Archive for January, 2011
Long-Term Care Insurance – Are One of These 5 Myths Keeping You From Planning With LTC Insurance
Many people avoid the issue of long-term care because of long-held myths regarding the use of LTC insurance as an option. Many of these myths surround the issue of who is or is not a good candidate for LTC insurance. The 2 most prevalent myths pertain to the best age for a person to begin planning (most people believe if they’re young, they do not need to plan for long-term care), and a person’s net worth (some people set an upper-end dollar net worth at which people should automatically self-insure). Once these myths are analyzed and understood, it becomes clear that everyone should be educated about the importance of planning for a future long-term care need.
Myth #1 If I am wealthy enough to rely on my own assets to pay for long-term care, then that’s what I should do. This is no different than saying that if I can pay more taxes, I should pay more. Wealthy people are delighted when they discover strategies to lower their tax bill. But they often fail to understand that by paying insurance premiums, they could potentially avoid hundreds of thousands of dollars in long-term care expenses. It’s important for you to understand that the acceptability of a catastrophic long-term care risk does not depend on the size of your portfolio alone. You need to know how your portfolio and estate will be impacted by a long-term care event. Once you have this information you can then decide whether it is an acceptable risk to take, or to choose another option for paying for your care.
Tags: acceptable risk, care expenses, importance of planning, insurance premiums, long term care, long term care insurance, michael j fox, myth 2, prevalent myths, term care insuranceRelated posts
Long-Term Care Insurance – A Simple Explanation
Long-term Care Insurance can be an effective tool for protecting your assets and estate from the high costs of senior care. Though the average nursing home length of stay is significantly higher than most people believe, 2.4 years according to a report conducted by the National Center for Health Statistics, less than 20% of long-term care is nursing home care. Home care, home health care, adult day care, assisted living facility care and others constitute the overwhelming majority of senior care services. These services are covered under most Long-Term Care insurance policies.
Generally, the people who are in need of care are responsible for paying the costs. Long Term Care is usually not covered by your personal health insurance plan or by the policy you may currently have from a present or previous employer. Medicare usually pays for only a small percentage of skilled nursing costs while Medicaid provides health care coverage to Americans with lower incomes and can pay almost half of all nursing home costs.
Tags: care home health, health care coverage, health insurance plan, home health care, long term care insurance, national center for health statistics, nursing home care, nursing home costs, personal health insurance, term care insuranceRelated posts