Reblogged: Genetics can Affect Long-Term Care Insurance Cost

Genworth is the only long-term care insurance company that considers medical histories of parents as basis for their rates. According to Jesse Slome, the executive director of AALTCI or American Association for Long-Term Care Insurance said that "Insurers are absolutely scrutinizing health conditions more, because they are paying a lot of money in claims." This is common in life insurance but this is a first in the long-term care industry. As of now, Genworth is the only carrier that considers family history as basis for the cost of long term care insurance. 

Original Source: http://www.mainstreet.com/article/genetics-could-spike-the-cost-of-long-term-care-insurance/page/3

Reblogged: How to Qualify for Medicaid to Pay for LTC

Medicaid is a government program for impoverished people. It helps pay for long-term care services such as home care, hospice care, nursing homes, assisted living facilities and CCRCs but only if you meet financial and functional criteria that varies from one state to another.  To qualify for Medicaid, you need to meet certain requirements first and they are the following:

1. You are 65 and above or permanently blind or disabled.
2. You are a resident of the state where you apply.
3. You meet immigration rules and U.S citizenship

In terms of the financial requirements, the state will assess your available income and assets in order to determine whether you are qualified for Medicaid benefits or not. With regards to your assets, your personal belongings, primary residence, one motor vehicle, property essential to self support, certain burial arrangements, life insurance with a face value below $1,500 and assets held in specific type of trusts are exempted from the Medicaid eligibility determination.

You can contact your State Medical Assistance office or Area Agency on Aging for assistance with applying for Medicaid to pay for long term care.

Original Source: http://www.agingcare.com/Articles/medicaid-and-long-term-care-133719.htm

Reblogged: Top 4 Reasons why Long Term Care Insurance Policy is the Best Gift for Parents

Are you one of those people who are worried about your parents’ financial security in the future? If yes, then purchasing long-term care insurance for them is one of the best things you can give them. Now is the time to give back and return the favor of taking care of you when you were still young. In my opinion, this policy type is the best gift you can give to your parents. 

There are actually four reasons why this is the best gift you can give them and they are as follows.

1. Erases their fear of long-term care – According to a survey, about 55% of Americans are afraid of becoming a burden to their family members once the time comes that they will need care. Long-term care insurance will prevent this from happening by covering any form of long-term care that they might need.


2. Gives you protection – Ltci is not just beneficial to your parents but to you as well because this can lift the burden of caregiving duties which are known as stressful and will take a toll on one’s health later on.


3. Protects you from legal liability – There are some states that have filial law, which obliges adult children to pay for their parents’ long-term care expenses. Ltci can protect you from this responsibility since your parents have coverage 


4. Provides peace of mind – Long-term care insurance also gives peace of mind to family members. It gives assurance that long-term care needs will not affect the quality of your family will not be affected.

Original Source:http://www.ltcoptions.com/4-reasons-consider-buying-ltci-parents/

Paying for Long Term Care through Annuities

Annuity is actually considered as a sound retirement plan if you prefer to receive a steady flow of income in the latter part of your life. Since long term care is becoming a pressing need for older adults, this can be used to pay for your long term care expenses.

There are different types of annuities that you can use to pay for care and they are Immediate Annuity and Deferred Long Term Care Annuity.

Immediate annuity works this way, the insurance company converts your single premium payment to a certain amount of money every month for a period of time or for the rest of your life. The money you will receive is based on your age, gender and initial premium.

Long term care annuity is usually offered to people who are below 85 years old. This type of annuity gives a stream of monthly income for a specific period of time. You are entitled to two funds. You can use the first one to pay for your long-term care expenses while you can use the other fund for your other expenses. You can access your long term care fund right away but you need to wait for a specific day before you can receive the other fund.

Original Source: http://annuitynews.net/2014/09/03/red-zone-multitasking-long-term-care-annuities/

How to pick a long-term-care facility when your loved one can’t live alone

Our first column on Care Options focused on moving a parent or other relative who was still fairly independent into a new living situation as he or she needed a little more help with everyday tasks.

In this column, we’ll focus on more advanced care needs. You may be dealing with chronic or progressive conditions such as Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s disease, diabetes or congestive heart failure, or a sudden crisis like a stroke. Care may be needed 24/7, and it might not be feasible for you to provide all the required care at home.

