Why You Need to Plan for Long-Term Care Before the Crisis Hits (Ep. 368)

"The farmers that are not listening are the ones that are not proactive. And we in the agriculture community, there is so much whining and crying and bitching and moaning about how everything is so hard, and it's gonna be so hard, and people don't care about leaving it to the next generation, and the boomers are the worst people on the planet. This is proof that that is not what's happening — that there are 60-year-olds and 70-year-olds that are looking and saying, 'Hey, how are we passing this off?' It is also proof, when I talk about there is going to be a 20-year lag. In 20 years, we're gonna see a whole different agriculture community than what we have now, because those people taking over are planners, and they are looking for different ways. And those people are the ones listening to the podcast."

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome back to the podcast. Thank you very much for being here. Well, she's back, my friends. Michelle Prather has flown in again, and we are gonna talk about long-term care again, because so many of you had questions about detailed things that we didn't get to, we forgot to address, and I want to make sure that we are answering those for you.

So we are gonna get into details of things. If you want the general overview of long-term care, then I would suggest you go back and listen to the other podcast. It was three hours, so there was a lot of stuff that we hit on. But today we have a specific agenda of what we're gonna go over. Thanks for coming back, Michelle.

Thanks for having me back. It's more enjoyable this time, 'cause we got to get out and about. And the temperature difference is quite amazing.

We learned a little bit last time that the two of us together is a lot of conversation. And so 24 hours here is not enough. So Michelle came for more than 24 hours this time.

Yes. And it's hotter this time.

Yeah. Last time was winter. Now it's 105 today. So, lucky Michelle.

It's very hot.

We sat on the deck yesterday, and it was warm. But it was absolutely fantastic. Scott stayed inside.

Yeah. And we sat on the deck. The girls stayed outside and chatted the entire time. It was good.

It was nice to have somebody I could sit on the deck with that wasn't melting and complaining about the heat.

All right. So let's get into some details. The first being premium examples. So let's talk about — we did get a lot of questions about, "Well, what's an example of premium?" Or, "How much is this gonna be?" And of course, everybody set up a meeting with you, and they scheduled. But for those people that are scared to be sold, and they don't wanna have a meeting — let's just go over some premium examples of different ages and what people can expect.

Yes. So these are very small samples. There's a lot of different ways to tweak and tailor any policy to fit someone's situation. But to give someone a snapshot to let them know what they could possibly expect — so I ran numbers for a 35-year-old couple, for a 45-year-old couple, 55 and 65.

And so what we ran was $8,000 a month, which is probably more on the high end than what I'm seeing. But again, I want to be over versus showing low. So $8,000 a month, each person —

In care coverage.

In care coverage.

That's what they would pay the nursing home or a facility. $8,000 a month.

Correct. So this money would come on their behalf and pay these bills, 'cause they're expensive. So $8,000 a month, each person in this couple, for a lifetime. And we'll talk about lifetime in great detail.

Because we're insuring a couple, not a single person on a policy.

You got it. That's correct. So 35-year-old, $8,000 a month each, would cost $3,900 a year total. And those are rate locked. So not like the old policies that I'll talk about again — the old policies that a lot of people are shy about, because they weren't the best.

$3,900 a year for two 35-year-olds to get $8,000 a month each, which is $96,000 a year.

So if they're both in the nursing home at the same time —

$16,000 a month. You got it. And they cannot outlive it. Which is why we do this catastrophic planning. Because we don't know what's gonna happen.

So two 35-year-olds is $3,900 a year. 45-year-olds is $5,500 a year for the same benefits — $8,000 a month each, lifetime, $5,500 total. 55-year-olds would be $8,600 a year, and two 65-year-olds would be $15,000 a year combined.

And I think what's important here is these premiums of $4,000 a year, $5,500 a year are figured that we're paying until we're 95.

Correct.

So I'm 35, I'm gonna pay that till I'm 95. But there are options — which we will get into at the end of this, that is absolutely crazy. There are options to single pay, 10-pay, 20-pay. And when I did mine, a 20-pay cut that total out-of-pocket in half.

Yes.

