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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-28-2006, 02:17 AM   #41
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

.....SamClem is exactly right and I was wrong. Tricare for life does not cover extended care. It does cover skilled nursing facility care though. It was not very long ago that I visited the Tricare website and saw some very different information than what is there now. http://www.tricare.osd.mil/Factsheet...eet.cfm?id=258
I am going to have to rethink this issue though my gut feeling is that I would rather be dead than living in a nursing home.
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-28-2006, 03:48 AM   #42
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

Quote:
Originally Posted by jclarksnakes
Tricare for life does not cover extended care. It does cover skilled nursing facility care though.
There is a 120 day limit to the Tricare skilled nursing.
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-28-2006, 09:10 AM   #43
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

It seems like $500K in todays dollars would easily cover several years of nursing home stay. So if you could afford to deplete your nest egg by that amount without lowering the standard of living too much for the surviving spouse, then you can self insure.

Of course it depends on what part of the country you live. Yet another reason to avoid areas of the country where the cost of living is high.

Then the surviving spouse has the whole rest of the nest egg to pay for LTC if necessary - if you are in LTC, what else are you going to spend money on? - nothing.

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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-28-2006, 09:22 AM   #44
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

Quote:
Originally Posted by honobob
It is my observation that most men fail relatively quickly after needing care.

As a member of the weaker sex I resemble that remark.* Did you stop to think that maybe we just missed our DW's great care and would rather die than* put up with inferior care?* Are we not the sacraficing/appreciative sex?

Otherwise, Great Post!
Perhaps I didn't state my observations as well as I should. *Almost every resident of an assisted living or nursing home establishment were cared for at home initially. The healthier spouse cares for the frail spouse. *It is more often the case that the eldest becomes frail first, most wives are younger than their husbands. *Men are most often moved to a care facility when the wife cannot transfer them from bed to chair/toilet - and most people don't live long once they reach that condition.* Just guessing here, six months might be 1.5 StD.

There are more widdows than widdowers. *When a widdow becomes frail there is no spouse at home to care for her. *She must either move in with the kids, receive care at home that is managed by the kids (note comments of others in another thread), or move to a group living situation. *That is when LTC insurance provises options.

This life process is exactly why DH and I plan to move to a continuing care community when he is in his mid 70s.* Social networks are important to healthy living.* Each move from one level of care to another trims that network.*
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-28-2006, 02:23 PM   #45
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Brat
There are more widdows than widdowers. *When a widdow becomes frail there is no spouse at home to care for her. *She must either move in with the kids, receive care at home that is managed by the kids (note comments of others in another thread), or move to a group living situation. *That is when LTC insurance provises options.
It seems to me that the benefit of LTC insurance is to protect the nest egg against the first spouse's needs. The remaining spouse can deplete the nest egg for LTC. LTC insurance only helps if the cost of LTC is much higher than the annual income provided by the nest egg.

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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-28-2006, 02:29 PM   #46
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

Personally, I think that anyone who bought LTC insurance 5 or so years ago got a good deal, assuming that the company will still be around to honor the deal and doesn't jack premiums to the moon. To buy it now? I think you'd either need to have your head examined, or you'd have to have so much money that it would be a waste of time to fool with LTC insurance.
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-29-2006, 07:37 AM   #47
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

Quote:
Originally Posted by brewer12345
Personally, I think that anyone who bought LTC insurance 5 or so years ago got a good deal, assuming that the company will still be around to honor the deal and doesn't jack premiums to the moon. To buy it now? I think you'd either need to have your head examined, or you'd have to have so much money that it would be a waste of time to fool with LTC insurance.
I'm guessing you don't know anybody who has had to use theirs?

Count me among those who need their head examined : I've been witness to too many fortunes drained by expenses that could have been avoided with LTCI
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-29-2006, 07:43 AM   #48
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

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Originally Posted by saluki9
I'm guessing you don't know anybody who has had to use theirs?

