The Care Girl Podcast
The Care Girl Podcast
Planning Care Before Crisis Strikes
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Ever wonder who will bathe you, dress you, or manage your meds if you can’t? We dive straight into the real world of long-term care with home care agency owner Alexandria and licensed financial educator Veronica Reyes. From late-night family triage to five-figure monthly bills, we unpack what care actually costs, what Medicare really covers, and the strategies that keep you from selling your home to fund basic help.
We break down the difference between healthcare and custodial care, demystify ADLs, and map out the hard numbers: national averages for home aides, assisted living, and nursing homes, plus the sticker shock in high-cost states. You’ll hear candid stories of prepared families who stacked policies and sailed through a crisis, and others who assumed $15 an hour only to face $30-plus rates and facility surcharges. The throughline is simple: 70% of Americans over 65 will need some form of long-term care, often at home, and the bill arrives whether you’re ready or not.
Veronica explains why earlier is cheaper and easier, how underwriting views health risks, and why transferring risk with insurance safeguards your retirement. We compare traditional LTC to modern hybrid life policies with long-term care and living benefits that you can tap during cancer, cognitive decline, or a serious accident. We also explore flexible features that let families pay for private duty help or even compensate a relative caregiver, preserving dignity and choice when it matters most.
If you’re a busy professional, part of the sandwich generation, single, or child-free, this conversation gives you a clear playbook: start while healthy, define the care you want, and pick a policy that follows you across settings. Ready to protect your time, money, and peace of mind? Follow Veronica for policy help, reach out to Alexandria for care planning, and subscribe to the show. Share this episode with someone who needs a nudge to start their plan, and leave a review to help others find it.
Hello everybody. Hello, hello, hello. What's going on? I am going to bring in Veronica. We're gonna be talking about long-term care tonight. So go get your wine, your tea. What's up, guys? I was like, let me just like start doing my my podcast live. Hi! Hi. Can you hear me? Yes, can you hear me? Okay. Yeah, my AirPods are dead, so unfortunately. It's so crazy.
SPEAKER_00It's all good.
SPEAKER_03Like, why are my airpods dead? Like, what's going on?
SPEAKER_00And then a productive day at home. Not really.
SPEAKER_03I think I just was listening to random stuff, and it's like it ran my battery down, and I haven't charged it in like three days. So it's okay. Thank you for coming in.
SPEAKER_00Of course, thank you for having me.
SPEAKER_03Did you get the kids to bed and all that good stuff?
SPEAKER_00Oh girl, that's what husbands are for.
SPEAKER_03I love it. I love it. Yes, yes. Well, my kids are still up. So good. Yeah, I mean, but they're older, so you know, they're relaxing and watching a movie, you know, all of that good stuff. I want to make this like a conversation casual conversation, nothing like too crazy serious because it's like after nine o'clock, and I'm like, let me just let me just get my girl on. So can you introduce yourself to us and tell us what you do and all of that?
Why Talk About Long-Term Care Now
SPEAKER_00Yes. Hi, everybody. Good evening from wherever side of the country you are. My name is Veronica Reyes. I'm a licensed financial educator, and I've been doing this for about five years now. I'm a full-time mom of three to a five, four, and soon to be one year old. And really, you know, I really want us to open the conversation about something that I feel like we don't talk about, especially people our age, right?
SPEAKER_03Yeah. We don't. We don't talk about it. And you know me, I'm on the other side, seeing people who didn't who did not invest in their long-term care is very bad. So, you know, it's so for me, like my mission like this year is to like educate people on like how to pay for care, you know, what's a good time to pay for care, uh, to start, you know, with the insurances and everything, because I see two different sides of it. I see the families who are prepared, and I see the parents who are sought, you know, and I see the families who just don't care.
SPEAKER_00So I'm honestly and and I love to I would love for everyone to hear your perspective. Because at the end of the day, we're just educating, but it really will not hit until you go through it yourself or you see somebody go through it, right?