And so this is really the highest cost for them. It's the lowest amount leaving in cash flow every single year. But volume of money paid is double, almost triple, depending on age, versus if you did a single pay or a five-pay or a 10-pay or a 20-pay.

And I wouldn't want anybody to be afraid of that, because here's what I will tell you — depending on your situation —

It's a cash flow thing.

It's a cash flow thing. If we need to do it cash flow this way, then you do it that way.

Correct.

But understand that in my opinion, these are still very, very reasonable. Like, this is cheap. $4,000 a year is what a month? That's not even 500 bucks a month. Y'all, I'm no math major, okay? 4,000 divided by 12 — we can clip out my pause if we want — $333 a month.

Correct.

Okay. So what are we spending? The reason I want to talk about this is because to me, that's so inexpensive. If we look at our budget, we can't buy a vehicle for that. We might be spending that on kids' activities. We might be spending that eating out and coffee. Fancy coffees, right? We might be spending that on eating out, coffee, and some beers while we go out to eat.

You might say, "Oh, that's so nice. We love to go out to eat and have coffee." Yeah, you also like having your butt wiped, as your book says. Who's Wiping Your Assets?

Who's Wiping Your Assets.

So if you guys haven't gotten Michelle's book yet, go to Amazon, Who's Wiping Your Assets? But who is gonna wipe your butt? And this is just ensuring that when we are old, you got somebody there to do that.

Well, and it's not an old thing. Thank you for saying that. So a 35-year-old couple might go, "Oh, I got time. This is for old folks." It's not. And so let me address that since I just brought it up. A lot of the time younger people don't do this 'cause they think they have time. Well, the longer you wait, the more expensive it gets. It's still a good deal — even older ages, I still work with people in their 70s and 80s doing this. But if they could have gotten it when they were younger, it's definitely a cost savings.

Well, look at it. It's $4,000 a year versus $15,000 at 65 a year.

Yeah.

That's the same coverage. Same people. Different age.

Correct.

So, yeah, why not buy it now, for cash flow purposes?

Well, and so what are the things that this could trigger, to trigger these payouts? It's not just, I end up with Alzheimer's or dementia and I can't do those things for myself. What these will pay out is for cancer. Now, it doesn't pay — I get diagnosed with cancer and so this money just starts paying out. What it is, is I have to fail my activities of daily living, which cancer tends to do. My activities of daily living are eating, dressing, bathing, toileting, continence —

And transferring.

I always miss one. And transferring, meaning getting in and out of bed.

Well, think about it. Let's explore this. Cancer happens to anyone at any time. And so if I'm at my age right now, really young, and I end up having cancer, and maybe I'm battling via taking chemotherapy, radiation, and I am so weak and so frail that I don't even have the energy to get myself out of bed, let alone give myself a shower or a bath or use the restroom — if I'm failing, and my doctor says, "Michelle cannot get herself out of bed and she cannot get a bath by herself," that turns these policies on.

Think about accidents. We have a mutual client that had a four-wheeler accident. Thank goodness he's fine now, but he was not in good shape there for a minute, right? So while he's battling and trying to get healthy again, and he's at home and his wife is trying to help take care of him, that would have triggered these policies. So farming accidents. I end up getting diagnosed with MS or ALS. Those happen at all kinds of ages. So it's cancer, strokes, accidents —

Even your autoimmunes.

Autoimmunes will trigger that. Yes.

You have, like in our world, we've got a lot of horse accidents. So we've got a lot of people that — hey, the horse just, for whatever reason, spooked, and somebody got kicked in the head, or somebody fell. I see those a lot. Got thrown off. And it's just very common.

And so I think that the last podcast that we did, we touched on this a little bit, so I'm glad we're touching on it more this time. But we touched on it a little bit and I did not know that. That was a huge eye-opener for me. And so now I'm like, "You guys all need long-term care."

Because you've seen the people.

Here's my thing. Obviously, I watch a lot of TikTok, and I see these people on TikTok that are kind of sharing their journey of cancer, and how their spouse is dying of cancer and they're caring for them. So we have a spouse that quit their job to care for the spouse with cancer. They have no income. The spouse with cancer can't do anything. They're basically hospice.

