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There are so many scams out there for buying "long term care" insurance. I'm looking for insurance that will cover in-home services as well as any outside arrangements for later in life if needed. AARP has one with GE (Genworth). It doesn't look that great a deal. They have increasing premiums based on "class" and "state", but never (they promise, promise) based on health status or age. The benefits can be "up to" $4000 a month for 3 years, with a starting premium of $1700. What is their history for premium increases? Has that company paid anyone (or family member) out there reading this thread?
Is there some type of "consumer reports" for comparing various long term care insurances? Thanks for any info.
I dont know much about this topic but thought I would throw in there to look at Penn Treaty. My MIL has been in an assisted living place for about 6 mos now. They also have a separate "in home care" policy that she had.
She never had any problems with it. She bought her policy a lon time ago and paid monthly on it. As soon as she went into the assisted living she didnt have to pay the monthly jpremiums. Her policy pays up to 3k per month.
Avoiding Fraud When Buying Long-Term Care Insurance: A Guide For Consumers And Their Families (http://consumerlawpage.com/article/insure.shtml#cover - broken link)
You might also check out MetLife and John Hancock. Both are reputable, very stable companies.
As I understand my plan, they are not allowed to raise my rates unless they are granted permission to do so by the state insurance commissioner for an entire "group" of insureds, not on an individual basis. Supposedly this is not an easy thing for an insurance company to accomplish, although I rather doubt this (cynic!).
When I did my research before I purchased my plan (over five years ago now) neither MetLife or Hancock had ever raised their insured's rates.
I bought MetLife long-term insurance for my husband and myself from AARP 4 years ago. It does cover in-home care, and it has only a 45 day elimination period. For the price, it is a very good policy, but....you can't buy it now. I received a notice several months ago that our policy would continue to be honored, but that AARP was no longer offering that particular coverage. When I compared our policy with what is now offered, I see that it will cost quite a bit more for comparable coverage.
I went with Met-Life because it is an old established company and I hope that it will be there for us if we ever need it, but with the current state of all financial and insurance products in this country (USA), who knows?
Each year, I am offered a 5% increase in benefits if I agree to a 5% increase in premium. So far, I have not increased our policies. I'd love to have the extra coverage, but we're already quickly becoming insurance poor (house, medical, dental, umbrella, long-term care -- we just dropped my life insurance coverage this year).
Thank you all for the replies. I have another question regarding LTC. I finally settled on a Life Insurance policy with a Long Term Care rider from John Hancock, which is, by the way, produced in Toronto, Ontario, Canada (!). It works like this (so I'm told by the agent): You pay a premium each year that is not likely to change (really?) and get a set amount for life insurance or you can use it for long term care if you can't do 2 of the ADL's. I can't figure out the policy it is so badly written with jargon. The agent goes over it and I still don't get it. A long term care health insurance agent said he wouldn't get it because it is a hybrid and I should get two separate policies. I have three weeks left to reject this policy. It is supposed to provide $150K coverage for $2000 per year premium. Can anyone comment?
I was going to send you a direct message, but apparently I can't.
DM me and I'll give you the number of a person to talk to. She set us up with a John Hancock LTC policy and we are very, very pleased with it. Doesn't sound like the one you were shown.
I finally settled on a Life Insurance policy with a Long Term Care rider from John Hancock......It works like this (so I'm told by the agent): You pay a premium each year that is not likely to change (really?) and get a set amount for life insurance or you can use it for long term care if you can't do 2 of the ADL's. I can't figure out the policy it is so badly written with jargon....... I have three weeks left to reject this policy. It is supposed to provide $150K coverage for $2000 per year premium. Can anyone comment?
First, NEVER buy anything you don't understand. I sympathize with you -- most policies are extremely difficult to understand. Before I retired, I was a Compensation and Benefits Manager for a large company, and I spent quite a bit of time writing clear, easy-to-understand pamphlets describing employees benefits. Insurance companies could easily do the same thing, but it is in their interest to keep things complicated. Do you need life insurance? Do you have a spouse or child who will be dependant on receiving a benefit in the event you die. If not, forget the life insurance or just get a simple term policy. Buy your LTC separately -- for a single person (depending on your age and physical health) you should probably be able to buy either a less expensive policy than $2,000/year, or still spend the $2,000 but receive a much higher total benefit than just $150,000 (I'm assuming that is a lifetime benefit).
Our cost for two policies (for my husband and myself) is only $110/month with a $300,000 maximum benefit for each of us. However, we did take those policies out when we were in our mid-50's. It would probably cost us much more if we were to buy similar policies today. Our rates have not increased over the past 5 years (Met Life).
Thank you. I tried to "edit my options" to no success, so I can't direct e-mail you either! I can't see "Administrator" contact info, so I'll just send this to you. I understand that you would like to give me the name of a LTC agent, but can't really publicly post it. If someone would like to tell me how I can directly e-mail someone on this discussion black board, I would appreciate it.
If you go to your "My Settings" screen there should be a list of reputation points given to you. Mine has my email address.
Top left of this screen in the blue band across the page.
Tek
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Long Term Care and Life Insurance/LTC combo