Host’s Home Care Experience
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah. Um, for the so for the new people that don't know me, but a lot of the people that do know me, I am Alexandria, the care girl. And I've been a home care agency owner over 10 years, and I sit down with families and we go through a plan to help them with a home care health aid or nurse that helps them, you know, from personal injuries to home care, elderly care, special needs for children. We definitely do it all. But I would say like the elderly care side is the side where, you know, it's kind of my favorite because I started this company due to my grandmother being neglected in the home several times. So let me give you an example of what I'm saying with the preparedness and the unpreparedness. So you have some families, they call it what they call us the sandwich generation. Yes. Where, you know, like I'm the youngest, so my mom is like 67. She's still well, so you know, thank God. And and and uh, you know, she actually lives with me. So if anything happens with her, like I'll probably be, you know, the main person that's gonna arrange everything. So that that leads me to have the conversation with her on, like, hey, what do you have in place? But, you know, you have people who have like long-term, like they have cancer or they may have dementia and all that, and they see that that famil that runs in their family. There's something that runs in their family. So they are trying to like say, well, what if I need care one day? Like it was a it was crazy getting my mom or dad care. But maybe, you know, what if that happens to me? And I don't know how to do that.
SPEAKER_00What if it's our turn?
The Real Cost Of Care
SPEAKER_03Yeah, what if it's your turn, right? So, so I've seen to where like families have policies that are stacked, which are very, very uh smart. It can be expensive, maybe, but if you get your policies early enough, you know, it's just it just goes within your budget. And we'll talk more about that on the different different kinds that you guys offer. But this is a conversation that a lot of people, like a lot of people ask me about. I'm not an insurance agent. Maybe one day I know you're trying to convince me to do it one day. But we're not convincing, we're recruiting, we're in a recruiting me, you just kind of you just kind of recruit me, but I just I just wanted to bring an expert on because there's so many questions around it, but like I said, like I see the families like that don't prepare. So, you know, you're walking into a a scene where everybody's working, you know, people are rearing small children, and and they they don't have the means to pay for mom's care. So they're asking me, like, okay, well, how much is care? They're like thinking like$15 an hour.
SPEAKER_00Like, oh no.
SPEAKER_03Maybe no, it's$30 an hour. Like, we're paying$15.
SPEAKER_00That's in Georgia. I live in California, so you can imagine what that looks like, right?
SPEAKER_03How much is that there?
SPEAKER_00Honestly, it's assisted living can be minimum like seven to fifteen thousand a month, and that's not even for a private room.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. That's fair. Oh. Y'all got the y'all got the fee fees up there. Um but no, here, but here, like maybe a personal care home. And for those who don't know what a personal care home is is basically when, you know, the person needs total care or like assisted leading care, or you know, I'm busy. I can't stop and take care of my parent because I have a high, I have like a very high uh career, or we don't have the money to do it, so we're gonna have to use Medicaid to put mom into a facility to receive care, right? But there's still gonna be an out-of-pocket where people don't know and don't understand, and they think that they can place mom or dad in a in a nursing home, and you know, that's that's fine, but the care is gonna be low quality. Right. So there is that. I mean, I think that we definitely I I get it, there are family dynamics to where, like, hey, you know, you may be adopted, you don't care about your birth parents or whatever. But you but what if you care about your adopted parents, right? Like, so I mean, because it's it's we gotta be real. Like, there's single parent moments, like, I care about my mom, but I don't care what happens to my dad. Like, so the parent, so because I got a lot of, I got a slack, a lot of slack on thread one day. And one of them was like, yeah, well, I don't care about my parents. And I'm like, well, this is for the people that care, you know. And then it also that they care about themselves, the people that care about themselves. Like, let's let's let's talk about like how, like, if you were looking at a busy professional, like, what age do you think somebody should invest in long-term care and then you know, give us the different like fears?
SPEAKER_00Like today.
SPEAKER_03Bring it down for us, girl.
SPEAKER_00Because really, the reality is we are just getting older, we're living longer, right? With medical advancements, women tend to live longer than men. And you have to ask yourself, you know, what will that look like when it's your time? Because really, the reality is 70% of Americans aged 65 and over will need some form of long-term care in their life. And really, people think that long-term care is such a rare event, but it's really a retirement reality. Because when you think about retiring and getting older, you have to make sure you don't outlive your money, your assets. And really, they do, and they they don't think about the risk. So when you're retired, you have to think about market risk, inflation risk, longevity risk. And again, the thing that people don't talk about is healthcare cost risk because it's just rising.
