Baby Boomers: The New Long-Term Care Products You Can Get Without Medical Underwriting: Here's What Changed

About 75% of baby boomers will need some form of care during their lifetime, making long-term care planning a financial necessity. Nursing home private rooms cost about $108,000 per year, and home health aides for 44 hours per week cost about $75,000 per year. Consumer sentiment near recessionary levels increases the risk of premium shock for pre-retirees. Traditional long-term care policies should be kept if already held. If coverage was rejected or priced out, guaranteed-issue long-term care options can be available without underwriting. Guaranteed issue typically comes as a hybrid life insurance or annuity with a long-term care rider, with different economics than standalone policies. Premiums may be higher, and benefits depend on whether care is used.

"“New products have come around. Innovation has really come through. There are products now that you can get without even going through underwriting and get basically what they would call guaranteed issue a form of long-term care.”"

"“A private room in a nursing home now runs roughly $108,000 a year, and a home health aide for 44 hours a week runs roughly $75,000 a year. If three out of four boomers will need some version of that, the financial question is how to plan, not whether.”"

"“If you have held a traditional long-term care policy for a decade, keep it. If you were rejected or priced out, the new guaranteed issue category is a real option. The catch is that ‘guaranteed issue’ almost always means a hybrid product, usually life insurance or an annuity with a long-term care rider, and the math works very differently from a standalone policy.”"

"“That is what the host means by the poker metaphor: ‘pot committed’ like chips already pushed in. The payoff only arrives if you draw care. But when you do, as the host puts it, ‘you'll get all that money back and then some, and you'll get it back rather qu’”"

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