Long Term Care Insurance – worth of considering?

[NicMM]

I will be reaching 40. My 70 years old father is not in good shape. He needs lots of help at home. He receives In Home Care Service covered by Medi-CAL. Long Term Care will be needed in the foreseeable future.

Seeing my father’s health condition, I start to wonder if we should buy long term care insurance for ourselves. I heard that it is cheaper when you buy it at a younger age.

Can anyone share your opinion/experiences?

Thanks,
NicMM

[flyer]

Lots of pros and cons to an issue that great numbers of us will have to face sooner or later–either for ourselves or family members–so we’ve done quite a bit of research on this topic.

When you learn that the average couple, from age 65+ will spend at least $260K on healthcare for the balance of their lives, you realize you have to take this issue seriously.

Google, “LTC” as well as “options to LTC,” and you’ll find a lot of information. The bottom line today seems to be “proceed with extreme caution,” if you are considering purchasing a policy.

When you try to buy a policy when you are older, it is prohibitively expensive for most. Conversely, many people who have purchased policies at younger ages, find they can no longer afford the huge premium increases over time, so they drop the policy, and everything they’ve paid in is lost. In other cases, the insurance company you’ve chosen might go out of business, and again, you’ve lost your investment.

Personally, we’ve decided to “self-insure,” with regard to LTC, and have long been allocating funds for this purpose alone. That way, if we don’t use the funds for healthcare, they are still ours to keep, or pass on to our heirs.

This approach is not for everyone, and, please don’t consider my opinions advice, but, hopefully, these ideas will give you a place to start.

[scaredyclassic]

My mom swears by it.

Me I think I want the Hemingway pistol plan for personal planning. Or a massive opiate binge.

[joec]

Being someone who used to sell and trained to sell it (not very successfully unfortunately however), I think most people who lives to an older age will probably use this type of insurance eventually…

Downside is what was already mentioned by flyer and cost. Since it’s an insurance that many people will probably use, a lot of Insurance companies have been getting out of the market and there are very few options for people. The premiums are also insanely expensive and since it’s so far away, most people just hope they die quickly or depend on the state (Medi-Cal). Please note also that in-home care (I don’t think) is covered by Medi-Cal so if you need help, you’d have to pay up.

Note that cost per month for staying at a decent LTC facility can run several thousands a month and I’ve had family who were in nicer ones for over 8k per month or more…

The pistol plan sounds like a good one and one I’d like as well.

[CA renter]

Not the pistol plan. It’s ugly, leaves a mess for your loved ones, and can often fail…with horrible results.

Better to go with the opiate plan, or just a ton of sleep meds. Peaceful, painless, and fairly clean and easy for your loved ones to deal with.

[scaredyclassic]

[quote=CA renter]Not the pistol plan. It’s ugly, leaves a mess for your loved ones, and can often fail…with horrible results.

Better to go with the opiate plan, or just a ton of sleep meds. Peaceful, painless, and fairly clean and easy for your loved ones to deal with.[/quote]

not mutually exclusive. i visualize handcuffing myself to a bed, taking a bunch of drugs and shooting myself.

maybe it’s justa fnatasy. maybe it’s way harder to do than i imagine.

there’s probably no particularly good day to die.

the decline is so gradual?

family friend had bad sudden turn of events has inhome care. lost her spunkiness…

maybe you become not spunky enought o kill yourself?

[scaredyclassic]

The thought of my family looking at me with pity disgust love and irriration makes me want to die.

[NicMM]

People seem pessimistic on the future of aging. But it is sadly true how the family members feel about the elderly.

Just being quoted for a Permanent Life + LTC, I know I cannot afford it. It is just that simple.

NicMM

[FlyerInHi]

[quote=scaredyclassic][quote=CA renter]Not the pistol plan. It’s ugly, leaves a mess for your loved ones, and can often fail…with horrible results.

