52% of Americans will need long-term care, averaging $140,000 per person. You can pay out-of-pocket, buy insurance, or use Medicaid, which requires spending down to $2,000 and comes with long waiting lists. For most people, affordable long-term care insurance is the practical choice.
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52% of Americans are going to need professional long-term care services in their lifetime. That means if you're a couple, that one of you is going to likely need it. How are you going to pay for it? Because the average cost of that care for the people who need it is $140,000. There are essentially 3 ways to pay for long-term care: long-term care insurance, pay the money right out of your pocket, or Medicaid benefits. And you need to know this about Medicaid benefits. To get them, you need to spend everything you have down to $2,000. You have to make yourself poor. Even if you qualify, many states have long waiting lists for them. If you do get them, when you die, if there is anything left in your estate, Medicaid is going to want their money back. So what's the answer? Well, if you've got a huge estate, you probably just want to private pay. The best alternative to doing that is to get some kind of long-term care insurance, but it has to be a good policy and it has to be something that you can afford. Long-term care insurance is not for everybody, but for some of you, it can be a lifesaver. The best age to start looking at long-term care insurance is