On Sunday July 5th, the StarTribune published an article “Long-term care policy saves cash“.  This article was a follow-up to a June article called “Long term care could break you.”   The June article generated a lot of questions from a public wanting to know more about long term care.  Once again, Deb Newman, founder of Newman Long Term Care, was consulted by the StarTribune staff for answers.

Click here to read “Long-term care policy saves cash“.

Deb Newman, founder of Newman Long Term Care, was quoted extensively in a recent StarTribune article. In the June 14th edition of the newspaper, Deb was featured prominently in an article titled “Long term care could break you”.  The article speaks to the consequences of not preparing for long term care needs.

A snippet from the article:

Many families try to handle as much of the care for their aging parents as possible. “Without long-term care insurance, you’re putting your kids in a very difficult position,” said Newman. “About 83 percent of caregivers are family members, and those family members are often providing that care while working full time and trying to care for their own children. About one in five care providers spends 40 hours or more each week caring for one of their parents.”

Relying on long-term care insurance would ease the load significantly for family members. “Long-term care insurance provides the assurance for your family that they can be in your life, but they don’t have to provide the care,” Newman said.

To read the full article, click here.

An article in this month’s issue of Investment Advisor magazine talks about why High Net Worth (HNW) individuals should consider long term care insurance (LTCI).  In “The Affluentialist: Why The Affluent Need LTC Insurance”, the author discusses the actual costs of self-insuring, the higher level of service that HNW people have come to expect, and how buying a return of premium rider on aLTCI policy eliminates the “use it or lose it” dilemna.

At Newman Long Term Care we have many HNW clients, some who in all likelihood could purchase their own care facility.  These people often are planners who have learned that it is wiser to share the financial risk with an insurance company by paying premiums, than to possibly lose a much larger sum by self-insuring.  They know how much it would cost to replace their car, or their home, but they don’t know what it will finally cost them when they need care.  HNW planners realize that since they don’t know what type of care they might receive in the future, and for how long, they can’t accurately save the amount of money they’ll need to finance their care.   They often turn to long term care insurance as a solution to this problem.

In the May 4th Chicago Sun-Times, financial advisor Terry Savage brings up a novel gift idea for Mother’s Day…buying Mom a long term care insurance plan.    Read her article “Make a gift of long term care”. 

At Newman Long Term Care, we regularly say that there is nothing better than giving someone the gift of “Peace of Mind in their Retirement.”   It’s a great idea for adult children to split the costs of a basic LTCI plan, and then do the same for Dad next month for Father’s Day.  Policies like John Hancock’s FamilyCare 2 Enhanced, offer the ability to have up to four families members, from multiple generations, all on one policy.   Substantial couple’s discounts are available for married parents, so it’s a great time for Mom, Dad and the entire family to consider LTCI.

On April 30th, Kiplinger’s Personal Finance ran an article called “How Much Long-Term-Care Coverage Do You Need?”.  In the article, they cite cost of care numbers just released by Genworth Financial.    In their latest annual cost of care survey, Genworth increased the average cost for a private nursing-home room to $74,208 a year ($203 a day).  The article states that “if the cost of care continues to rise at its current rate (more than 4% per year), then one year in a nursing home could be more than $270,000 if you need care in 30 years”.   The survey also found the average rate for home health aides to be $18.50 per hour (over $400 per day for those requiring around the clock care).

Click here for the entire article.

In the April 18^th edition of the PioneerPress, reporter Jeremy Olson penned a great article called:  “Crisis in long-term health: Boomers caring for elderly parents, but who will care for them?”  The article ran on April 18^th and talks about the toll that providing care takes on loved ones.  It mentions how caregivers are prone to anxiety and depression, they suffer higher rates of injury and chronic disease, and they sacrifice their jobs and savings taking care of loved ones.

The article also talks about the recent tragedy in Hudson, WI, where 83-year-old Claire Erickson allegedly killed himself and his wife. Erickson’s family believes he was trying to spare his children from the caregiving burden he endured for years with his 81-year-old wife, who had Alzheimer’s disease.  The Erickson family is supposedly well-to-do, and therefore well within the means of being able to hire care providers.  At Newman Long Term Care, we’ve been discussing how some of the basic services included in most long term care insurance policies might have helped avoid this tragedy.  From respite care, to care coordination services to different forms of home and community care, there are many options that should have been available to a family that supposedly had the financial means to provide care.

Read the article online by clicking here.

We try to make sure that all our policyholders understand exactly how their policies work.  To that end, we hold regular policy review meetings where we re-acquaint people with the policies they bought years ago.  We also encourage our clients to bring along their friends and family who may end up becoming their caregivers so that those people can also understand the benefit triggers and the claims process.  Our next scheduled policy review session will cover the old John Hancock Custom Care series, and will be held on April 16th in Eden Prairie.  For more information on upcoming Policy Reviews we have scheduled, click here.

The Center for Retirement Research (CRR) at Boston College released its biannual National Retirement Risk Index (NRRI) report.  The report now adds long-term care expenses to the Index calculation. This addition produced another increase in the number of working Americans who may not be financially prepared to retire. Just this factor alone increased the Index number to 64 percent from 61 percent reported one year ago.

U.S. Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) joined with several other senators to introduce national legislation that would save Medicaid billions while making it easier for the nation’s workforce to afford long-term insurance premiums. While similar bills have been introduced in past years, we hope that 2009 might be the year it passes. Click here for the full story.