I am in a nursing home and on disability. Medicaid has been paying my bill minus my social security.

Ok, I'm going to change the practice area to elder law because this really is not a Social Security question. Since you are receiving Medicaid benefits, the inheritance will likely cause you to lose your Medicaid eligibility because it will probably put you over your Medicaid resource limit. Worse still, it appears that you are going to be inheriting real estate...which if it is a "countable resource" for Medicaid eligibility (and it most likely will be) means that you won't re-establish your eligibility for Medicaid until the property is sold and the proceeds are spend down. This is a recurring problem and dad really ought to have talked with an elder law attorney so that he could have prepared an estate plan that would not interfere with your benefits. You will need to consult with an elder law attorney in your local area...one who is completely familiar with IL Medicaid rules. You need to do this immediately because I fear that this is going to be a real mess for you. If you contact an attorney and the attorney recommends executing a disclaimer of the inheritance...run because you are probably NOT dealing with a qualified Medicaid attorney. I do not imagine that this will be a quick/inexpensive fix here. I did not address the possible additional major problem which you will face if you are receiving Supplemental Security Income (SSI)...again you need to consult an elder law attorney ASAP.

I would add to what Tate has said that depending upon facts which are not stated in your post, it may be possible to do things with the assets to reduce or eliminate any period of Medicaid ineligibility while improving your quality of life or preserving some of your inheritance (like establishing a special needs trust if you are under 65 or adopting other Medicaid planning techniques), but you really need the advice of an experienced elder law attorney. To locate one near you use the Find a Lawyer search tool or go to the website of the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys at www.naela.org. Expect to pay some money but it will be worth it in the long run.

The State of Illinois has the legal right to recover money expended on your behalf. You have an obligation under Illinois law to inform the State of your receipt of any asset or amount of money above the exempt limit within 10 days of receipt of the asset. The other Attorneys are correct in the information they provided. In Illinois a disclaimer of a right to receive an inheritance is an improper transfer which would subject you to a period of ineligibility. There are potential things that you might be able to do to preserve some of this money for your future use or that of your family, but you must seek out and retain an experienced Elder Law Attorney immediately. You must understand that timing is essential in most any plan to preserve as much of the inheritance as possible. Money received while you are Medicaid is treated as income in the month it is received, subject to Medicaid income limitations; however it is not an asset for Medicaid spend down purposes until the first day of the month following your receipt of the money. This means an experienced Elder Law Attorney might be able to take advantage of this short window between receipt of the asset and the first of the following month to implement a plan on your behalf. However any such plan takes a lot of work and planning and so it is essential that you retain the Elder Law Attorney sufficiently in advance of the anticipated distribution date from your father’s Estate. This is an extremely complex area of the law and successful actions to preserve assets post-Medicaid approval are much more difficult than plans taken prior to approval. The rules regarding allowable spend down are different post-Medicaid approval. The information you provide is inadequate to provide any actual suggestions as to a course of action, other than the most important one which is hiring an experienced Elder Law Attorney immediately. In addition to the suggestions the other Attorneys made for finding an Elder Law Attorney, you can contact the Illinois chapter of the NAELA for a directory of qualified Attorneys near you in Illinois. Good luck.