North Carolina Long-Term Care Planning Attorney Explains the Costs of Long-Term Care and How to Protect Your Assets

The Cost of Long-Term Care

Long-term care costs could be home care costs, assisted living care costs, or nursing home costs. These can be substantial and can deplete a family’s savings in a very short period of time. In some cases, it’s necessary to shelter assets, so that the assets do not have to be spent on care. Sometimes assets can be protected from the cost of care depending on, among other factors, your assets, your family, your state, and your illness.

The first question to ask yourself is, “Do you want to protect your assets from the costs of long-term care, and if so, why?” If there is not an important reason to protect your assets for your children or other beneficiaries, then it makes sense to use those assets to stay at home, even if it depletes the estate.

There are reasons a person might want to pay privately for care. Perhaps the client desires a private room at the nursing home. Private rooms are often only available to those residents who privately pay for care. In some states, assisted living facilities must be paid for privately. Quality of life is often better at an assisted living facility than a nursing home, and, therefore, clients who cannot manage at home may want to live in assisted living. Many times, the government benefits available to pay for home care are not sufficient to keep a person at home. If the client wants to stay at home, then either the person’s family must supply care, or caregivers must be hired privately. 

Long-term care costs vary significantly based on:

• Type of care needed (e.g., custodial care vs. skilled care);
• Amount or hours of care needed;
• Care Environment (e.g., home care, assisted living, etc.); and
• Geographic location.

Average Cost of Long-Term Care in the Raleigh, NC Area

The 2023 Genworth Cost of Care Survey reports the following averages for the Raleigh, North Carolina area:

Remember, the above figures are averages. Around-the-clock in-home care can easily cost $11,000-$12,000 per month.

Projected Future Cost of Long-Term Care in the Raleigh, NC Area:

The same Genworth study estimates the future annual costs of long-term care in the Raleigh, North Carolina area:

When Care Is Needed

While some might begin needing long-term care after a sudden health event such as a stroke, often the need for more and more care progresses over time, especially with degenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, and dementia.

Often informal caregiving by family members begins at home before eventually progressing to hired home health care. As the home health care needs increase, a decision may be made that assisted living would be a better quality of care and a more cost-effective approach. And eventually, as the need for skilled care arises, the transition from assisted living to a skilled nursing facility becomes necessary. In our office, we refer to this as The Elder Care Journey.

According to the National Center for Assisted Living, the average age of a resident upon entry to an assisted living community is 84.6 years old. Sadly, we’ve also worked with many families with a loved one in their early 60s who need assisted living or skilled nursing facility care due to a severe stroke or early onset Alzheimer’s disease.

Protecting Your Assets

Seek out an elder law attorney for help in protecting the family home and sometimes other assets from the cost of care so that the assets can be given to children or other heirs. It helps to do some research, start with our free guide for Caregivers. There are ways to protect the home and other assets from having to be sold to pay for care, but these methods can be complicated. Veteran's benefits, Medicaid, subsidized housing, long-term care insurance, and reverse mortgages; each of these topics can be used in the appropriate circumstance as a tool to protect assets from the cost of care. It is important to asses these programs to determine which are suitable in your situation.  

We Can Help You Develop a Long-Term Care Plan

Having assisted many Wake County clients with long-term care planning, our team at Carolina Family Estate Planning understands that developing a long-term care plan is about not just protecting your own independence and dignity, but also protecting those you love from the physical, emotional, and financial toll that caring for a loved one can take.