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Comment by berbec | Hacker News Reader

I'm going through this with my father. Since he didn't buy a long term care plan, the assisted living facilities by us will be $11k a month out of pocket.

If you live in the USA, please talk to your parents/spouse/friends about long term care.

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Not sold on LTC. That’s great if your goal is to live in a facility some day. But hopefully I never have to. Can downgrade from big house to maybe a smaller condo over time. Take care of myself so hopefully will end up OK.

If not? I get checked into the same home as a LTC user with Medicare. I pay for it until I am broke, then Medicare takes over.

I really don’t see the upside. In the case I have a large estate and need LTC, the LTC insurance protects my estate so I can pass more of it on. But as not a huge fan of generational wealth, I see no benefit to me or the world to buy LTC insurance. In fact, less money to enjoy now or grow my estate.

Medicare won’t pay for assisted living, but you can use your social security money towards it. If you can’t pay, and you can’t take care of yourself then Medicaid kicks in, your social security gets taken and you go to a nusing home.

Yah so at that point you are living out your days in a home. So not seeing how the long term care insurance mattered.

I'm new to it myself, but it seems difficult to navigate the minefield of LTCI, particularly the Daily Benefits payouts available are around $200/day, which is lower than the cost of many facilities.

Long Term Care insurance was a massive miscalculation in the insurance industry and shareholders paid dearly for it. It was super smart to buy it in the 80s and 90s but most insurers have gotten out of the business. The rest have raised rates so high as to make it not worth it.

Genworth’s stock more than halved when they announced they had to take additional LTC write offs a few years ago.

There's actually a whole industry around this in certain low tax areas in Switzerland. High end retirement/nursing homes in olaces with low/zero inheritance tax, so the family can park the elderly relatives in good care until the inevitable happens but then avoid paying inheritance tax. It looks silly, when you have almost entire villages whose core business is this.

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