I watched this one guy who took care of his wife for years battling cancer. Well, their income was coming from social media — and her dying. Like, not everybody wants to share that journey on social media and have cameras up watching you and how you're interacting with your kids and your spouse. No, thank you. Like, I am out here in front of y'all, but if I'm dying of cancer, you're not seeing it. You wanna set that camera up — Scott's not gonna film. He doesn't even know how to get to his camera on his phone.

Well, let's paint this picture. So here's a husband and wife. I'm gonna make this up 'cause I don't know the story. They probably were both working, so they had two incomes. Let's say that she works for a dental office, and he's a farmer, okay? And now he gets diagnosed. He has a stroke. He has an accident, a farming accident. He no longer can work. He can't work, and he can't take care of himself for whatever reason. She now has to quit her job to take care of him. They also have children.

So now they used to have two incomes, now both of those incomes are gone, because she has to quit to take care of him. And who's taking care of the kids? So what's happening to her now? He can't take care of himself. She's taking care of him and the kids, and they don't have income. The ripple effect of this, not being prepared for this, is really devastating.

And she doesn't have any income, anything to help pay for somebody to come in and give her a break. So now it's mom and dad having to come in, or siblings having to come in.

If they're willing.

Or, like, I follow a guy on social media that fell out of a tree stand while he was hunting, and so now his sister takes care of him. And the long-term care piece would be so important for mental health of whoever that caregiver is, to say, "I can walk away for a few hours." And even if I have not $8,000 a month, but if I had $4,000 a month, or I had $2,000 a month — something is better than absolutely nothing.

And again, I know we're kind of beating this dead horse, but I did not know that care would include those things, because I just thought long-term care was, I'm old, I'm in a nursing home. That's just where you go, and that's when you need long-term care.

Well, it's not condition specific. It's not cancer. It's the residual impact of those conditions.

Right. So it's anything that's gonna cause you to lose two of the six daily living activities.

Correct.

It doesn't matter. They don't go, "Oh, hey, you were hunting and fell out of a tree stand, that doesn't qualify 'cause we don't like hunting."

Right. They don't care. You fell out of a tree stand, you hurt yourself, you paralyzed yourself, you broke something, whatever it is. And so now you can't get yourself out of bed, you can't get yourself into the restroom, you can't feed yourself, whatever it may be.

And those things — a tree stand — is a lifetime. So we talked about the price of these for lifetime coverage. So we're paying, in these examples that we had talked about, $8,000 a month. So it doesn't matter if it's $2,000, $4,000, $8,000 a month, lifetime. So if I do fall out of a tree stand, I don't die, I'm paralyzed the rest of my life, and I'm 40 years old, then I get that paid until the day I die.

Yeah. And we'll dive into the why lifetime.

Well, let's talk about it.

Okay. So I offer all of them. I offer all the products out there. I offer all the different benefit periods, we'll say. And what we hear a lot of financial professionals say is, "The average length of care is only four years. You don't need lifetime coverage."

Well, I'm gonna break that apart, and I do that in my book. So Who's Wiping Your Assets? — I try to take a funny approach to all these different objections or reasons.

It's very funny.

Thank you. Thank you for reading it. It's a quick, easy read, and I made it that way for a reason. You're not gonna find that this book is really detailed. It's trying to change the way people view long-term care planning, because it's such a big impact to society in general. So I tried to take even sarcastic approaches to some of it just to make people laugh and make it more easy to talk about.

So, okay, so lifetime. When you hear about the average length of care, people are not understanding where those averages come from. And let's just talk about average first. So an average, just by definition, is halfway. So I talk about, if I'm standing in a bucket of ice water and my hair is on fire, on average I'm comfortable — which sounds silly, right? My hair is on fire, of course I'm not.

So when we talk about averages, what we're talking about is 50% will need less, but the other 50% will need more. So when you're planning based on average, you are leaving out half of the population. So I don't like that, first of all. And number two, I don't know where I am in that. I don't know where I'm gonna land. And if right now Alzheimer's has an average length of care of eight years, that means half of them will need care for longer than eight years. So I don't want to leave people exposed.

