According to an article which appears in the September 14th, 2009, edition of the Margolis and Bloom Weekly Newsletter, the life expectancy of Americans has reached a new high of nearly 78 years. The findings were reported by the National Center for Health Statistics in August of 2009 and are based on 90% of death certificates filed in 2007. The leading causes of death continue to be heart disease and cancer. Alzheimer's moved up to sixth place, from seventh in 2006. Notably, there were declines in all top ten leading causes of death from 2006 to 2007, with the exception of Alzheimer's and Chronic Lower Respiratory Disease. The report also found both men and women are living longer, and a gap of five years exists between sexes. Women are living to an average of 80.4 years, while men averaged 75.3 years. The gap between the sexes also narrowed from a decade ago, when it was reported to be eight years.
Today, with one of every four Americans being a baby boomer, a generation of 78 million strong, and with the first baby boomers expected to reach 65 years of age in 2011, it is time for all baby boomers to seriously consider purchasing a long-term care insurance policy in light of future unprecedented demand for long-term care services. Why is it so important to do it now? The reason is simple, and it is related to cost. With the unprecedented high demand, prices for home health care, assisted living, and nursing home care will skyrocket, making the care unavailable to most. Secondly, as long-term care costs enter the system, insurance companies will have no choice but to raise the initial cost of acquiring a long-term care insurance policy in order to satisfy pending claims.
In light of the above, what is the best long-term care insurance policy for a client? The best long-term care insurance policy covers all levels of care - home health, assisted living, and nursing home care, provides a reasonable daily benefit, has 3-5 years worth of coverage, offers no benefits in the first 100 days - avoids an overlap with Medicare, has a 5% annual inflation rider - daily benefit goes up by 5% per year, has a return of premium rider - if no benefits are used, the insured's family or trust gets a full refund of all paid premiums, and has a guaranteed annual payments amount for only 5 to 10 years - the policy is totally aid up at the end of the premium paying period.
The advantage of the aforementioned long-term care policy is that it will be sold on the "safety net theory" - use it only if you need to, versus the "use it or lose it theory" of traditional long-term care insurance sales. At Krause Financial Services, we are experts in developing safety net long-term care insurance policies for our national clients.
