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 countable income above that line routes you to a Miller Trust.1 Wyoming's eligibility manual tells the caseworker to hand an applicant whose countable income lands above the standard an income-trust packet.1

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

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.4 And for a senior or a person with a disability seeking long-term care, federal rules set the MAGI test aside anyway.5

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.5 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 are an adult under 65, say a 60-year-old between jobs, 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 $15,960.6,7 That MAGI pathway applies no asset test and none of the SSI-style income disregards, and it counts Social Security in full, including any portion that is not taxable.5,8

Wyoming is not one of those states. It did not adopt the ACA adult expansion, so there is no "new adult group" here.4 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.4

If that describes you, the realistic fallback is the Health Insurance Marketplace rather than Medicaid. Check what coverage and any premium subsidy would cost for your income at HealthCare.gov before assuming you have no option. 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, or on the basis of a disability) may still reach you.

A second door opens at 65. The aged, blind, and disabled track (the federal SSI benefit rate of $994 a month for an individual as its yardstick, 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.9,5

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.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. A separate step in the manual decides what counts, so don't 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 is handed an income-trust packet to set up an irrevocable Qualified Income Trust, almost always called a Miller Trust.1

Here is the mechanism, as Wyoming's manual lays out the trust's required terms. The trust must be created for the purpose of making the applicant eligible for Medicaid, and it may hold only pension, Social Security, and other income listed in the trust's Schedule A. It must provide a monthly distribution equal to the income level for the applicable Medicaid group, and that distribution is used to pay the cost of the nursing-facility or waiver services furnished to the client.1 Federal law adds one term every Miller Trust carries: when the beneficiary dies, the state receives whatever remains in the trust, up to the total Medicaid paid on their behalf.10

Two things to know about the trust. It must be irrevocable, so this is work for an elder-law attorney, not a do-it-yourself form. And timing matters: no Wyoming source we read sets a deadline by which the trust must be in place, so confirm the timing with the Long-Term Care Eligibility Unit before relying on a trust created after you apply.1 The trust does not shrink the income, it reroutes it: the distribution goes toward the cost of care.

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, the couple figure Wyoming's Legislative Service Office reported as of January 1, 2025; the state's current standards sit in a table it publishes as an image.1

"Countable" is the qualifier that decides the outcome. 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, and only if you, your spouse, a child under 21 who is blind or disabled, or a dependent lives there. If none of them does, as for a nursing-home resident who lived alone, the home stays exempt only once you have signed a Statement of Intent to Return Home (form DHCF-302).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 $1,130,000.11 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, counted backward from the long-term-care application, not from the transfer.11 Wyoming's eligibility manual tells caseworkers that resources cannot be transferred for less than fair market value during the look-back period, but the table that sets Wyoming's look-back and penalty period is published as an image, so confirm the duration with the Long-Term Care Eligibility Unit.1 Giving away money or property for less than fair market value inside that window, such as deeding a house to a child for a dollar, can trigger a penalty period during which Medicaid will not pay for nursing-facility or waiver services, even though you otherwise qualify; the rest of your Medicaid coverage is not withdrawn. The penalty length is calculated by dividing the total uncompensated value transferred by the state's average monthly private-pay cost of nursing-facility care. A state may excuse the penalty for undue hardship: where it would deprive you of medical care so that your health or life would be endangered, or of food, clothing, shelter, or other necessities.11

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 owes a patient contribution, paid to the facility, toward the cost of their care. Wyoming calculates it from the resident's total income less six allowable deductions, and the first is the Personal Needs Allowance (PNA) of $50/month: money reserved for the resident's own small expenses such as clothing, a haircut, or a phone.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.5

The other five deductions are court-ordered garnished child support, the spousal maintenance allowance, medical expenses not covered by Medicaid, Medicare, private insurance or a third party, a Medicare premium for the first two months of eligibility, and a health-insurance premium. So more than $50 of a resident's income can be kept out of the patient contribution: a health-insurance premium the resident still pays, for example, comes off before the contribution is figured.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 resource standard inside the federal range below.3

These are federal figures.3 A reverse mortgage or home-equity loan can bring equity under the home-equity limit, so being over it is not permanent.11

Wyoming's own income table, effective January 1, 2026, lists a spousal maintenance allowance of $4,066.50, the same figure CMS publishes as the 2026 federal maximum.1,3 The table gives only that figure. No Wyoming source we read explains how the state computes the allowance for a particular couple, whether the at-home spouse's own income reduces it, or whether Wyoming applies the $2,705.00 federal minimum, so don't count on receiving the full $4,066.50; ask the Long-Term Care Eligibility Unit.1 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.10

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.10 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 can apply online through the Wyoming Eligibility System (WES), the state's benefits portal, or by phone to the Long Term Care Unit at 1-855-203-2936.1 A paper application works too: pick one up at any Department of Family Services field office, print one from the Wyoming Department of Health website, or call the WDH Customer Service Center at 855-294-2127 to have one mailed or faxed. Return it by mail or in person to the WDH Long Term Care Unit, 122 W 25th St, West 4th Floor, Cheyenne, WY 82002, by fax to 307-777-8399, or by email to wesapplications@wyo.gov.1

A nursing-home applicant must also be found medically eligible in a public health nurse's needs assessment, and must meet a 30-day requirement by remaining in an institution for 30 consecutive days, being verified as SSI-eligible, or receiving home-and-community-based waiver services immediately before entering the nursing home. An applicant who dies before completing the 30 days still meets it.1 For waiver coverage at home, federal rules tie eligibility to needing the level of care a nursing facility provides, so being under the income limit is not by itself a route into a waiver.2

If your countable income is over the $2,982 standard, ask the Long-Term Care Eligibility Unit, before you apply, when the Miller Trust needs to be in place. 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

Get help with Wyoming's 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.