one test; assets are the other, and they are judged separately. A single applicant for nursing-facility or waiver coverage may hold no more than $2,000 in countable assets. A married couple with both spouses applying is limited to $3,000.1

"Countable" is the qualifier that decides the outcome, and this is where most published summaries of Wyoming's rules go wrong. Wyoming's resource table, effective January 1, 2026, does not exempt whole categories of property. Each exemption carries a condition, and the condition is what decides whether your asset actually comes off the count:1

• The primary home is exempt regardless of equity value when it is lived in by the applicant's spouse, a child under 21 who is blind or disabled, or an adult disabled child. Otherwise it is exempt only while its equity stays at or below the home-equity limit Wyoming publishes in its resource-standards table.1
• One vehicle is exempt regardless of value only if it is necessary for employment, necessary for the treatment of a specific or regular medical problem, modified for a person with a disability, or necessary for performing essential daily activities. A car that meets none of those tests is not automatically protected.1
• Household goods and personal effects are exempt as to one wedding ring, one engagement ring, and items needed for a medical or physical health condition, plus up to $2,000 in total equity value of other household furnishings, goods, and personal effects.1
• Burial arrangements: an irrevocable burial contract is exempt outright, while revocable burial funds (contracts, certificates of deposit, bank accounts, or other financial instruments) are exempt only up to $1,500.1

So the $2,000 ceiling applies to things like bank accounts, a second vehicle, stocks, and other liquid holdings, and it can also reach the parts of the list above that fall outside their conditions.1 The asset limit applies whether or not a Miller Trust is involved; the trust solves the income problem, not the asset problem.

Wyoming publishes its current resource standards, including the home-equity limit and the spousal resource allowance, in ECOM Medicaid Table 7. The federal home-equity limit for 2026 is $752,000 unless the state elects a higher amount, up to a maximum of $1,130,000.9 Ask the Long-Term Care Eligibility Unit which figure Wyoming applies before you assume a home with substantial equity is safe.

The five-year look-back

Federal law applies a 60-month (five-year) look-back to uncompensated asset transfers made before a long-term-care application.9 Wyoming's eligibility manual tells caseworkers that resources cannot be transferred for less than fair market value during the look-back period, and publishes the look-back and penalty schedule it applies in its own resource-transfer table.1 Giving away money or property for less than fair market value inside that window, such as signing a house over to a child for a dollar or gifting a grandchild a down payment, can trigger a penalty period during which Medicaid will not pay for long-term care, even though you otherwise qualify. The penalty length is calculated by dividing the total transferred value by the state's average monthly private-pay cost of nursing-facility care, and states must waive it where the penalty would deprive the applicant of medical care or of food, clothing, shelter, or other necessities of life.9

There are legitimate exceptions (transfers between spouses, transfers to a disabled child, certain caregiver-child home transfers) and legitimate planning approaches, but anything done inside the five-year window deserves an elder-law attorney's review first. For the broader toolkit, see our guide to Medicaid planning strategies.

What a nursing-home resident keeps

When Wyoming Medicaid pays for nursing-facility care, the resident contributes almost all of their monthly income toward the cost of care. What they keep is the Personal Needs Allowance (PNA): money reserved for the resident's own small expenses such as clothing, a haircut, or a phone. In Wyoming the PNA is $50/month, per the state's Division of Healthcare Financing.1 That sits above the federal floor, which sets a minimum institutional PNA of $30/month for an aged, blind, or disabled individual; states may set theirs higher, and Wyoming does.10

For an applicant who needed a Miller Trust, the PNA comes out before the rest of the trust's monthly distribution goes to care. For one already under the standard, it is simply held back from the income that would otherwise be owed. Either way, $50/month is what stays with the resident.1 (For the national picture on how the allowance is set, see our explainer on the Medicaid personal needs allowance.)

Protecting the spouse who stays home

When one spouse needs long-term care and the other remains in the community, federal spousal-impoverishment rules keep the at-home spouse from being left destitute. Each state elects its own standards inside the federal ranges below.3

Wyoming's own income table sets the spousal maintenance allowance at $4,066.50, the federal maximum.1,3 Wyoming publishes its elected spousal resource allowance and home-equity limit in ECOM Medicaid Table 7, which the state renders as an image rather than as text; confirm both figures with the Long-Term Care Eligibility Unit rather than assuming Wyoming takes the federal maximum.1

The mechanic the state's manual gives its caseworkers is worth knowing, because it explains why the two limits stack. The worker totals the couple's countable resources, subtracts the spousal resource allowance, and the remainder must be at or below the $2,000 single resource standard. So the applicant's own $2,000 limit sits on top of, not inside, the spouse's allowance. At the periodic review afterward, only the applicant's own resources are reviewed against that $2,000 limit.1

After death: estate recovery

Like every state, Wyoming runs a Medicaid estate-recovery program. Federal law requires the state to seek recovery from the estate of a recipient who was 55 or older when they received nursing-facility services, home and community-based services, and related hospital and prescription-drug services.9

Read the survivor protections carefully, because one of them is a delay, not a cancellation. Recovery may be made only after the death of a surviving spouse, so a widow or widower is protected during their lifetime and the claim can still be pursued against the estate afterward. Recovery is separately barred while there is a surviving child who is under 21, or who is blind or permanently and totally disabled. Every state must also have a procedure to waive recovery where it would work an undue hardship.9 Planning around a surviving spouse on the assumption the debt disappears at the first death is the mistake this rule most often causes. For how recovery works and where families have room to plan, see our Medicaid estate recovery explainer.

How to apply in Wyoming

Wyoming Medicaid long-term care is administered by the state's Division of Healthcare Financing. You apply through the Wyoming Eligibility System (WES), the state's online benefits portal, or by phone through the Long-Term Care Eligibility Unit.1

Long-term-care applicants also go through a level-of-care screening to confirm they need nursing-facility-level services. If your countable income is over the $2,982 standard, set up the Miller Trust before or alongside the application, since Medicaid cannot pay until the trust is funded and the income is rerouted. Apply even if you think you are over the limit. Between the trust pathway and the spousal protections, many people who assume they are disqualified are not.1

Learn More

Find personalized help working through the Wyoming Medicaid income rules and whether a Miller Trust fits your family at brevy.com.

The information on Brevy.com is for educational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional legal, financial, or medical advice. Rules vary by state and program and change frequently. Always verify with the relevant agency or a qualified professional. Brevy is not a law firm, financial advisor, or healthcare provider.