SPEAKER_03Right? Yeah, it's rising, it's rising. So, what would that look like for a healthy 36 seven-year-old like myself? Like, what would what would a plan look like for me? I know there's the traditional route. Do you do the traditional and hybrid?
Medicare, Medicaid, And What They Don’t Cover
SPEAKER_00Yes, there's hybrid ones. And we can, you know, talk about what the cost looks like. But if you don't mind, I really kind of want to talk about what is long-term care and how it differentiates from health care. Because people are like, oh, I'll rely on Medicare. Okay, well, do you know what Medicare can do for you?
SPEAKER_03Come on, break it down. Coming from an insurance agent, because I have so many people that call me, do you take Medicare? I'm like, Medicare doesn't pay for personal care, it does not pay for home care.
SPEAKER_00Right. So, so what is long-term care? Let's define that, right? So it's if you lose the ability to do two out of the six activities of daily living for at least 90 days, or obviously if you're cognitively impaired. So if you cannot feed yourself, bathe, transfer, toilet, take medicine, get dressed, who is gonna do that, right? Because if you think about the different coverages, really there's three main coverages Medicare. So, of course, you have to be qualified depending on age, and it may cover a portion of long-term care for up to 100 days. After that, like you said, it's out of pocket. And usually it requires like a three-day hospital stay consecutively and other qualifiers. So just because you may, you know, get the Medicare, maybe they may not give you as much. And we all know they're slashing Medicare right now, right? There's also Medicaid, right? Which covers long-term care, but those are really for people who are low income, who have really low assets. So we know of a client where she had to transfer her assets in her son's name. So on paper, it looks like she has nothing. Otherwise, I mean, if you're below 65, you can't get Medicare. Right? And also long-term disability insurance, which is great. And it covers working people and insures a portion of their salary due to disability, but that's for working people. What happens when you're retired? Right. So at the end of the day, we have to really think about health care versus custodial care. Because really, health care is again acute. Right? Long-term care is long term.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and it's and it's it's I think I think a lot of people are very afraid of long-term care because of because of you know, the you have the traditional plan to where you you if you don't use it, you lose it. Like so that that that does not right. That doesn't transfer, that money does not transfer over to wealth for you know when you pass away if you don't lose it, right? And then there's certain qualifiers that activate that policy, right? Am I right on that? I'm not just trying to speak your language.
Defining Long-Term Care And ADLs
SPEAKER_00Because we we hear a lot of you know comparisons, and really you can compare at the end of the day, but it's not a matter of if it happens to you, it's a matter of when. And really, how do you want to react to that or just have a plan in place so you could you don't have to, you know, risk it, right? Because really, when we talk about the cost, right, most people think nursing home when they think of long term. Always, always, but in reality, the majority of care happens in our home. Yeah, so like you said, you know, grandma had a hip surgery. People have to take time off work, and what if they don't have family members? What if people have their own lives or they can't miss work? Right? So, really, I wanna I actually pulled up some stats because according to the federal long-term care insurance program, really when it comes to again, yes, exactly, nurses in finance, proactive over reactive at the end of the day, right? Because home care, so like home health aid, right, that's around$51,000 a year or$4,200 a month. Yeah, and that's paying somebody$33 an hour. Let's say that's the national average, right? Assisted living,$66,000 a year or$5,500 a month, nursing home semi-private,$112,420 a year.
SPEAKER_02That's combining salary.
SPEAKER_00That's combining salaries. Exactly. So again, do you want to have to react to that? Because oftentimes, uh especially for us younger people, we think we're invisible, right? Or we'll think, oh, I'll oh, I'll self-insure. Maybe I won't have to worry about it. Maybe, maybe later. But there's always the saying it pays to delay.
SPEAKER_03Right. Right? Yeah. And it's it's like I said, I'm on the I'm on the side of it where I'm sitting in front of the families, and I have their I have families with this, with the policies. Like, I had a cancer patient who probably gonna beat it, right? But you know, her son was a high-level executive, and he was like, Oh, oh, just sends the invoice, we're gonna pay cash, but that's gonna just break it. We're gonna, we're gonna, we're gonna send it, but we're gonna send it to, you know, AFLAC or we're gonna send it to whatever, because she has a cancer policy that she's been paying into for years, whatever, right? And then she had the long-term care plan. Then she had like it was like four different insurances, and I'm like, you're prepared. But guess what? He didn't have to worry because exactly he thought he thought in advance for, you know, they actually sat down and I'm just trying to have people have the conversation way earlier for for yourself, and also, you know, what can we do for like you know, we'll talk about like if there's is there any hope for someone that's delivered. Of course.