Before any decision is made about residential care, try to visit more than one care community with your parent and/or another family member. Ask to join the community for lunch and get a tour, view the activities schedule and menu, and take particular notice of how the staff interacts with the residents.

Speak with as many residents as you can. If the community under consideration is required to be licensed, ask to view the facility’s history of compliance with minimum standards and the number and types of complaints that may have been filed against the facility.

Costs: It’s important to understand that Medicare doesn’t generally cover the costs of long-term care, particularly when it’s provided at home or in an assisted living facility. Private long-term care insurance policies can help, but may have limitations and loopholes, and are quite expensive. They must be purchased before care is needed.

Options for Residential Care:

• Residential Care Facility (RCF): These facilities are small group homes (sometimes called board and care homes, residential care homes or adult foster homes) that provide supervision, meals and care for people who cannot be left alone but do not require skilled nursing care. Residential care facilities provide assistance with bathing, grooming, eating, using the toilet, and walking, and they also provide socialization, some recreational activities, and a more home-like atmosphere. Rooms may be private or shared.
• Assisted Living Facility (ALF): Individuals who are somewhat independent but require daily oversight and assistance with housekeeping, medication management and personal care will want to consider an assisted living facility. Assisted living facilities offer rooms or apartment-style accommodations and, often, social activities. Meals are provided in a shared dining room. Staff is available to assist with care needs such as transportation, bathing, medication management, grooming, eating or using the toilet, and care is arranged as needed by the individual. Nursing staff may be on-site or on-call. The monthly charge for assisted living is determined by rent plus the amount of care a person requires and varies widely throughout the U.S.
• Some assisted living facilities are dedicated to — or include a separate wing for — those with Alzheimer’s disease or other memory impairments. These dementia careor memory care units offer a special security-protected environment, and social and other activities designed for the abilities of the residents.
  There are several online guides to assisted living facilities to help find a unit in your geographic area, but the guides are not necessarily comprehensive. A little investigative work, along with personal recommendations, can help to find a facility that fits your family’s needs.
  
  
  There are also companies that will consult with you as you seek assisted living or an RCF, but keep in mind that although this service is generally offered at no cost to you, consultants are paid commissions by the facilities for referrals. Nonetheless, some of the consultants are very knowledgeable about resources in your community, and that’s another avenue to explore.
• Skilled Nursing Facility (SNF): Commonly called nursing homes, these facilities provide nursing services 24 hours a day and are designed to provide high levels of personal and medical care, such as administering injections, monitoring blood pressure and managing ventilators and intravenous feedings. People living in skilled nursing facilities usually require help with the majority of their self-care needs; it would be very difficult to provide this level of care in a home environment.
  Medicare may pay for a time-limited stay in a nursing home after hospital discharge, on a doctor’s orders. Medicaid may help cover the costs if residents meet specific financial and medical requirements. Some families qualify for Medicaid assistance after they have “spent down” their assets to a minimal amount. An elder law attorney can help you sort through the complex rules.
  
  
  One source of information on facility quality is Medicare’s online Nursing Home Compare, which provides ratings of nursing homes. However, please keep in mind that the data is self-reported. Use that as one tool, but combine the information with visits to the facility, recommendations from friends and/or professionals in the field, and your own intuitive reaction during your visit.
  
  
  Visit www.pbs.org to read the full article and to learn more about options for residential care.

Reverse mortgages can be godsend for seniors

When originators are considering adding a product to their mix, it’s only natural to consider the advantages to their business. But in the case of reverse mortgages, it’s also important to consider the advantages to the customer.

“First and foremost, there’s really no product in the world like a reverse mortgage,” says Jonathan Scarpati, vice president of Urban Financial of America’s wholesale division. “I don’t think there’s another product in the world that will allow you to borrow money and not make a payment. It’s a huge advantage to a senior. Many of these people don’t have the income to qualify for a loan – but this is based on age and equity. It allows them to tap into that equity without having to make a payment.”

Some seniors are leery of reverse mortgages because of horror stories about elders losing their homes. But those stories leave out one important fact.

“The only requirement of the program is for the borrower to pay their taxes and insurance. Even if you’re not in a reverse – if you don’t pay your taxes and insurance, the county’s going to take your house from you regardless,” Scarpati says. “So the requirements aren’t any more or less than any senior would have just living in a home.”

