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Ask Todd: Long Term Care Insurance Explained · The Financial Exchange Show

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  Speaker 1: This is Ask Todd on the Financial Exchange Radio network.
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  Speaker 1: If you have an existing estate plan or in the
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  Speaker 1: market for one, Todd Lutsky is here to answer your
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  Speaker 1: questions and help you plan for a later life. Ask
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  Speaker 1: Todd is presented by Cushing and Dolan, serving Massachusetts and
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  Speaker 1: New England for more than thirty five years, helping families
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  Speaker 1: with a state and tax planning, Medicaid planning, and probate law.
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  Speaker 1: Visit Cushingdolan dot com. Now here's Todd Lutzky.
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  Speaker 2: As promised, We've got Todd Lonski right here in studio
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  Speaker 2: for Ask Todd. It's your chance to ask Todd your
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  Speaker 2: estate planning questions, and we got the phone lines open
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  Speaker 2: for you. That number is eight eight eight two zero
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  Speaker 2: five two two six three. Get calling early and often
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  Speaker 2: usually can only get through got two three questions. There's
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  Speaker 2: a lot of information that he likes to convey, and
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  Speaker 2: so unlimited time. Again, only get a chance for a
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  Speaker 2: couple of these. That number again is eight eight eight
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  Speaker 2: to zero five two two six three, And so if
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  Speaker 2: you've got a state planning questions, call so you can
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  Speaker 2: chat with Todd right now live on air again. It
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  Speaker 2: is eight eight eight to zero five two two six three.
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  Speaker 2: Mister Lutsky, How are you doing today?
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  Speaker 3: I am never better? How are you?
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  Speaker 2: I'm worried, just a little disappointed. Try to do I
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  Speaker 2: was making a belt out of herbs over the weekend.
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  Speaker 3: A belt out of herbs.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, herbs. Yeah, it turned out it was just a
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  Speaker 2: waste of time.
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  Speaker 3: Now, that's that's true. It is y.
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  Speaker 2: So what are you? What are you gonna do?
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  Speaker 4: Todd?
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  Speaker 2: I want to talk to you a little bit about
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  Speaker 2: nursing home costs.
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  Speaker 3: Yes, they are not cheap.
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  Speaker 2: I've been in this business for like sixteen seventeen years now,
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  Speaker 2: and it's it's hard for me to keep up sometimes.
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  Speaker 2: Where is kind of the range for nursing home costs
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  Speaker 2: at this point? Or even just you know, long term
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  Speaker 2: care expense if someone wants to stay home but still
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  Speaker 2: get home care, Like, what are we looking at?
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  Speaker 5: So?
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  Speaker 3: I think two things. One, you know, staying home, which
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  Speaker 3: of course we all want to. We all think it's better.
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  Speaker 3: I totally want to. But if you're at a point
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  Speaker 3: where you need you know, eight hours a day, or
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  Speaker 3: someone just coming in at night, or you know something
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  Speaker 3: like that, well, that might be less than a nursing home.
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  Speaker 3: You know, if you need that kind of care, sure,
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  Speaker 3: but you know to stay at home because I need
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  Speaker 3: twenty four to seven care. Now you're looking at every
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  Speaker 3: bit as much as being in a nursing home. So well, yes,
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  Speaker 3: I want the luxury or the benefit of being at
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  Speaker 3: home and not in a nursing home. Understand it's not cheaper.
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  Speaker 3: And so now what is that number? You know? Here
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  Speaker 3: in Massachusetts anyway, it's going to be right around sixteen
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  Speaker 3: thousand a month if I had to guess, I mean,
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  Speaker 3: can you find some further out of for you know,
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  Speaker 3: west of four ninety five, maybe for fourteen or thirteen,
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  Speaker 3: but you come closer you could be looking at you know,
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  Speaker 3: depending on where you go. I've seen one as high
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  Speaker 3: as twenty two thousand a month. A pretty fancy place,
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  Speaker 3: I guess, But it varies, I think, is the answer.
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  Speaker 2: When you look at the at someone who tries to
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  Speaker 2: qualify for Medicaid. Does Medicaid pay those stated rates or
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  Speaker 2: is there a different rate that they pay?
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  Speaker 5: Yeah?
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  Speaker 3: And I think that's really the rub here, right, and
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  Speaker 3: the reason people try to get on Medicaid. Perhaps the
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  Speaker 3: reason people try to protect their assets from the nursingo one.