Home Versus Facility: Where Care Happens
SPEAKER_00Of course there is. And you know, I feel like by the time they talk to you, it I don't want to say it's too late, but it's gonna cost you, right? Because when you talk about it, at the end of the day, insurance is a transfer of risk. So if you have all these comorbidities and you expect an insurance company to dish out$10,000 a month hoping that you know you will live long, what what is that mortality and morbidity risk? At the end of the day, it is a business, right? Right?
SPEAKER_03It is a business. It is it is a business. So, I mean, the e the the because a lot of times, like a lot of times, people are like thinking, we can get Medicaid, we can get this, we can get can get that. And I see a lot of times people are waiting on disability, they're waiting on bearing, they're waiting on all these different policies when you have a qualifying event in long-term care that happens, boom, your long-term care is educated.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and it's just it's that easy. Guggen said many patients have no choice but to sell their home. Isn't that crazy? They tell us go to school, get a good job, work hard, save money, and have all these things. And then at the end of the day, if we're not prepared, I have to sell my house.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, you do they do reverse mortgages. Yep. Yeah, reverse mortgages. They they sell all of the assets, you know, in so many ways. It's it's just it's so many ways, like I said, but but like what is the age like? What do you feel like maybe like 45-ish, 50-ish?
SPEAKER_00I want to say, especially if you're in your 30s, today is the day. Because that's when you're you're the healthiest, nothing's wrong with you, and you don't even have to be older to qualify for long-term care. What if we get knocked out wood into an accident?
SPEAKER_03Right. Right? Oh, yeah, so this high, can you tell us about the the Jerusalem versus the hybrid version? That way we know where both are.
SPEAKER_00So usually traditionals is again, like you say, you if you don't use it, you lose it. It's kind of like, you know, how we have car insurance, health insurance. We pay premium into it, hoping we never have to, you know, use it. But at the end of the day, that premium just goes to the company. You really don't see it back.
SPEAKER_02Right.
Stats, Rising Costs, And Budget Shock
SPEAKER_00So, really, again, why the planning matters before I go into the solutions is that people build their financial foundation upside down. Yes, get invest, get that money, yes, have an emergency fund, yes, control your debt. But if you don't have proper protection, that income replacement plan, Alexandria, then you have to dip into all of that, anyways. So why don't you transfer the risk? Because when you see people who are financially literate or successful, they just know how to leverage their money to protect it, not have to use their own money at the end of the day. Because why pay$10,000 out of my own retirement, my own pocket, when I can transfer that risk to the insurance company?
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And you wonder why the rich get richer and poor get poorer, right?
SPEAKER_03Yeah. I mean, if you because if you have that uh had an event and then you have to use all your savings to for something that you could have tapped into one of your policies. Exactly. And then you're gonna sell your house. Yeah, yeah. I mean, that you probably didn't even pay off. So it's, I mean, how much you're gonna give that? Is this if you get a three-year mortgage? It's like it's it's a lot. It's it's it's a lot.
SPEAKER_00You work too dang hard for that mortgage. Don't get it.
SPEAKER_03You work you work too dang hard for it.
SPEAKER_00So tell us about the policies and yes, so there's hybrid policies that that life insurance comes with with long-term care and living benefits. So some of these things can be temporary, which maybe max 30 years, or also there's permanent ones where it follows you forever and you don't have to worry. And again, again, there's policies with return of premium features. So again, if you don't use it, it goes to your beneficiary. There's gonna be a death benefit. So you don't have to worry about, you know, oh well, it's just my money going a waste, right? And again, I said there's return of premium. If you don't like it, there's companies out there that we partner up with where you get your money back. Okay, which is yes, which is awesome. So so again, you know, it pays a death benefit if care isn't needed, and it allows flexibility in how the funds are used. Because when it comes to certain long-term care plans, sometimes you have to submit receipts for everything, and then they tell you how much money you get each month.
