We are strong advocates that anyone who is healthy enough and can afford to pay should purchase long-term care insurance as the foundation of any long-term care plan. The great virtue of long-term care insurance is that ordinarily, it will provide care in the home. It is our experience that 100% of our clients would prefer to be cared for in their homes than in a long-term care facility. The only way to provide in-home care is through your personal resources or through long-term care insurance. Although Medicaid has a provision for home care, in the real world that care does not exist.

Long-term care insurance is the least expensive when you are healthy and young. Long-term care insurance is offered by numerous insurance companies, and each policy is different. It is almost impossible for the average person to understand the complexities presented by long-term care policies. It is much easier for us to discern the differences and alert you when the policy does not provide you with the benefits that you expect.

Fortunately, our experience in this area can assist you in evaluating the quality and benefits of a proposed long-term care policy. At the very least, we recommend that you consider some of the following factors:

• Inflation protection to insure that you truly are ‘getting what you paid for’
• A premium waiver to provide that once you are collecting benefits, you no longer have to pay premiums
• Home health care coverage that is broad enough to include costs other than those solely provided by nurses or licensed home health aides
• The waiting period/elimination period must be tailored to your situation, to make sure that you are comfortable with the out-of-pocket expenditures that you are assuming during this period

We have found that if a policy looks too good to be true, it probably is. If it seems to you that the policy offered is inexpensive compared to the promised benefits, there are probably provisions that will lead to future premium increases. We will be glad to review any long-term care insurance policies with you and evaluate them in light of your personal circumstances and values.

Feel free to contact us for a free confidential appointment.