The other thing to think about is, that is typically care in a facility that they're averaging. We really don't know how long someone received care at home prior to, because we're not doing some census with all these home care providers. We're not asking spouses, "How long did you take care of your husband before you moved him into a nursing home?" Or, "How long did you live with your daughter before they just couldn't anymore, and then you had to move to a facility?" So the averages aren't even real. They're just these numbers that they came up with.

So I am absolutely more biased on lifetime coverage for three reasons, and I will break them down.

Number one, if you are a part of a couple. I always want to lean more towards lifetime, because what I don't want to have happen is Scott use up all that limited benefit and leave you with nothing. Because what if I got you a policy of six years and Scott uses it all because he gets Alzheimer's? Well, now you're completely left exposed. That doesn't make sense.

Okay, hold on. This is new to me. So if I got a policy that did not have lifetime, and Scott and I are on that same policy together —

And it was a six-year coverage.

It's not six for each of us. It's six together.

It's together. It's total.

Okay.

And you'll see, like, sometimes there might be eight years, but still, nonetheless, it's limited. Because the lifetime is lifetime of each.

I assumed it was six years each.

You can buy individual policies and get six years each, but the pricing is gonna be different. You're still limiting.

Okay, good to know.

All right. And look, if I have health insurance, I don't want my provider to say, "Michelle, I have a great policy for you. The average stay in the hospital is five days. We're gonna cover you for five days in the hospital." I'd be like, "That's not good." What if I have something catastrophic? That's the whole point in this. If I'm in a coma, cover me for the whole coma.

Yeah, and I'm not gonna split your husband's with yours.

Right. That doesn't make any sense to me, but for whatever reason, everybody's buying that. And the price differential — we're talking a few hundred dollars a year. When I show clients, I'll show them, "Here's what you get for lifetime. Here's what you get for a limited benefit." And when I show them the price difference of a few hundred dollars a year, they go, "Who would do that?" And I go, "I don't know."

So number one is if you're a part of a couple. Number two, if one of you is female. Why? Because females are more likely to need care, and they're more likely to need it longer. So we have — by the way, I don't know if you knew this — men have a one in 10 chance of developing Alzheimer's. Women have one in five. One in five women develop Alzheimer's.

And I don't know exactly why that is. I'm not a scientist. Those are just the stats. We are more likely to need care longer. We're more likely to outlive our spouses, all those reasons.

And then the third reason — so if you're a couple, if one of you is female, the third reason is if you're healthy. I get people that go, "Michelle, I'm healthy. I don't need this." I go, "You're the problem." You need to start smoking cigarettes. Don't exercise. Eat a lot of bacon. Because if you're healthy, you are more likely to live to the ages where you are more likely to need care. You're not gonna die younger.

So if you're unhealthy, you're most likely gonna die from that condition. If you're healthy, you're probably gonna live longer. And by the way, the farming community that I've been working with so far, most of them have been healthy. I've been pleasantly surprised. They are healthy.

So three reasons why you do lifetime: you're part of a couple, one of you is female, and you're healthy. You need lifetime coverage.

Now, let's do the opposite. You're a male, you're not healthy, and you're not married, right? So I still will show you the lifetime coverage versus the limited coverage, but you may want to choose the lifetime coverage just because of the price difference. I'll still show it to you both, because I want my people to have all of the information. I want you to make an educated decision.

Well, and I wanna go back and just touch a little bit on your statistics stuff that you talk about. And we talked about this last time, so go back and listen to that podcast, 'cause I don't wanna spend a ton of time on this. 'Cause we don't need another three-hour podcast.

However, I think what's important to understand in that scenario is, how long are we taking care of people at home? And today's long-term care pays for you to be taken care of at home. The old long-term care, you had to go to the nursing home. And if I only bought 24 months, I'm going to take care of you at home as long as I can before I put you in there — to the point where I have exhausted myself, I am ill, I have hurt myself physically, because we only bought so much care. We're concerned about it, right?

But if I can keep you at home and have the long-term care kick in, because I do have cancer, I am paralyzed, whatever that might be, or I'm just old, and I do want to keep you at home — it's truly not the same insurance that it used to be.

