If your aging loved one is ready to transition into life in an assisted living community, there’s a whole slew of different factors to take into consideration. While assisted living provides a variety of benefits such as access to different activities, programs, and amenities, they all come at a price that can be hefty. However, if you want to allow your loved one to enjoy the support assisted living communities can provide, there are various ways to enable your family to afford it. Read to learn more about how you and your family can pay for assisted living for your loved one.
Who Pays for Assisted Living?
Most families usually rely on private funds to pay for one’s assisted living residence. Usually, this is a combination of retirement accounts, pension payments, and individual savings. While most older adults would have amassed a good amount of personal savings for retirement over the years, family members also often contribute to care costs, helping to relieve some of their loved one’s financial burden.
Insurance Plans
Whether your loved one’s insurance plan can pay for their assisted living community fees varies from plan to plan:
- Medicare: Medicare, unfortunately, doesn’t cover assisted living costs because it only applies to short-term, non-custodial care.
- Private Health Insurance: Depending on your loved one’s insurer, their plan may cover some skilled nursing or health care costs. However, most private health insurance plans don’t contribute to personal care costs such as bathing and dressing.
- Long-Term Care Insurance (LTCI): Your loved one likely would’ve registered for an LTCI policy before reaching the age of 80. LTCI policies come with more benefits for assisted living residents than most other policies but also come with significant premiums over the years.
- Life Insurance: Your loved one can sell their policy to a third party for market value, using the proceeds to fund their long-term care in an assisted living policy while preserving some death benefits. On the other hand, they could also surrender their life insurance policy for cash value.
Home Equity
If your loved one owns their own house or another property, their home equity can be used in various ways to contribute to assisted living costs. One of the most obvious options is selling their home if they’re not using it after moving into their assisted living community. If they’re not ready to sell the home entirely, they could also consider renting it instead for some extra cash flow. They could also borrow money through reverse mortgages or bridge loans.
Other Benefits
If your loved one was a wartime veteran or a spouse of one, they may qualify for a pension program that provides them VA benefits, which can help them cover assisted living costs. Additionally, if your loved one is a federal or postal employee or a qualified relative, they can consider applying for Federal Long Term Care Insurance (FLTCI) before retirement, which can help to pay for long-term care expenses.
Interested in finding the perfect senior living community for your loved one? Consider our senior living community’s Assisted Living program!