Count me among those who need their head examined* *:* I've been witness to too many fortunes drained by expenses that could have been avoided with LTCI
If you need LTC, you have to pay for it. That can be done via your checkbook, or via insurance. I've spent enough time dealing with the largest writers of LTC insurance and some of the biggest former writers of LTC insurance to form an opinion of the "paying with insurance" option.
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-29-2006, 07:58 AM   #49
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

Quote:
Originally Posted by brewer12345
If you need LTC, you have to pay for it. That can be done via your checkbook, or via insurance. I've spent enough time dealing with the largest writers of LTC insurance and some of the biggest former writers of LTC insurance to form an opinion of the "paying with insurance" option.
And I've spent countless hours working with clients to liquidate tens of millions of dollars that have gone towards long term care.

As trustee on a family trust I have signed well over $1,000,000 of checks to pay long term care expenses for my grandmother that could have been avoided by a $5K annual premium.
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-29-2006, 08:04 AM   #50
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

Saluki,
You have personally seen "too many fortunes drained by expenses that could have been avoided with LTCI?" I understand your reasoning and concerns, and if you can afford the premiums perhaps it provides peace of mind, like insurance is supposed to do. But I have not often observed what you describe. Fortunes drained, yes. But prevention of this by LTC? Not often; slowing the "drainage" perhaps, but rarely prevented.

Benefits of $100 a day or more may still leave considerable unpaid expenses which will likely only worsen. The "gap" alone can drain an average nest egg pretty quickly; LTCI will partially mitigate that of course, but compared to the opportunity cost of years or decades of premium payments, it is not so clear. And like term life, the premiums will rise with age until often the buyer just can't justify it and they drop the policy after years of premiums, when they are most likely to benefit from it. Future costs and gov't coverage for LTC? Totally unknown and unpredictable, but probably not good news.

While I don't know the right answer for anyone (including myself), but I don't think it's quite the slam dunk. I've elected not to buy LTCI, trusting that if the need arises it'll be a sad swap between your FIRE money paying for the leisurely lifestyle you had hoped for, versus the high cost of a 3-year stay in a nursing home. More of a probability-based decision factoring in how much you have rather than one to make based on anecdotes. If it turns out to be one of the rare cases of a 10 year NH stay, everyone loses (even with LTCI) and it collapses into Medicaid.

Just food for thought.
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-29-2006, 08:10 AM   #51
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

Rich

Personally I don't know anybody who has bought only $100 a day in benefits. Most people I've seen have purchased between $150 to $250 with simple indexing. Of course that depends on what kind of care you choose to buy

I don't know if you're spent much time in the homes that medicare pays for, but they aren't pretty. Around here a decent nursing home costs between $65,000 to $110,000 a year. Even they aren't what you would consider to be "nice" If you can avoid it most people would prefer to get in home care which isn't cheaper than a home. That being said $150 a day wouldn't be bad to help out with those costs.

In the case of my family, the LTCI would have saved us around $600K by now





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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-29-2006, 08:22 AM   #52
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

saluki, its not that I don't take seriously the issue of paying for LTC. Its that I think the protection that is offered by LTC insurance is dubious at best for a prospective purchaser in their 50s or 60s. The product isn't mature enough and enough underpricing writers of this product have gotten burned that all that is left is the guys who are guessing as best they can at morbidity, hoping they can get the spreads they assume in their pricing, and telling themselves that if tings get bad they will just jack ates on their in-force blocks. This isn't a recipe for a stable industry that provides solid protection to insureds.
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-29-2006, 08:41 AM   #53
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

Saluki,* on the LTCI issue..........

A $5k to $10k/person annual premium would represent a significant chunk of our, and most folk's, RE budget.* Before going that route, I'd like to understand how to buy the product so that I could feel very comfortable that I understand what I'm getting and that the company will be there to deliver if and when we need it.* My current reading uncovered many concerns that companies might not be delivering, as promised today, a decade or two from now.

I feel comfortable with my home owners, auto, life and umbrella liability insurance and the companies I purchase them from.* How would you suggest I research companies and policies so that I could feel the same way about LTCI?

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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-29-2006, 08:49 AM   #54
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

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Originally Posted by youbet

I feel comfortable with my home owners, auto, life and umbrella liability insurance and the companies I purchase them from.* How would you suggest I research companies and policies so that I could feel the same way about LTCI?
That's he problem: you cannot. LTCI is not a mature product like life, home, car, etc. insurance. The companies I would normally look to in the life industry (NWM, MassMutual, TIAA-CREF, USAA, maybe Pacific Life) either do not sell LTCI, or price it at stratospheric levels. Since we are talking about a LOT of money in premiums and very possibly some jacking up of rates down the road, I don't think LTCI is what it claims to be.
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-29-2006, 08:51 AM   #55
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

Quote:
Originally Posted by saluki9
In the case of my family, the LTCI would have saved us around $600K by now
Yes, it's all but impossible to ignore personal experience and hindsight. Just that such experience is not always the best guide as to what to do for the future. Who knows.

