Last month, the California Public Employees’ Retirement System said it would have to boost the premiums it charges its policyholders for long-term care insurance by 85% by 2015. The move caused an outcry among the 110,000 CalPERS policyholders who have long-term care coverage with lifetime benefits, most of whom have had the insurance for 10 to 20 years.
Why is long-term care insurance getting so expensive?
It’s easy to understand why having long-term care insurance is important. With people living longer and the cost of health care skyrocketing, having the safety net of an insurance policy designed to cover the costs of nursing homes and home-health care has grown increasingly necessary.
But the same trends of rising health-care costs and an aging population that have made long-term care insurance so attractive to consumers has presented big challenges to the insurance industry. Having underestimated the true costs of the health care that long-term care policies offer, insurance companies have struggled to price their policies correctly. Moreover, low investment returns have hampered insurance companies in their efforts to reap enough income from early premium payments to cover costs when insured policyholders start claiming benefits.
In response, insurance companies have faced a dilemma: Should they try to get state insurance regulators to approve huge premium increases, or should they simply eat their losses and move on? A number of companies have chosen the latter approach, with Genworth Financial Inc (NYSE:GNW) having decided earlier this month to suspend sales of certain long-term care products in California pending approval of a replacement product that will offer reduced benefits at higher costs. Prudential Financial Inc (NYSE:PRU) and Metlife Inc (NYSE:MET) have taken the more dramatic steps of discontinuing long-term care sales in recent years, largely because of the financial challenges involved in offering the policies.
In addition to CalPERS, many private insurance companies are seeking higher premiums to keep selling long-term care policies. A subsidiary of Manulife Financial Corporation (USA) (NYSE:MFC) serving California got approval from regulators to raise long-term care premiums by 40% late last year, while Cna Financial Corp (NYSE:CNA) has a request for a 45% increase before the California Insurance Department.
Bait and switch?
For existing policyholders, the main problem is one of sunk costs. Insurance agents typically advise people to obtain long-term care insurance as early as possible to reduce costs, as premiums are much lower for younger policyholders who are less likely to need benefits in the immediate future. What that means, though, is that those who’ve held onto their policies a long time have already paid tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars in policy premiums without having gotten a dime in benefits to show for it.
Now, to avoid losing their coverage, these long-time policyholders have to find hundreds of dollars to cover extra premium payments each month. For many retirees living on a fixed income and already facing substantial price increases for other basic living expenses, that will prove an impossible task, and they will have to accept lower benefits or even give up their policies entirely — thereby having essentially wasted all the money they’ve spent on premiums for years.
What should you do?
Policyholders now face some tough decisions. Retaining full coverage will cost a lot more, so some insurance providers are offering less extensive benefits as a replacement. As painful as accepting reduced benefits might be, it could prove to be a better option than simply allowing coverage to lapse entirely.
Unfortunately, the economics of long-term care make it likely that price pressures on policies will continue. For those considering buying long-term care insurance now, it’s essential to read long insurance-policy documents carefully so that you’ll know in advance about provisions that could send your premiums skyrocketing in the future.
The article Is Long-Term Care Insurance Just a Ripoff? originally appeared on Fool.com and is written by Dan Caplinger.
Fool contributor Dan Caplinger has no position in any stocks mentioned. You can follow him on Twitter: @DanCaplinger. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned.
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