SPEAKER_03So you're not getting fully are you fully getting reimbursed or are you doing like an 80% time situation?
SPEAKER_00It depends. So that's why we I'm proud to say that we partner up with AA plus companies that allow people to just do what they need to with the money, whether it's nursing home, private care, or even paying a family member. Because if you think about it, you know, you see this, I've experienced this where we we all have to pitch in.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Right? And then when it comes to pitching in, what if I can't afford to take the time off work? What if I don't get the PTO? Well, now if my family member pays for me to be there, I don't have to worry about it.
Prepared Families Versus Panic Mode
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I love that. I love that. I I like the I like the new flexibility because I've I've been in the, and like I said, I've been in the industry over a decade. So I've seen I've seen the inflexibility of it, and I love that now it's it's it's looked up, it's better with the hybrid version because the traditional, I feel, had it had people scared. And and then a lot of times people were saying that they had they had very difficult ways, it was very difficult to get the money for when they needed care. And that's the that's the thing that I I want to partner with companies that actually, you know, can get the people what they need versus like it's it's it's like you know, putting your nails, nails on the on the on the wall, like I don't want to do that, you know. So I that's that's the that's my main thing on on it educating people like on what to on how to do it and what to do it. Can you tell us like how like on with a healthy person, like how would like what's that process? Do they have to get an assessment done on, you know, like one-on-one done and all that?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so it depends on your health. If you're absolutely healthy, they just kind of look at the Medical Information Bureau. And then if you don't need to get labs done, they just kind of go through the Medical Information Bureau and approve you. But if you say of the application you have a history of diabetes or maybe, you know, high cholesterol, then maybe you would have to get labs done. But most companies these days tend to not really need the medical unless, again, we wait and we develop comorbidities, asthma, diabetes, hypertension, CHS, those things that are kind of like trigger words, like, oh no. Right. Because when you have heart failure, it affects the whole body system.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and your heart can fail any moment. So it's very yeah, I mean, because it's it's they're taking on their risk and then yes, correct. Yeah, I love that. I love that. So, so uh, so for a pretty healthy person, what what kind of what kind of fee are they looking to pay every month? Well, we're gonna say we're not even gonna say fee, we're gonna say investment.
When To Buy: Younger And Healthier
SPEAKER_00No, it's the contribution, right? Because when you say contribution, it pays you in return more than you put in at the end of the day. So let's say for me, I have a term with living benefits, so it includes chronic and critical illness. I applied when I was 29 years old, healthy. So for me, that looked like for 30 years for$600,000 in coverage,$34 a month. Okay.
SPEAKER_03That's doable. That's doable.
SPEAKER_00Okay. And then for one of the more permanent policies that I have, this is what I like. I practice what I preach because at the end of the day, we believe in what it is that we do, and we truly believe. It helps people, right? Whether you and whether you see that today, your future self will thank you later.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Right. I love it.
SPEAKER_00Because if you think about it, when we get older, who do you want to rely on? The government. Is social security gonna be around when we're older? Are we gonna hope that you know the market is good so our retirement funds don't get drained quicker? Are we gonna rely on our adult children? And I'm sure you can kind of see the strain that causes on the family. Right. Right? When when people again, obviously our parents expect us to take care of them, but at the same time, we don't owe them anything.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. You know what I mean?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And it's a very real conversation that people are having today, call it selfish or not. But at least for me, one, I know my butt is not going to be in a nursing home. And two, I don't want to have to leave my kids to figure out what happens to me, especially since I know better.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think preventative is the best case scenario. Let's say, let's say something happens, you know, before you're elderly. Let's say you maybe you had you've been paying into this and you know, you have a cancer diagnosis and you are you able to pull money from that policy?
Traditional Vs Hybrid Policies
SPEAKER_00Yes, yes, ma'am. I can I can honestly have peace of mind. That's something that you can't buy, right? If I were to hit a knock the one, if I were to get hit by a bus, like when I walk out of this building, I know my family will be okay. Because when you think of GoFundMe's Alexander, people get it when someone passes away. And what's the likelihood that someone's eventually gonna pass away?