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  Speaker 3: Of course, you could see how fast they would go
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  Speaker 3: away if you don't. But setting that aside, it's the
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  Speaker 3: leverage you get by being a Medicaid patient versus a
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  Speaker 3: private pay patient. The average cost for Medicaid with the
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  Speaker 3: state pays. You know, it's varying, It's still about sixty
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  Speaker 3: five hundred, seven thousand, maybe seventy five hundred a month,
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  Speaker 3: somewhere in that range. I give you a little range there,
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  Speaker 3: because depending on the level of care that you need
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  Speaker 3: does impact the Medicaid rate. Okay, but in any event,
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  Speaker 3: to say it's to say it's fifty percent of the
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  Speaker 3: private pay rate is probably a fair a fair bet.
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  Speaker 3: And so by getting on Medicaid, by getting the state
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  Speaker 3: to pay rather than pay personally, you are significantly slowing
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  Speaker 3: the bleeding of your assets for sure if no planning
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  Speaker 3: was done, and perhaps saving the assets if your planning
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  Speaker 3: has been done.
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  Speaker 2: Talking with Todd Letsky, we've still got room on the
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  Speaker 2: phone lines for your estate planning calls. That number is
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  Speaker 2: eight eight eight to zero five two two six three.
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  Speaker 2: Again it is eight eight eight to zero five two
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  Speaker 2: two six three. We're gonna take a quick break here.
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  Speaker 2: But when we come back, we're gonna get to your
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  Speaker 2: questions for Todd again. Still a little bit of room
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  Speaker 2: on the phone line, so get calling to make sure
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  Speaker 2: you can have your question answered by Todd. That phone
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  Speaker 2: number is eight eight eight two zero five two two
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  Speaker 2: six three. One more time it is eight eight eight
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  Speaker 2: two zero five two two sixty three.
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  Speaker 1: Ask Todd with Todd Lutsky every Wednesday at ten thirty
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  Speaker 1: every Wednesday at ten thirty right here on the Financial
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  Speaker 2: Still got Todd Lotsky here. If you've got a question
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  Speaker 2: about a state planning to ask him now. The number
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  Speaker 2: is eight eight eight two zero five two two sixty three.
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  Speaker 2: Again eight eight eight two zero five two two six three.
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  Speaker 2: Let's go to JP on the Cape. JP. What's your
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  Speaker 2: question for Todd Lutsky.
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  Speaker 5: Well, it's a question, but it's also to share an experience,
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  Speaker 5: if you will, pertaining to long term care. Three family members,
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  Speaker 5: which basically is my parents and my grandmother needed to
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  Speaker 5: go to a facility after they received home care for
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  Speaker 5: a period of time. And had quite a different experience
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  Speaker 5: with the three of them. One of them was well
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  Speaker 5: to do and had care at home and then went
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  Speaker 5: to assisted care. And then when you're needing the assist
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  Speaker 5: of more than one person to get out of bed
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  Speaker 5: or a chair, you can't stay there. You need to
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  Speaker 5: go to the facility nursing home. So my point here
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  Speaker 5: is this one parent that my parents split. One parent
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  Speaker 5: I had done a state planning, basically had hidden at assets,
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  Speaker 5: and when she needed to go to a facility out
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  Speaker 5: it extremely difficult to access a facility that we wanted
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  Speaker 5: because one of the first questions they asked when you
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  Speaker 5: sit down to the interview is how do you plan
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  Speaker 5: to pay? And if you say, well, you know, I've
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  Speaker 5: got about twenty thousand dollars and that's about it, well
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  Speaker 5: then they say, okay, great, we'll take your name, give
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  Speaker 5: you a call when there's an opening.
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  Speaker 4: Phone's not going to ring.
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  Speaker 5: And then the other parents had long term care insurance,
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  Speaker 5: so god care at home because the covers that good
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  Speaker 5: care in the assistant covers that. Yeah.
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  Speaker 3: Just get to the question though, what's the question?
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  Speaker 5: Well, the question here is what do you think about
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  Speaker 5: long term care insurance? Because with Dad's case, he got
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  Speaker 5: accepted right away. You want a room with a view
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  Speaker 5: because he had.
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  Speaker 3: The comfort, all right, So a couple of couple of comments.
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  Speaker 3: I just want to try to answer the question now.
