Coverage that does something for you while you are alive.
Most people think of this as money their family collects after they are gone. Some of it can work a good deal harder than that, and the part nobody plans for is care.
Life insurance with living benefits
Certain policies let you get at part of the death benefit early, while you are still here, if you become seriously ill or reach the point where you cannot care for yourself.
That matters because the expense people are least prepared for arrives during their lifetime, not after it. Coverage that only pays out at the end leaves that gap wide open.
Whether a policy like this belongs in your situation depends on what you already have and what you are trying to protect. Sometimes the answer is that it does not.
For every extra feature on a policy, there is a cost somewhere. Nobody is giving anything away. We would rather tell you where the cost is than let you find it later.
Long-term care planning is not long-term care insurance.
Insurance is one possible answer. Planning is working out which answer fits you, and whether you need one at all.
It is not one size fits all. Some people will need full assisted living. Many will only need a nurse for a month or two.
We start with what you would realistically need, what you already have, and where the line sits between what you would rather cover yourself and what is worth insuring.
What we look at
What you have, and what you would part with
Your assets and income, and more to the point, how much of it you would actually be willing to spend down before you would want insurance to step in.
Who is nearby
Whether there is family close enough to help, how much they could realistically take on, and for how long. This changes the answer more than people expect.
Health and family history
What has happened in your family, and what your own health suggests about the kind of care you are most likely to need.
What you actually want
Some people want to stay at home no matter what. Some would rather cover the whole thing out of their own pocket and never buy a policy. That is a legitimate plan, and we will tell you so.
One thing about Medicare
Medicare is not long-term care coverage. A great many people believe it is, and find out otherwise at the worst possible moment.
It pays for skilled nursing only after a qualifying hospital stay, for a limited number of days, and partway through that stretch the patient starts covering a share of the cost.
Everything past that point is yours to handle, out of your own money or out of a plan you made in advance.
How you leave it matters
How you leave money matters as much as how much you leave. Which account it comes out of, who is named on it, and when it arrives all change what your family actually receives. We look at that alongside your documents so the two are saying the same thing.
If your documents are not in order yet, that is the place to start. Are my documents in order?
Protect what you have built.
Let us talk through your family situation together, at no cost.