LONG TERM CARE INSURANCE

Long Term Care Insurance is an often forgotten financial tool. With the high cost of long term care, it is not something that should be taken lightly. Consider these statistics:

$82,125– The average cost per year for a private room at a nursing home in Phoenix.

$14,657.04– The average yearly income from Social Security.

$67,967.96– The remaining cost you have to figure out how to pay for.

Where can you find the money to make up for the difference?

The Shortcomings of Medicare

Many people do not worry about Long Term Care Insurance because they think Medicare will cover their expenses. Part A may cover some of the expenses related to a skilled nursing or home health care, but it is not designed to pay for long-term care. Consider this, your coverage is broken down into benefit periods. You have a certain amount of coverage per benefit period. If you are in need of medical equipment within the home, such as a portable ultrasound for regular checkups, you can go now to see how to finance this in a viable way.

Your benefit period begins the day you are admitted into a hospital or other care facility and ends after you have had no care for 60 consecutive days. You have coverage for 90 days. Then after you use the 90 days you have to start using your “lifetime reserve” days, which you only have 60 of. After you have used those you are out of coverage. If you are expecting to need care for the rest of your life, you will run out of benefits very quickly. See the chart below for a breakdown of the costs you can expect to occur by relying solely on Medicare.

What About Medicaid?

Other people think that Medicaid will come in and help them. But qualifying is not as simple as deeding your home into a trust. The government has a 5-year look-back period to see if you qualify. There are many other complex rules regarding your income and assets. If you ever are approved, you have no choice over where you are placed for care. Medicaid-covered long term care facilities are well-known for being second rate.

Paying for Long Term Care Out of Pocket

So where does this leave you? If you want to choose where you are to stay or to have help brought into your home, you are looking at incurring a great expense (See Chart Below).

Do you really want to leave the burden to your children to pay? Do you want to exhaust all your estate to pay medical bills instead of passing it on to your loved ones?

Utilize Long Term Care Insurance

Long Term Care Insurance is there to fill the gap. Long Term Care Insurance can cover the costs related to nursing home care, assisted living, adult day care, and home health care. There are many different policies that cover a variety of services. Also, you have several options regarding the different methods through which you receive your benefits. It can be hard to find the perfect policy to fit your needs. Wealth Guardian Financial can help. We have the tools to help you compare policies to find you the right coverage for the right price.

Sources:
http://www.aarp.org/relationships/caregiving-resource-center/LTCC.html
www.ssa.gov/policy/docs/quickfacts/stat-snapshot/
http://www.aarp.org/relationships/caregiving-resource-center/LTCC.html