10 Tips for Current Retirees – Tip 4- Have a Game Plan for Long Term Care

Hi, I’m Jamison Smith, a wealth advisor with EWA, and this is another video continuing our series on 10 tips for retirees or anybody that is entering retirement. This tip is to have a sound game plan for long -term care planning. So long -term care need, women’s stay on average three and a half years in a long -term care facility and men’s stay on average two years.

And in the state of Pennsylvania, which is where we’re located, the average long -term care cost is about $8,000 a month, so almost $100 ,000 a year. If you have not planned properly, this can drastically eat away at your net worth and assets once you’re in retirement, especially if you are not a super high net worth individual that is self -insured.

Many of our clients that we work with, they end up becoming self -insured, but there is still sufficient long -term care planning that needs to be put in place, and one of the main reasons is for tax efficiencies. If you have accumulated a high net worth where you’re able to be self -insured, you’re most likely going to be in the highest tax bracket, especially in the distribution phase.

And so if you have to pull an additional $100 ,000 or $200 ,000 a year out of your portfolio to pay for a long -term care cost, all of that’s going to be taxed at the highest tax bracket on top of all of your other income. So having some sort of long -term care policy or life insurance policy with a long -term care option on it will allow you to draw on that tax -free and avoid getting clipped at the highest tax bracket on any distributions for retirement.

So there’s a number of different ways and situations that you would want to fund long -term care. This is all situational, depending based on net worth, goals, and a number of other factors. So if you have any questions on your situation, feel free to reach out.