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Page 5 of 11 § 10:71-4.4 Excludable resources Because a Medicaid applicant did not have access to her assets during the three-month period that began on the date of her son's removal from the position of guardian and ended on the date on which a successor guardian received her commission, those assets were not "countable resources" during the interim period and could not be included as a resource on any date during that period. M.L. v. DMAHS et al., OAL DKT. NO. HMA 13804-17, 2018 N.J. AGEN LEXIS 800, Final Agency Determination (July 27, 2018). Medicaid recipient who failed to report income the receipt of which would have rendered her ineligible for benefits was properly required to repay the $ 8687 in benefits received during the period of ineligibility because her only defense to the claim was that she was "in a rush" when she reviewed the application and thus missed the section requiring income to be reported. T.S. v. Mercer Cnty. Bd. of Social Servs., OAL DKT. NO. HMA 07970-17, 2017 N.J. AGEN LEXIS 893, Initial Decision (December 18, 2017). Medicaid application made on behalf of a married couple should not have been denied on the ground of excess resources. The resources that the agency deemed to be "excess" in fact were transferred to a valid, irrevocable trust prior to the commencement of the 60-month eligibility look-back period and thus were "unavailable" to the couple within the meaning of governing regulations. C.F. v. Hudson Cnty. Dep't of Family Servs., OAL DKT. NO. HMA 11517-17, 2017 N.J. AGEN LEXIS 824, Initial Decision (November 9, 2017). County social services board erred when it established an eligibility date of February 1, 2015 on an application for Medicaid benefits. Although the board denied having received relevant information about real estate owned by the applicant and listed for sale prior to the August 14, 2014 application for benefits, the evidence clearly showed that all of the necessary information was provided to the board with the August 14, 2014 application and that a DRA- compliant annuity was purchased thereafter. That being so, the property should not have been considered an includable asset and the eligibility date should have been the date on which the application was made, which was August 14, 2014. M.O. v. Burlington Cnty. Bd. of Social Servs., OAL DKT. NO. HMA 13076-15, 2017 N.J. AGEN LEXIS 836, Initial Decision (November 8, 2017). Once a Medicaid recipient was declared incompetent by reason of dementia, he in fact did not have "access" to the cash value of his life insurance policies for the purpose of resource counting and that value could not be used as a basis to terminate his benefits based on the existence of excess resources. Nor was a delay in the verification of financial information good grounds to terminate the recipient's benefits. Both of these circumstances were byproducts of a five-month delay between the filing of a verified complaint for guardianship in the Superior Court and the issuance, by that court, of an order granting the same and the additional delay occasioned by the guardian's need to obtain Letters of Guardianship and a related bond. R.P. v. Gloucester Cnty. Bd. of Social Servs., OAL DKT. NO. HMA 05302-17, 2017 N.J. AGEN LEXIS 734, Initial Decision (September 28, 2017). Unapplied deposit of $ 174,000 paid by the adult children of a Medicaid applicant in connection with her placement in a continuing care community (CCC) was properly considered a "countable resource" for the purpose of determining the applicant's eligibility. Even though entrance fees were not explicitly listed as an excludable resource under governing state regulations, federal law including 42 U.S.C.S. § 1396p made it clear that entrance fees that met certain criteria were properly considered "countable resources." Here, because the applicant could access the entrance fee to pay her expenses associated with her residence at the CCC once the conditions in the applicant's contract with the CCC were met, the social services board acted properly in treating the entrance fee as a countable resource for purposes of determining Medicaid eligibility. A.T. v. Morris Cnty. Bd. of Social Servs., OAL DKT. NO. HMA 10162-17, 2017 N.J. AGEN LEXIS 654, Initial Decision (September 4, 2017). Institutionalized spouse who failed to cause her attorney-in-fact to elect against the estate of her deceased husband within the statutory 6-month period was properly found to have transferred those assets into the inter vivos trust of the deceased spouse for less than FMV and such amounts were properly considered in determining and imposing a transfer penalty on the Medicaid eligibility of the institutionalized spouse. R.L. v. DMAHS et al., OAL DKT. NO. HMA 09762-14, 2017 N.J. AGEN LEXIS 669, Initial Decision (August 30, 2017).