PORTLAND, Maine—Life Care Funding, www.lifecarefunding.com, is undertaking an ambitious national education campaign to make consumers aware that they have the right to use their life insurance policies to finance their long-term care.
Life Care Funding developed the model for converting any life insurance policy to a Life Care Benefit, an accepted method of payment for private duty in-home care, assisted living, skilled nursing, memory care and hospice care. Life Care’s pioneering model was endorsed as law by the Texas Legislature earlier this summer.
“Consumers aren’t aware that this option exists because their life insurance company isn’t going to tell them about it,” says Chris Orestis, a former insurance industry lobbyist and CEO of Life Care Funding. “The insurance companies profit because they receive premiums for years on policies that are dropped before the holder dies, often because they are struggling to pay for long-term care.”
Life Care Funding’s education campaign includes articles in the Wall Street Journal and 20 radio interviews, such as Bloomberg, CBS and Fox News radio, along with free webinars (1 p.m. Tuesdays and 4 p.m. Thursdays – register through the Life Care website). It also includes dozens of speaking engagements across the country and testimony before five state legislatures, including Texas.
“We want policy owners to know they can receive 30 to 60 percent of the death value of their policy while they are still alive and convert it to a Life Care Benefit–Long Term Care Benefit Plan. That will allow them to remain in private pay longer, as opposed to going on Medicaid, which will sharply curtail their choices about their care,” Orestis says.
“The benefit qualifies as a Medicaid spend-down, which means they’ll still be eligible for that program if the money runs out.”
California, Florida, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, New Jersey and New York have all introduced consumer rights legislation that, like Texas, would require Medicaid to make people aware of their legal right to use this option.
About Life Care Funding
Life Care Funding has been providing life care benefits to insurance policy holders since 2007. Chris Orestis, nationally known senior health-care advocate and expert, is co-founder and CEO. He developed the model for creating Long-Term Care Benefit funds in order to provide an option for middle-class people who are not wealthy enough to pay for long-term care, and not poor enough to qualify for Medicaid.