SPEAKER_03Mm-hmm. 100%. I mean, tomorrow, I mean, anytime, okay. Like it's it's been it's been so crazy from what I've been seeing. Like every time I go on like Facebook, I guess it's like the place people just put like so many people like, oh, this person died, or that person. I'm like, wow, we're the same age, or wow, they're younger than me. Like, I've been seeing it, and then you know, and nothing against the GoFundMe's, I don't know, like it may be different, but they need it.
SPEAKER_00Do you want to count on that as you know, a solution? Right? Because I remember the go the founder of GoFundMe was like, you know, I'm basically running a company where if you're not popular enough, you die. What if you don't get enough donations? How are you gonna live? Right? Because it doesn't stop at just healthcare. What about the mortgage, the groceries, the kids, the college? Really, the luxury here is choice. And sometimes when we fail to prepare, we won't have a choice. I have a lot of people telling me, you know, oh, this, oh that. I was like, well, you can't be choosing when you can't qualify later on. And it's kind of like a bad I told you so. And we never want to say I told you so, but we only do what we can to educate, right?
SPEAKER_03Mm-hmm. I totally 100% agree with you. Like I said, I'm on I'm on the side where like I'm like sitting here, I'm like, we might like, okay, so how do you how are you all gonna pay for the care? I'm on the phone or I'm like sitting there in front of them. You'll have a long-term care policy. They're like, what is a long-term care? It's gonna be a long night. And they're kind of like, uh-huh, uh-huh. And um so that's like$8,000 a month. And then don't, if you need 24-hour care, you're looking at exactly plus a month. You're looking at facilities, let's say that that person is total care. Total care, you're looking at, you're looking at if they go into a facility, you're looking at 10K plus as well. I had a I had a client that just transitioned who was memory care, which is a high-level care. Um, and she was paying the facility 10 10K plus we were private pay coming in because the facility said, hey, we can no longer handle her. She's two-person assist, so we had to come in to assist her. She was paying my company five, I'll almost seven K a month plus 16K. But her mom had she had a pension. She had this, she had that. She probably had long-term care insurance. So she had these different things to put her from, but she was running out of money because her mom wasn't outliving, she was outliving all of these policies. And she was like, I don't know what I'm gonna do, and she'll die. I again Berlin was a good one. I mean, she did it, it was on hospice, like it, but she was like lit out living everything, and it was just like it was crazy. In my opinion, I would have took her home later past successfully at home, but you know, some people, they're too much for them. They don't they don't want that. So in that case, that person should have those policies and this and that because in that they're gonna give you 30 days and your parents are gonna have to go somewhere.
SPEAKER_00That's crazy.
Transferring Risk And Protecting Assets
SPEAKER_03Yeah, 30 days, you can't pay anymore, you gotta get the head on. And that's the reality. And that's and that's the reality, you know. You know, and some people like they keep their parents with them and they're unattended. Right? So, you know, you can only pay for four hours of care a day. Hospice only covers a nurse that comes once, once every like three days or something like that. You get a home care age, a home health aid every day, five days a week, that comes in for an hour just for a bath. Right? They cover your hospital bed, they cover, and that's Medicare. You know, that's that's Medicare. And um, there are special cases where Medicare will cover somebody that's that's less than 65 years old. Right. Like I met a guy, he was on Medicare. I was like, what the heck you should be Medicare? But he had like kidney failure, this, this, and that. So he was dying.
SPEAKER_00But again, it has to come to that, right?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, but he still has to have money to pay for like in a retirement community that he was in because nobody wants to deal with that. That's crazy. His family, nobody wants to, nobody wants you, have that too. Like you have you're single and you're by yourself, and nobody wants to pay for this because you didn't take care of them. Like you have that too. So if you want to be, if you want to just be like that in your life, you need to make sure you have a plan.
SPEAKER_00You need to exactly because some people are like, Well, I don't have kids, I don't need life insurance to pass any money on. But again, exactly. That's why you need that, especially the living benefits, because who is gonna take care of you?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, exactly. And then that way you can tap into it or have somebody oversee it if you you know you're incapacitated or whatever. And you know, it's it's a lot, it's a lot of uproar. Like people are saying they want to do, I forgot the name, the term of it, but I think it's like assisted, you know, like death. Like you they're gonna like kill themselves. I don't know. Oh my god. What is that called?
SPEAKER_01Are you thinking about it?