Better to go with the opiate plan, or just a ton of sleep meds. Peaceful, painless, and fairly clean and easy for your loved ones to deal with.[/quote]

not mutually exclusive. i visualize handcuffing myself to a bed, taking a bunch of drugs and shooting myself.

maybe it’s justa fnatasy. maybe it’s way harder to do than i imagine.

there’s probably no particularly good day to die.

the decline is so gradual?

family friend had bad sudden turn of events has inhome care. lost her spunkiness…

maybe you become not spunky enought o kill yourself?[/quote]

Everybody I talk to says that they’ll find someway to end it when it gets too bad.

But, in reality, I’ve heard of nobody doing it.

Ok. Where will you get the opiates?

I think that if people really were serious about a humane way of ending life, euthanasia would be legal in this country.

[scaredyclassic]

Probab lit need a plan and mental training to be able to execute when necessary.

Need to get your supplies in order in advance.

[CA renter]

[quote=FlyerInHi][quote=scaredyclassic][quote=CA renter]Not the pistol plan. It’s ugly, leaves a mess for your loved ones, and can often fail…with horrible results.

Better to go with the opiate plan, or just a ton of sleep meds. Peaceful, painless, and fairly clean and easy for your loved ones to deal with.[/quote]

not mutually exclusive. i visualize handcuffing myself to a bed, taking a bunch of drugs and shooting myself.

maybe it’s justa fnatasy. maybe it’s way harder to do than i imagine.

there’s probably no particularly good day to die.

the decline is so gradual?

family friend had bad sudden turn of events has inhome care. lost her spunkiness…

maybe you become not spunky enought o kill yourself?[/quote]

Everybody I talk to says that they’ll find someway to end it when it gets too bad.

But, in reality, I’ve heard of nobody doing it.

Ok. Where will you get the opiates?

I think that if people really were serious about a humane way of ending life, euthanasia would be legal in this country.[/quote]

While many don’t do it, others certainly do. Suicide is the 10th leading cause of death in this country, and I believe that many of the cases (probably not the majority) are because people are trying to quickly end an long, miserable, humiliating, depressing road to death.

http://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/suicide/statistics/leading_causes.html

[njtosd]

A health care power of attorney that prohibits the use of antibiotics or other life extending drugs once dementia has set in would take care of a lot. Most elderly people live beyond what they would choose because doctors are required to do their best to extend life of a patient with dementia absent a health care directive. For example, if I hit a certain level of dementia (can’t remember my kids names, my own birthday etc.) I no longer want anything other than painkillers. For many people, that would mean discontinuing high blood pressure medication, cholesterol lowering meds, but it would also mean not treating pneumonia and/or UTIs, which are very common in the elderly.
FWIW – Long term care insurance doesn’t kick in for 3-4 months after certain triggering events. In the case of things like strokes and heart attacks, the patient is either dead or significantly recovered before that period is up. Plus, unless they have a lot of help, an elderly disabled person would find it very difficult to supply all of the information necessary to prove that they qualify for their benefits. All that being said, my mom is in a skilled nursing facility and her LTC policy plus SS pays almost all of her expenses. I know she would not like to live the way she is living – but her “living will” or whatever it’s called was sort of vague. So she will “live” for a while without really living.

[scaredyclassic]

Scary.

Somehow the prospect of killing myself is not that terrifying to me. I am scared of lots of things. But strangely. That doesn’t freak me out

[UCGal]

We’ve researched it, priced it, and decided to self insure.

And this is as we’ve dealt with FIL moving to a nursing home (lasted 5-6 months before passing) after a decade of in-home care – much of it in the granny flat we built to accomodate his mobility issues and dementia. MIL is nearing the point of needing to be in a facility due to dementia.

The biggest issue with LTC insurance is that there is no cap on how much the rates can go up. On the early retirement forum there are accounts of rates going up 20% in a single year… so after paying in for 10-15 years it suddenly busts the budget… do you keep it because of the sunk cost, or do you cancel it – and eat the sunk cost…. I have decided against going down that possible path.

For us – we have a paid for house that includes a granny flat that is wheelchair accessible and friendly. (We’re betting we won’t need it before the kids have flown the nest.) We can move to the casita, and hire in home help. When that becomes untenable, we sell the property, community spouse buys a paid for condo, and the extra equity funds many years of LTC. That’s our plan B and has been for a while.

[scaredyclassic]

Hopefully I will die magnificently in battle.

[Author]

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