Long Term Care
Long Term Care
Starlight Financial is here to help you navigate long term care coverage.
While it may be unpleasant to think about having to enter long term care at some point in your life, it is important to make sure your family is protected in the event it does happen. Starlight Financial can help you explore long term care coverage policies and decide which is right for your needs.
When looking at long term care policies (LTCs), you can choose between a hybrid LTC or a traditional LTC. Traditional LTCs are policies where you pay an annual premium, and if you need long term care, the policy pays a daily or monthly benefit to cover it. However, some people worry that if they do not end up needing long term care, they have wasted money on premiums, which is where
hybrid LTCs come in. Hybrid LTCs combine long term care insurance with a life insurance policy that builds up value over time. This way, if the individual does not need long-term care, or they do not use up all the value in their policy, the remaining amount will be given to the investor’s beneficiaries as a death benefit. Some hybrid LTCs also offer a time after a surrender period, where you can remove the money or change your policy with little to no penalty if you decide that you no longer need it.
When looking at LTCs, it is important to find one that offers a
cost of living adjustment rider. This is an optional feature that adjusts payouts based on cost of living increases. Long term care expenses can increase if cost of living does, so it is important for you to be protected from those added costs if you do need long term care.
There are also tax benefits to long term care policies. Like the death benefits on most life insurance policies, the death benefits on hybrid LTCs may have little to no susceptibility to being taxed. Similarly, because the policy is not liquid, meaning you cannot access it freely, it is often not counted as part of your taxable assets by the IRS. However, not all policies are equal, so it is important to talk with an advisor about what is and isn’t taxable.
Shared care can also be an important part of long term care policies. A
shared care plan means that a married couple could have each party purchase a policy individually, but allow their spouse to be a “rider” on their plan. That way, if one party had to go into long term care and ran out of money on their plan, they could use part of the plan of their spouse in the event that their spouse needed less long term care. This lets couples share a set of benefits, and can act as a safety net in case one person needs care for longer than what their insurance covers.
Deciding whether you need insurance for long term care can be difficult, but Starlight Financial is here to help. Our expert advisors can walk you through all of your options to ensure that your family will be protected in the event that you do have to enter long term care. We currently have locations in Kingsport, TN, Lexington, the Louisville/New Albany area, Pikeville, and Florence, KY, Linton, IN, Phoenix, AZ, and Fredericksburg, VA, and we proudly serve the surrounding areas. We also have have a new location coming soon to Southern Illinois.
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