Long Term Health Care Insurance

Many of these boomers faced care giving for elderly parents and found the task of balancing work and family impossible. Caring for parents was different from childcare that many learned to juggle. It required more giving and forgiving when the roles reversed. Because of their experience, they choose never to burden a family member with their personal care and long-term care policies became increasingly more important.

Long-term care coverage is an asset protector. It becomes important if you want to make your own decision on where and how you receive care in your senior years. It protects your assets for children and more importantly for your spouse. Illness of one partner should never leave the other poor, but it does. Hard assets such as real estate, businesses or the family farm shouldn’t be sold at a reduced or ridiculous price to pay for long-term care, but frequently they are.

If you feel a long-term care policy is necessary for your financial well being, you need to form a plan of action. There are several ways to approach the funding of a long-term care policy.

Start a policy early make additional payments into a side fund. When you purchase long-term care earlier, the premiums are lower. Calculate the amount of money you need in a fund by retirement to make the premium payments for the future. Use a reasonable rate of return on the money. Even if you believe you can average 15 percent in the stock market every year, are you willing to take the chance in your retirement years? The vehicles for the fund can vary. Use a mixture of stock and bond mutual funds or mutual funds inside tax-deferred variable annuities as your investment if you have at least 10 years to retirement. This allows for the market fluctuations. As you get closer to the time you need the funds to pay, reduce your risk and use a more solid or fixed investment. Again, this may just be adjusting the blend of the funds or using a fixed return. Some of the newer variable annuities have guaranteed withdrawal rights. These allow you to remove a specific percent and guarantee you never run out of money. When you retire, let your fund’s annual return pay your premium.

If you passed that age and now want to make sure you have funding for your policy, choose an asset. Many times seniors have money earmarked for long-term care costs. Use a portion of those funds to pay premiums and enjoy the rest. Set up a fund where the interest is earmarked for long term care premiums. It takes a lot less to cover the premiums on the policy than it does to cover the cost of nursing home or at home care. Policies frequently have a waiver of premium benefit. This benefit releases you from payments if you have to use the policy. The returns from the fund you established can revert to other necessary items or special needs.

The use of a little money for a long-term care policy far outweighs the burden of all your money for payment to a nursing home. Consult an agent and discuss your long-term care needs. Learn about the costs and benefits of the policies and choose carefully.

Long term health care insurance