Yeah.

And I think that when we have the lifetime, we'll kick that in faster.

Oh, yeah.

The problem is that is not a standard option for most companies. Most companies have an option that is two years, three years, four years, whatever it might be. And so it's kind of like having only so much money in our IRAs. And we're like, "Oh, we don't want to use it 'cause we might outlive it." So now we live frugally.

But what if you have a pension that guarantees you a lifetime? You're gonna turn that on when you're eligible.

Exactly. This is like your pension versus, I only have a pool of money of this saved up. This is why Michelle talks about cash flow, because this is like the cash flow that's coming in. It's her income. That's why the name of her business is Care Income Planning.

Yes.

So we've got this income coming in to pay for things without having the rental properties, without having all of those things. And so I think that it's important for people to just make that distinction — that we don't have to put someone in a facility in order for this to kick in.

Well, so there's a lot there. So first of all, we'll go back to the pricing. The 35-year-old's getting $8,000 a month each for lifetime for long-term care, and it costing $3,900 a year. Maybe they can't do $3,900 a year. Some people would go, "Well, I can't afford to get the crème de la crème, so I'm not going to do anything." Something is always better than nothing.

So maybe they buy $4,000 a month now, and it only costs them $2,000 a year. Here's what happens. That same scenario, husband has an accident, wife needs to take care of him. Well, now she doesn't have to quit her job entirely. Maybe she takes reduced hours, but she's still working and she's still taking care of her kids. She's got $4,000 a month now that she can use to pay a professional to come in and do the heavy lifting. Meaning give him a bath three times a week.

She can't physically pick him up. She's gonna do her best. Without a policy, she's gonna do it, and she's gonna break herself. With a policy, she can hire a gentleman to come in and lift her husband up and give him a bath three, four times a week, whatever's needed. Get him out of bed. It will also pay for other supportive equipment to help her take care of him.

Something is better than nothing. That policy, even a smaller amount, bought her a lot of relief. Bought her a lot of time. Even a limited policy — look, if you can't afford the lifetime, then get something, 'cause it buys a lot of time. But like I said, with the price differential, most people will choose that lifetime.

So you touched on, it will pay for other things. That's one of the questions I have on here. So what are the other things that it will pay for?

So this is probably a good time that we can talk about the old policies and the new policies, okay? So let's address the old — what I call flip phone policies. The old policies did basically one thing, just like a flip phone. They were good for phone calls in and out.

So those old policies is what a lot of people say, "Oh, long-term care doesn't pay out. I've experienced it with my parents." Well, your parents bought the policies in the early '90s, and those were very different. It's almost like buying a 1990s car that didn't have power windows, and you go, "Well, I'm not buying a car anymore because they don't have power windows." You had to roll the window up, and they had the knobs. Now the new cars have all these other things that they do. Well, I wouldn't say don't buy a new long-term care policy because of what you've experienced with the old policies.

Old policies didn't have all of the neat features that the new ones do. So you're talking about old policies that had rate increases. There wasn't a death benefit paid if they never needed it. They were limited options. They didn't pay for home healthcare. Maybe they only paid for you to be in a facility. So what your grandparents or your parents dealt with is very different than the new policies.

So let's talk about the new policies. The new policies have a lot of consumer protection. Those are the two of six activities of daily living. Those old policies were kind of loosey-goosey in how they were triggered. So the new policies — the two of six activities of daily living, your doctor has to state, "Yes, Mary Jo cannot get out of bed. Mary Jo cannot get herself dressed." That triggers the policy. It's a very clear definition.

But what does it pay for, for you? First of all, it will pay for a lot of forms of care. Not just nursing home — pay for care in your home, assisted living facilities, which are the fastest-growing. It used to be you would go from getting cared for at home by a family member and directly into a nursing home. Now people have this new step up, so they're now going into assisted living facilities instead of having to go directly into a nursing home, and people are doing really, really well in assisted living.

It will pay for adult daycare. When I started in the industry 29 years ago, I didn't know what adult daycare was. Nobody had adult daycare facilities. But because of the boomer generation, as I talk about in my book, "The Boomers Are Coming," we're starting to see more and more of these, because people need more access to care. So, adult daycare.