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  Speaker 3: So the answer is that that I love long term
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  Speaker 3: care insurance and I tell people, if you can get it,
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  Speaker 3: please get it, because I think it can provide not
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  Speaker 3: so much full coverage for a nursing home, because very
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  Speaker 3: very hard to get full coverage for a nursing home
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  Speaker 3: because it just costs too much. Please try to get
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  Speaker 3: it before you're seventy, because around seventy, I think it
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  Speaker 3: gets really hard to get it. In your fifties. I
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  Speaker 3: don't sell it, but my understanding is in your fifties
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  Speaker 3: that yes, you can get it. Why I love it
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  Speaker 3: so much as if it's affordable and you can and
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  Speaker 3: you can get it, then please make sure that you
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  Speaker 3: get enough to cover in home care, right because they
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  Speaker 3: have an in home care piece, and a lot of
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  Speaker 3: times that's why people get it. So I love that.
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  Speaker 3: I think the point being made here is that, yes,
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  Speaker 3: nursing homes are very expensive, and that's what he's mentioning.
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  Speaker 3: It is unfortunate that these nursing homes seem to discriminate
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  Speaker 3: against whether or not you have assets or you don't
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  Speaker 3: have assets. I do know the care is the same.
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  Speaker 3: You could have two people in the same bed in
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  Speaker 3: the on the same bed, but in the same room,
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  Speaker 3: sharing that that room, one getting Medicaid rate, one getting
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  Speaker 3: private pay rate, and the care is the same because
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  Speaker 3: thankfully the provider is providing the care and they want
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  Speaker 3: to provide the care the same. They don't know the difference,
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  Speaker 3: and it is unfortunate that they do discriminate, although they
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  Speaker 3: should not because if you have a bed, they take you,
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  Speaker 3: but if you don't, then they do. They do do this,
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  Speaker 3: But I can tell you that you know when you
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  Speaker 3: go there, you just simply tell them all the assets
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  Speaker 3: you have. Most people have a house, most people. You know,
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  Speaker 3: whether you did the planning or not is not the question.
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  Speaker 3: The question is whether or not these assets exist, and
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  Speaker 3: then at least that way you'll get in to the facility.
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  Speaker 3: But they should not be discriminating against, you know, people
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  Speaker 3: who need a Medicaid bed. But they tend to so
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  Speaker 3: doesn't mean I'm not going to plan. I'm certainly going
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  Speaker 3: to can still do my planning. But if you're faced
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  Speaker 3: with long term care planning last minute. This guide will
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  Speaker 3: ex explain to you how to get that how to
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  Speaker 3: get that care, and save your assets last minute from
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  Speaker 3: the cost of long term care. So once you're in
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  Speaker 3: a nursing home, you can then do a lot of
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  Speaker 3: shifting around of assets to save things. For married couples
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  Speaker 3: and single people, assets are treated differently like the home,
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  Speaker 3: like rental property, like life insurance four oh one k's iras,
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  Speaker 3: they are treated differently countable non countable. The rules are
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  Speaker 3: out there and this guide will give you those rules.
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  Speaker 3: Call and get it. It's eight six six eight four
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  Speaker 3: eight five six nine nine or Legal exchange show dot com.
• 10:42
  Speaker 3: We're getting close to the end of the month, folks
• 10:44
  Speaker 3: eight six six eight four eight five six nine nine
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  Speaker 3: or legal exchange show dot com. You can download it
• 10:52
  Speaker 3: right there. And I also want to mention our Cushing
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: and Dolan Instagram page, Folks, Cushing Dolan PC. Go check
• 10:59
  Speaker 3: it out. Lots more information on there than we can
• 11:02
  Speaker 3: give anywhere else, So please give a call or go
• 11:06
  Speaker 3: ahead to Cushing Dolan PC and get much more content
• 11:11
  Speaker 3: than we can give on our website.
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  Speaker 2: Todd got another one for you here. Let's go to
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  Speaker 2: Greg in Kingsboro. Greg, you are on with Todd Lutsky.
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  Speaker 4: Hi, Greg, are there various products for long term air insurance?
