Long-Term Care Funding in Colorado

Why Colorado runs differently

Health First Colorado is Colorado’s Medicaid program, and the Department of Health Care Policy & Financing, commonly called HCPF, administers it. HCPF describes Long-Term Services and Supports as the umbrella for services for older adults and people with disabilities, including nursing-facility care and Home and Community-Based Services waivers (Colorado HCPF; HCPF LTSS programs).

Colorado is an income-cap state for long-term-care services. HCPF’s current income-trust form says that an applicant whose gross income exceeds 300% of the individual SSI level, but is below the nursing-facility private-pay rate for the person’s geographic region, needs the state income trust to establish and maintain eligibility for institutional care, HCBS, or PACE. That state-specific, regional structure matters because Colorado does not use one identical income-trust ceiling or transfer-penalty divisor everywhere (HCPF Income Trust instructions; HCPF 2026 COLA memo).

Colorado’s 2026 numbers at a glance

The beneficiary-deed rule is unusually important

Colorado authorizes a revocable beneficiary deed that can transfer real property at the owner’s death when it is properly recorded before death. But Colorado’s statute separately says that a person seeking or receiving the medical assistance described in the statute is not entitled to it while a beneficiary deed is in effect, and the property is considered a countable resource. The required statutory form itself warns that the deed may disqualify the grantor from Medicaid; this is a sharp contrast with states where a transfer-on-death deed is discussed chiefly as a probate-avoidance device (Colorado General Assembly, beneficiary-deed statute; Colorado General Assembly, beneficiary-deed form amendment).

Care at home, veterans benefits, and insurance

Colorado’s Elderly, Blind, and Disabled Waiver is a community alternative for people who meet its financial and program criteria. HCPF currently says that the Developmental Disabilities waiver is the only HCBS waiver with an active waitlist, a distinction that prevents a generic “Colorado waiver waitlist” answer from being accurate for EBD applicants (HCPF EBD Waiver; HCPF waiting-list information).

These ten pages organize the current published Colorado rules for families considering nursing-facility Medicaid, care at home, a home-title change, veterans benefits, and insurance. They are education, not an eligibility determination or legal advice. A Colorado elder-law attorney should review a proposed gift, beneficiary deed, trust, or Medicaid application before it is relied upon.