It will pay for hospice care. Not just hospice care at home, but also if you're receiving hospice care in a facility. You're still needing to be taken care of during that time. So it pays for a lot of things.

It also pays for supportive equipment. Meaning, Mary Jo, if you want to stay in this beautiful house of yours, it will pay for a ramp to be put in at your house so that you can get in and out. It will pay for a human lift so that Scott doesn't have to pick you up and get you in and out of bed. It will pay for this equipment to get you up and out, so he doesn't break his back trying to do it himself. It will pay for grab bars in the restroom, for in the shower, so that you can stay at home as long as possible.

Will it pay for an elevator in my house?

It will not pay for an elevator. As a matter of fact, the policies will state it won't pay for blood, it won't pay for dentures, it won't pay for artificial limbs. It says that specifically because your health insurance will pay for those things. But it does pay for those things so that your family members aren't having to do those things for you.

So, yes. I better have my infinite banking, my life insurance policy with cash value, for my elevator.

That will pay for an elevator. Yes, that will pay for an elevator.

Here's what I want to end this little segment on. The new policies will say alternative care, and basically what it says — I'm paraphrasing — it will say, if there's any kind of new care in the future that we can't even dream up of now, robots or whatever, and it is cost-effective and it's good for the client and it's good for the company, they will consider paying for that. The old policies were very strict and very rigid. It didn't allow for this new way of providing care. The new policies will allow for that.

But who decides that? So let's say that I've got this new policy. It says alternative care. I'm the one being cared for, and Scott goes to who then, to say, "Hey, there's this other option. Will the policy pay for that?" Does he come to you? Does he go, and then you go to the company?

Oh, you would definitely want to come to my company first so we can help advocate. Because Scott's not gonna know the verbiage or how to navigate the insurance company. Or what kind of bills or details would we need to submit, to go, "Hey, will you consider this? It's maybe less expensive. It's better for Mary Jo. It keeps her at home as long as possible. She's healthy, she's doing well. Would you consider this type of care?" So we would submit that.

And that is super important. Because just like the life insurance side of things, we in our office are extremely active — if you want us to be. If you don't want us to be, that's fine. But we will hold your hand with loans and paperwork and those sort of things. And so if I have something new that comes up, I wanna make sure that I have someone to go to that has the relationship with the insurance company.

Because when we have clients call the insurance company, it can be a nightmare. Because the people answering the phone, it could be their second day on the job, you know? They're gonna maybe go through a system of procedure stuff, and they're gonna say, "Nope, we can't do that," when in fact, yes, you can. We just need to talk to the right people, and we know the right people to talk to.

So I think that that's important for people to understand. When you buy long-term care, you're also buying your agent. And you want to make sure that that agent is going to be there to help you.

It's insane to me, when I file a death claim, how many other insurance companies — people will always have other insurance that they've not canceled before they met me. And we had one claim in particular that we helped her file the claim on this other policy, because that agent didn't call her. Literally, not even a sympathy call of, "Hey, I'm really sorry, here are my condolences," right? Nope, she just gets a check in the mail.

That's insane to me. I have fought with the insurance company and said, "You are not allowed to send paperwork to my clients if there is a death claim. You need to be calling me." We've actually changed how the death claims are handled within the company, because they're like, "Mary Jo, nobody else does this." And I'm like, "What do you mean? That should be standard." So it's the same for you. You want an agent that truly is going to be there to help you file that claim and be able to work through those things with you.

Well, and it's not just that. There are plenty of financial professionals out there that can sell you all kinds of stuff. They are not specialized in this. So they're just selling what someone told them, "Hey, this is great," and they go, "Okay," and they'll put a policy in place. It might not be the right one for you. They might not have set it up correctly for you. But most of them have not been there to help the family when it happens.

Now here's what I will tell you. I had one of my clients say, "Michelle, you're gonna be in the nursing home with me." "What are you talking about? How are you gonna be there to help?" And we giggled about it. My company is built and structured that I have a succession plan, that they will be there to help your kids. Because you're right — it's gonna be your daughter that's calling saying, "Hey, Mom's lost her mind," or "Mom, Dad had an accident. What do we do now?"