And the advantages for seniors are numerous. A reverse mortgage can give older borrowers the opportunity to improve their quality of life – or access to ready cash when they need it most.

“One of the greatest parts about releasing the proceeds is that the proceeds can be used for anything and everything the borrower wants,” Scarpati says. “We have seniors using the proceeds simply to travel, go see the grandkids they don’t normally get to see. You could use the money for medical expenses. You could use the money for long-term care or estate-planning options. Long-term care is a big one, because there’s a tremendous need for long-term care insurance, but most people can’t afford it. Here’s a great way to unlock some cash that can pay for something really important in your senior years.”

Visit this website to view the original article. 

Investing to combat real inflation for retirees

The long list of risks facing today’s retiree is enough to strike fear into even the most-prepared among us. The risk of another major stock market decline looms, an unprecedented level of government debt threatens the very underpinnings of our economy, not to mention growing taxes, and a weakened Social Security system. As if that list isn’t enough to contend with, we have to consider inflation for our clients. They’re thinking about it, so we had better be proactive in talking about it and preparing them for the worst.

If you research the subject of inflation-fighting investments, you’ll discover countless articles that tout inflation hedges such as TIPS (Treasure Inflation-Protected Securities), Commodities, Real Estate, and equities. All of these investments have demonstrated positive correlation to the rise in consumer prices. In other words, when prices rise, these investments tend to go up. Problem solved, right? Actually, that depends: Who exactly is your client and how are they planning to spend their money in the future?

If you work with retirees, you may want to dig a bit deeper before dispensing the standard investing advice. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ Consumer Expenditures Report, retirees spend less in almost every spending category as they move throughout retirement than they did when they began retirement. The exceptions? Housing spending remained stagnant as a percentage of income, and the other change – you guessed it - health care. In fact, the “retirement smile” spending curve, demonstrating a consistent reduction in spending throughout retirement, only trends up (thus forming a smile-shaped spending curve) at the end of life because of the steep rise in medical spending.

What this means is the inflation fears that retirees have (and we should be planning for) are driven almost exclusively by medical costs. The standard list of inflation-fighting investments is thereby missing a notable entrant: long term care investments. For if we don’t allocate resources to long term care, aren’t we neglecting the very cause of the inflationary effect of our retired clients real spending?

Consider sharing these four distinct options with your clients for funding their long term care costs:

Self pay – Choose to pay for any care needs out-of-pocket or from investment assets and/or spend down those assets until Medicaid begins to pick up the tab. It may be possible to do some legal estate planning to move assets out of the client’s estate to avoid a full spend-down before qualifying for Medicaid. Consult an estate planning attorney to ensure this is done correctly.

Buy traditional long term care insurance – Purchase policies that are designed to pay for your care during your life. Unfortunately, this type of long term care insurance typically leaves nothing to loved ones after death. If you’re fairly certain that you’ll be a long term care candidate, and still qualify medically, this can still be a very effective strategy for getting help with your care needs.

Link long term care benefits to a life insurance policy – By using a specially designed policy, there will be a pool of money available to pay for long term care expenses. If no long term care is needed, a tax-free death benefit passes to your loved ones, meaning the money was not lost to the insurance company.

Link long term care benefits to an income annuity – The Pension Protection Act of 2006 enabled certain annuities to have an “income doubler” that will enhance your guaranteed income payout by a factor of two for up to five years when qualifying long term care is needed. The effect, like the long term care-linked life insurance, is one where you actually get the use of your money whether you need long term care or not. If you don’t use the annuity income or long term care benefits during your life, your beneficiaries receive the money.

Because some of these options were newly-introduced within the last few years, the landscape has changed, as have the conversations surrounding long term care. It’s no longer a use-it-or-lose-it proposition.

For people who live to age 65, there is a 40 percent chance of becoming a resident of a nursing home. If this happens to your client, how will they be paying for it? It’s your job to find out.

It’s not enough to discuss inflation-fighting investments if we’re not helping our clients become clear about the true cause of inflation. While long term care insurance is not the only possible remedy for health-care induced inflation, avoiding the conversation leaves families exposed to their most costly risk in retirement.

By simply using the list above in your conversations and newsletters, you will initiate new and very powerful planning discussions in your practice. Even if you don’t have all the answers right away, pledge that you’ll become their advocate and their inflation-fighting hero. They may owe you a huge debt of gratitude if you simply take the first step.

Click here to read the original article.