facility fees

[questded]

I live in a retirement community that has independent, assisted, memory care and hospice care. Do I qualify for facility fees and if so, what?

[AnnetteB6 · Accepted solution]

If you are a chronically ill individual as defined by the IRS, then you can claim medical and lodging expenses as a medical expense for Schedule A, Itemized Deductions.  The key is that you must be chronically ill, not that you simply live in a retirement community that can provide those services.

Here is an excerpt from the IRS Publication 502, Medical Expenses:

Chronically ill individual.

An individual is chronically ill if, within the previous 12 months, a licensed health care practitioner has certified that the individual meets either of the following descriptions.

1. He or she is unable to perform at least two activities of daily living without substantial assistance from another individual for at least 90 days, due to a loss of functional capacity. Activities of daily living are eating, toileting, transferring, bathing, dressing, and continence.

2. He or she requires substantial supervision to be protected from threats to health and safety due to severe cognitive impairment.