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  Speaker 4: I just got pitched by my last Thursday about this
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  Speaker 4: and what what do I have to look at as
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  Speaker 4: far as the good ones versus the average once or
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  Speaker 4: for one?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, So, like I say, I am certainly not licensed
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  Speaker 3: at all. I want to put that out there right
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  Speaker 3: out front, that I'm not licensed to, you know, provide
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  Speaker 3: information about long term care insurance. I'll just give you
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  Speaker 3: my my thoughts on what I've experienced. So you know,
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  Speaker 3: there are some that are really good, right and they
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  Speaker 3: but they might be too expensive for you. I don't
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  Speaker 3: know what your asset level is, but you know, I
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  Speaker 3: tell people you got to have, you know, five hundred
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  Speaker 3: thousand dollars tucked away, you know, I would think to
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  Speaker 3: be able to afford the premium payments and not hurt
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  Speaker 3: yourself financially. Just my own comment, I don't really have
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  Speaker 3: a lot to base it on. And and I would say,
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  Speaker 3: you know, check you know how much am I able
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  Speaker 3: to generate an income on my own? And maybe I
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  Speaker 3: only need a you know, an average policy? What is
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  Speaker 3: an average policy? An average policy? Could pay, you know,
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  Speaker 3: seven thousand a month. Maybe that's you know, half the
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  Speaker 3: cost of the nursing home. Maybe eight thousand a month.
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  Speaker 3: You find them maybe two hundred a day. I'm guessing,
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  Speaker 3: you know, maybe a little more. That's nice. I mean,
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  Speaker 3: that's at least going to provide help when you're ready
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  Speaker 3: to go to the nursing home. You only have to
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  Speaker 3: cover the difference, So I think that's helpful. And whether
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  Speaker 3: you're looking at this sort of more moderate life long
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  Speaker 3: term care policy, also look at either way, whether it's
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  Speaker 3: a fancy policy or a Cadillac or a moderate one,
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  Speaker 3: see if it has in home care, because I think
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  Speaker 3: the goal is that, you know, people want to stay
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  Speaker 3: at home as much as they possibly can, and so
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  Speaker 3: they would provide some kind of a payment for in
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  Speaker 3: home care. So look for that as a possibility. And
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  Speaker 3: then I've heard other people mention that there are these
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  Speaker 3: hybrid policies where there's some kind of a life insurance
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  Speaker 3: component that exists with the long term care component. So
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  Speaker 3: I guess, if you don't use up all the money,
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  Speaker 3: you know, during life for your long term care when
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  Speaker 3: you die, there's some kind of a payout for long
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  Speaker 3: term care insurance, So I mean for life insurance. So
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  Speaker 3: that might be something to look at, but I don't
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  Speaker 3: really have any other ideas on that, And again that's
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  Speaker 3: just my thoughts.
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  Speaker 2: Todd, any other made your considerations for people if they're
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  Speaker 2: trying to prioritize accounting for long term care costs in
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  Speaker 2: their state planning.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think when you're doing your your trust funding,
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  Speaker 3: and maybe that's what you mean by prioritize what should
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  Speaker 3: go in a trust and maybe what should stay out
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  Speaker 3: of a trust. Sure, So I always tell folks that,
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  Speaker 3: you know, you can't put an IRA in, you cannot
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  Speaker 3: put a four to oh one k in, There's going
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  Speaker 3: to be a huge income tax hit, so please leave
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  Speaker 3: that outside the trust. I always want you to leave
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  Speaker 3: your personal bank account outside the trust, you know, the
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  Speaker 3: one that's receiving your direct deposits, social security or pension.
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  Speaker 3: You know, please don't put that in the trust. That
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  Speaker 3: will cause all kinds of nightmares for you. So you
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  Speaker 3: have that fun money, lots almost everything else. I'd probably
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  Speaker 3: move house, rental property, I'd move. I'd put you know,
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  Speaker 3: my investment taxable investment portfolio in there. Why not get
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  Speaker 3: it all per detected live on the assets outside the
• 15:02
  Speaker 3: trust live on the IRA. It's at risk anyway, and
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  Speaker 3: saving it for the kids results in a much bigger
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  Speaker 3: income tax to them than you.
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  Speaker 2: So there you go, mister Wutski, Thank you so much
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  Speaker 2: for joining us today.
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  Speaker 3: Always a pleasure. Thank you.
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  Speaker 1: This has been Asked Odd on the Financial Exchange Radio network.
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: Askedd with Todd. Lutsky has been presented by Cushing and Dolan,
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  Speaker 1: serving Massachusetts and New England for more than thirty years,
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  Speaker 1: helping families with the state and tax planning, Medicaid planning,
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  Speaker 1: and probate law. Call eight hundred three nine three four
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  Speaker 1: expressed in this segment are solely those of Cushing and Dolan.
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  Speaker 1: Armstrong Advisory does not provide any legal or tax advice.
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