You're not advocating for yourself. These kids have no idea where to go, what to do. They oftentimes don't even know that Mom and Dad bought a policy. So I also have done some other things that is very unique to my practice that other financial pros haven't done, to make sure that kids know where to go and what to do.

That's the whole point of this — is to not only help you get the right plan in place, but to be there for your family, 'cause it is hard. It is usually chaotic when something happens. They don't know where to go, what to do. They're frustrated. They're upset. They're scared. And so when they call the insurance company, I don't doubt that the insurance company reps aren't kind or that they're not willing to help, but oftentimes they use industry jargon that a kid doesn't even know what they're talking about. And that's where there's just this language barrier — not that they don't speak English or anything. They just don't know how to talk to the children to say, "Hey, here's what you need to do. Next step, here's what's going on." And I help them through that.

But not only help them navigate the insurance company, which is one of the things that I, unlike most financial advisors, have — I have worked for the insurance company for many years, so I know how to navigate that. But also I can help you find a geriatric manager, a care coordination service, all those little things that people don't think about, to relieve the burden off your family. I mean, if anybody out there is living this right now, you know how hard it is to learn all the things that you need to learn on the fly. I help that.

Yep. It's almost like preparing a funeral. People don't understand how much work it is and how many decisions have to be made after somebody dies. And these are the same kinds of things that you have to make these decisions on before somebody dies.

True.

Okay. So let's go back to premiums, 'cause we got a little sidetracked. Can the premiums be a tax deduction for me in any way?

Uh, yes and no. So all of my answers are yes and no, and very loaded.

Sounds like an attorney and an accountant.

Yes. So let me back up. The policies that I prefer, there is going to be a life insurance component to it, and the life insurance component is what delivers all of the guarantees, so that you don't have these rising premiums over time. Or you also have a death benefit if you never needed care. Like, heaven forbid, you actually never need care — at least something passes on, you didn't waste the money.

So when we're talking about these particular premiums, there is a piece of it that is life insurance. That cannot be tax-deductible. There's other things that we could do, and I won't go into detail, but we're just going to say point-blank, those cannot be tax-deductible. There is a piece of it that is considered long-term care premium. That can be tax-deductible.

And so I will first say, I am not a CPA, so I always tell all of my clients, "Please consult your tax professional. I will give you all of the numbers, and they will tell you what can be tax-deductible." There are some tax deductions that are available for business owners, if they provide their own self-employed health insurance, because this is considered self-employment health insurance. So it can be tax-deductible depending on how you file. There's what they call age-related caps, but I provide all of those specific numbers so they can go to their tax accountant and they can get extra tax deductions.

Let me say this. You're not doing this solely for the tax deduction. You're doing this because the cash flow, or the care income that it can provide, you cannot replicate that in any other investment anywhere else. And you're protecting that farm, you're protecting the ranch, you're protecting your family. But if you can get tax deductions, we're always trying to sniff those out. If you can get an extra tax deduction for that, why wouldn't you? It's a cherry on top.

So yes, there are some things available, and maybe it's not every single year, because you also have to show the income in order to be able to tax-deduct it. So if I can just plant that little seed — yes, if you're a business owner, you need to tell me you're a business owner so that I can supply the extra information so that you can supply it to your CPA.

Okay. Can I pay my premium with an IRA that I have, or an annuity that I have, or some sort of investment money? Maybe I am in a position where I am 65, 70, maybe I'm coming up on 73 and I have required minimum distributions that I need to take. Is there a way to use any of those tools to maybe make a single payment or make payments at all?

Absolutely. This is a very popular option, and it's becoming more popular. So I'll tell you about two cases that I have working right now. These are two people in their 60s, so they are past the penalty phase — meaning if you're 59 and a half or older, you don't receive a 10% distribution penalty. So they're not going to get a penalty on this, but they have quite a bit in their IRA, and we all know that those are tax time bombs. At some point in the future, you're going to be forced to take that money out. You're gonna owe Uncle Sam his portion. He gets his part.