SPEAKER_03Yeah. They're using that now. So, so so it's a lot, DNR, because people just like, I don't want to have to pay for care. Like, I just and I don't want my family to say. And that's a sad reality. Yeah, but other countries, other countries, I put on my thrust the other day how other countries handle care. I believe like it's like Japan, like, requires the adult child to like come and see their their adult parent. Like, every like so often, like it's all like I we we definitely have to do better in the in the USA to really, really care for our elderly.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, be more collaborative.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, be more collaborative and and all of that. But I just I just feel like this conversation needs to be had, like, even for like my age and up because if there's a hybrid policy to where like you get some type of illness, you know, look at how COVID, you know, had people, and then people are still like not able to work because they they have long covers the lingering effects, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Some people are nowhere on oxygen permanently.
SPEAKER_03Mm-hmm. So that's I mean, would that be a qualifying event? So, hey, I might need to tap into that, you know.
SPEAKER_00We have to just ask. At the end of the day, it's about again, just asking the underwriter what's the risk like, and again, just doing something before you need it. If you think you don't need it, that is the time you apply for it. Yeah. Right? Yeah. Because if you think about it, you know, you're working right now, you're actively making income. And really, in the United States today, some people live paycheck to paycheck and cannot afford a month without steady pay. If they miss a paycheck, they're they're in the red. So imagine.
SPEAKER_03I mean, there's like 90% of people though.
Real Cases: Memory Care And 24/7 Help
SPEAKER_00Yeah, exactly. So imagine when you're retired, you're not making active income anymore. You're hoping to stretch out your retirement funds. Again, not guaranteed that the amount will be there because, again, it's tied to the stock market. So imagine in 2008 when it went down negative 40. Can you imagine? I would, again, maybe euthanize me because that is terrible. That's terrible. So you have to ask yourself again. It's not to scare you, but again, it's better to just be proactive.
SPEAKER_03It is it's better to be proactive. Tell tell everybody where they can find you and get a policy and all that good stuff. Yes, yes.
SPEAKER_00So so you can find me obviously on my Instagram, and you can DM Alexandria because we will be working very closely together. Because again, we educate, and at the end of the day, education is powerful, but it's more powerful when you apply it.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, absolutely. Like I said, like I'm sit, I'm sitting like I'm a fly on the wall in these conversations daily. And I think if I think if I had$10 every time, but I'm gonna say$100 every time somebody did, they did not know Medicare didn't pay for care in home care, or they did not know like that that care costs this amount of money. Like, I I would be rich right now. Like I would I would be a million dollars, I wouldn't even be a trillionaire. I would be a trillionaire, like for real. Like I Lord,$100 every time a person called me now, okay? So maybe that's what in my bank account. But I'm just saying, like, it's it's that, it's that like it's such a it's such a learning curve there. And that's why I say get with experts like like you, because the thing is just have the conversation. Now it may be too late for for for the guy who you know has been diagnosed with a heart failure and all this and all that, you just get your go ahead and get your other policies that you can write, right? And then we need to just talk about creating a creative type of transitional plan for care, which I can help with that.
SPEAKER_00But for you know, 30 and up, even younger than younger than that, you can actually be 25, 23, as long as you got a job and you're contributing to society, please have a plan in place. My kids have their own policies as soon as they got a social. Okay.
SPEAKER_03Look, I love it. I love it. It's nothing wrong with that. Well, I I thank you for coming on, and like I said, we'll probably be having more conversations, more questions come up because it's it's it's so it's so important to know what's happening in in the industry. And I wanted to bring an expert on and talk about more long-term care because a lot of times people don't know about it. And you guys, I will say this on this page and I'll put it up on my other platforms as well. Make sure you follow Veronica. Thank you. You know, get your policy through her and all that good stuff. And if you have questions, ask her. Me, ask me about care, any type of care transition, any type of home care. And you know, y'all have a good night.
Singles, Child-Free, And Planning Alone
SPEAKER_00Good night. And I also just want to leave off with this, Alex Jr. Long term care insurance isn't just about protecting your money, but it protects your family from becoming the plan.
SPEAKER_03I love that. I love that.
SPEAKER_00Thank you so much. Good night, everybody. Have a good night.
SPEAKER_03Good night.