Two Conditions For An Affordable Long Term Care Coverage

By Author: Cynthia Clarke
Total Articles: 18
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They say any type of investment will require the investor to fork out a chunk of money, but with long term care insurance this rule does not apply as buyers of such product have the freedom to adjust their long term care premiums.

Just like any business negotiation, though, there are conditions that policy buyers have to meet so that they can have a say on the parameters of their policy, as these directly affect the cost of their coverage.

The first condition is for them to be young and not 10 or five years away from requiring long term care (LTC) services. Then the second one is that they should be in perfect shape or free of any type of illness. Sometimes, even a slight change to one’s health will already result in a rated coverage.

Applying for an LTCI policy while you are young and healthy has many advantages than disadvantages. Among the advantages, you get to instantly lock in the preferred health discount so your annual premium rate is naturally lower. Even if your health condition changes afterwards, like you develop symptoms of a chronic illness, it will not affect ...
... the price of your coverage.

Tax-qualified policies also guarantee huge tax deductions each year as LTCI premiums, according to the IRS Code Section 213(d), are treated as medical expenses and thus deductible from the itemized deductions of insured taxpayers.

As for the disadvantage, you will be subjected to more years of premium payment. However, this should not matter at all especially if the amount of your annual premium is smaller than what you spend on your whims.

How to Deal with Your Long Term Care Premiums

Older LTCI policy buyers, however, should not feel discouraged. If you happen to be among those who were unfortunate to receive the good health discount and thus the annual premium of a policy that you’re eyeing exceeds $2,200, there are still ways to reduce this amount.

With the help of a licensed LTCI specialist this should not be a difficult problem to solve. However, you have to point out your priorities first. Priorities here pertain to your preferred LTC setting, the cost of care in your area, and how long you plan to obtain care.

If you’re considering in-home care and nursing home care later on, you have to choose where you want to receive 100% coverage and where you should get 75% or 50%.

Aside from the coverage amount, you also have to study your inflation protection as this will affect your premium, too. Experts say the ideal is a 5% compound inflation protection but this can raise your premium significantly. Perhaps you can choose among the 5% simple inflation, 4% compound inflation and 3% compound inflation protection.

Policies that comply with the Partnership Program’s rules are also worth considering as these allow people to settle for a small maximum benefit amount and thus they can save on their premiums. Should they need additional care after having used up their LTCI benefits, they could simply apply for Medicaid without spending down a portion of their assets that is equivalent to the total amount of benefits that they were able to receive from their policies.

Get in touch with an LTCI adviser to discover other ways to save on long term care premiums.

Find out the long term care insurance costs in your area and get free long term care quote when you visit our website now!!!