I'm just glad that we'll probably have enough resources to even consider self-insuring in this situation. Maybe not to the level we would like, but at least the intact spouse will be able to live in comfort.

Better go jog and take my statin .
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-29-2006, 08:56 AM   #56
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

It's a tough call. I had an aunt who had a 5 year stay in a nursing home. It knocked a big dent in her savings but her husband had already passed so it didn't hurt anyone other than her kids inheritance. I'm sure she would have liked to have left them more but that is one reason we save, to have enough for our end of life uncertainties.

As I metioned before, I have a policy through our group company plan. Only cost $42/mo with $3,600/mo coverage(6 yr max) and a 5% per year inflation rider but caps out at $72,000 per year. Certainly won't pay for everything but not bad coverage for the price. Like Brewer said, the product isn't mature enough to know what the future holds for LTCI. I plan to hedge my bets for now and keep the policy as long as it is reasonable. *
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-29-2006, 09:12 AM   #57
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

Quote:
Originally Posted by brewer12345
I don't think LTCI is what it claims to be.
And I'm just not sure.........

I put together a DW-friendly spread sheet complete with color charts and graphs showing her the impact of both paying LTCI premiums beginning now and of self-insuring. *I ran a few scenarios..........one of us needing care for a short time through both needing care for a long time and everything inbetween.

She was showing a slight lean towards buying LTC until I mentioned that the product might be confusing to select and that there was some risk that it would actually be there for you, at least as compared to something simple such as term life insurance. *That revelation brought us back to the "what to do" status that the analysis started with........

If we had an opportunity to buy something like DOG52 has with his company, we wouldn't hesitate.* We'd be strictly on the private market.* DOG, in a hypothetical situation where you retire and you could continue the policy for $500 a month with the possibility of significant premium increases going forward, how would you feel about it then?

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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-29-2006, 09:14 AM   #58
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

Quote:
Originally Posted by Rich_in_Tampa
Yes, it's all but impossible to ignore personal experience and hindsight. Just that such experience is not always the best guide as to what to do for the future. Who knows.

I'm just glad that we'll probably have enough resources to even consider self-insuring in this situation. Maybe not to the level we would like, but at least the intact spouse will be able to live in comfort.

Better go jog and take my statin .
No doubt Rich. There is a good reason that most reputable research doesn't include testimonials. I just put it forth as my reasoning for believing in it so strongly. On top of that, my first hand experience in dealing daily with several dozen moderate to highly wealthy families has reinforced the importance to me.

As Brewer can attest, most early offerings were vastly underpriced. Companies like CNA and Trans would love to get rid of their book from that period. However the concept still make a lot of sense to me and as long as others are willing to share the risk I will buy the coverage as I near my 40's.

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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-29-2006, 09:20 AM   #59
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

Quote:
Originally Posted by saluki9
As Brewer can attest, most early offerings were vastly underpriced.* Companies like CNA and Trans would love to get rid of their book from that period.* However the concept still make a lot of sense to me and as long as others are willing to share the risk I will buy the coverage as I near my 40's.*
Actually, I'd wait until at least 50. That's one of the few advantages we yunguns have from following the boomers. By the time they have ruined thoroughly tested the systems designed to deal with the elderly, we will have a much better idea what not to do.

In 20 years, LTCI should be sorted out. Whether it will still be available on the open market is anther question.
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)
Old 08-29-2006, 09:37 AM   #60
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Re: Anybody Here Own LTC (Long Term Care)

Quote:
Originally Posted by youbet
And I'm just not sure.........


If we had an opportunity to buy something like DOG52 has with his company, we wouldn't hesitate.* We'd be strictly on the private market.* DOG, in a hypothetical situation where you retire and you could continue the policy for $500 a month with the possibility of significant premium increases going forward, how would you feel about it then?

When I retire my rate will still be at the group rate. But it will be dropped if it goes to $500/mo. I'm not sure where my pain threshold is.
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