3 Reasons You Need to Plan for Your Long-Term Care

By Barbara Franklin

So much of our life is built around planning. We plan for big events like weddings, careers and the birth of a child. We plan for summer vacations, where we’ll celebrate the holidays and even what we’ll cook for dinner tomorrow night.

Unfortunately, there’s one area of planning that falls short for a majority of people: long-term care and retirement. We think “that’s so far away” and “let’s worry about that later” but you’ve invested years planning and building a career, a family and a home so you want to be able to enjoy the fruits of your labor as you age.

November is Long-Term Care Awareness Month, a time when we pause to think about whether we’re prepared for the future and how we would like to live out our later years. So why is planning critical?

Here are three reasons you need to plan for your long-term care:

1. You will need care. It’s highly likely you’re going to need long-term care of some sort. According to the Department of Health and Human Services, 70 percent of the people who turn 65 will need long-term care before the end of their lives. People live longer so it just makes sense they will need some kind of care down the road.

You need to begin thinking about your own care and, if you’re in that “sandwich generation,” you’ll need to have a direct conversation with your parents about their plans for the future. It all boils down to taking the time to talk about what you want and making a plan to achieve that.

2. It’s a women’s issue. Long-term care planning is very much an issue of grave importance for women and one they should make sure is part of their financial planning and retirement program. Women typically outlive their spouses, so this means not only will they most likely be caring for a spouse but they also will need outside care as they age.

The majority of nursing home residents and those with Alzheimer’s disease are women. More than 65 percent of all long-term care insurance benefits are paid for care received by women.

3. You want choices. Most people want to age in place. They prefer to stay in their own home with their personal belongings and with a sense of independence. But aging in place safely, comfortably and independently doesn’t happen by accident. It takes planning.

Many people don’t realize Medicare and Medicaid don’t typically cover care that allows you to stay in your home. If you want a choice and a say in the matter, you need to start the planning process when you have the time to make a thoughtful decision – not when a crisis situation hits. Having a plan means you don’t have to settle for whatever options are available when the time comes.

If you take a moment to consider just those three points, it become clear you need a plan. Long-term care insurance may be part of that plan or it may not. Not everyone needs long-term care insurance, necessarily, but everyone needs a plan. If 70 percent of people are going to need some kind of long-term care, isn’t it time you had a conversation about what you want and how you’re going to get it?

Barbara Franklin is the owner of Franklin & Associates (www.franklinassociatesinc.com), a Charleston-based company offering both traditional and innovative approaches to long-term care planning and financing. Franklin is also the chairwoman of the S.C. Aging in Place Coalition (www.scaipc.org).