So I'll tell you one situation just to give you some details. I have a wonderful woman, she is a widow, and she has a substantial amount in her IRA. She doesn't need it to live on. It's just sitting there. Now, she's in her 60s, so she has not hit required minimum distribution yet, but she knows it's coming. So why is she gonna wait until she gets there and then be forced to take it out?

So what we decided to do, rather than trying to find money in her budget to pay for her long-term care — which, by the way, she wants to protect her family. She doesn't want her children to be burdened with this, and she also knows of a good friend that is currently paying about 15 grand a month for long-term care because they have memory care issues. It's really expensive.

So she said, "Can I use my IRA to pay for this and get that funded?" Absolutely. And her son even said, "Mom, what else are you gonna use that for? You might as well protect everything and make sure that you have a lifetime bucket of money." So she's repositioning a large chunk of that to pay for this. The best part is, she also put an inflation protection on it, and if she never needs care, her family's gonna get that money. They're gonna get it as a death benefit. So it worked beautifully for her, because she has income coming from other things, other investments, royalties and things like that.

The other person is a husband and wife. They, again, have quite a bit in IRA dollars. He doesn't wanna wait till the point where he's being forced to take it out. He wants to start to reduce that future RMD now, but cover him and his wife for the care. So they're moving a couple of hundred thousand dollars out of their IRAs, and it's going to provide them — I'm gonna say $8,000 a month each.

So let's just unpack this math. They're gonna reposition $200,000 one time as an IRA, and that's gonna provide them each $96,000 a year for life. What kind of rate would they have to get on that $200,000 to generate $96,000? That's almost a 50% return. They would have to earn 50% somewhere else. They're not getting that. And then double that, of course, if both of them needed it.

So what happens is, the IRA — just a one-time move, there's nothing taxable with moving it. But once it gets moved, they take a distribution each year over a 10-year period. So they're really spreading out that tax hit, so they're only paying minimal taxes each year over 10 years instead of all at once.

So if they take $200,000 out, it's not a single pay premium. They're taking a little bit every year for 10 years? Or does it go to the company and the company takes a little bit every year for 10 years?

Correct. That's the way. So they reposition lump sum. They're technically moving it one time, and then that IRA is actually paying that premium over that 10-year period. So it's just done and taken care of, and it works beautifully.

But they're only claiming then that portion of premium every year as a withdrawal from their IRA. So they're not having to pay income tax on $200,000. They're only paying income tax on whatever got moved for premiums.

You got it. That is correct. So it's a way to kind of spread that out.

A lot of people talk about doing Roth conversions. I'm sure a lot of your people that are listening have heard, because they might have quite a bit of IRA money or 401(k) money or 403(b) money, and people will say, "You need to start to convert that to a Roth to make that money tax-free." You can do the same thing here. Because when you're doing the IRA dollars and you're converting that, meaning you're paying your taxable portion of it, you're gonna have to do that. There's no way you can avoid that.

Right. You do that when you do a Roth conversion. You pay it.

But here what you're doing is moving it over to a bucket that's specifically designed to pay this type of care income tax-free. So it's a similar principle or concept. But this one is specifically for long-term care purposes.

And I want to hit on something here that we actually don't even have on our list of questions. Michelle talked about the portion of the policy that is life insurance. So the chassis of the ones she loves — now she writes everything, okay? So if you don't qualify for that, she's got other companies she works with. But the chassis of what you love to write is life insurance.

Yes.

So if we have moved over $200,000 because Mom and Dad have this IRA and they want to provide long-term care for themselves, but they never need the policy — there is death benefit that goes to the heirs. So this money is not lost, as this old-fashioned long-term care that we don't like. That money is not lost, because there is death benefit associated with that policy if they die and don't use it.

You got it, right.

Yeah.

So a lot of people don't like the use-it-or-lose-it policies. That's what they say, "If I didn't use it, I just wasted all my money." And look, those policies are still good. Be thankful. Something is better than nothing.

But if we have an option to buy something better, we're gonna buy something better.

And that's why these are more popular these days. Because not only does it provide all the guarantees, there are no surprises in these policies. What I show people is exactly what it's going to be. It's never gonna be worse, but it's never gonna be better either. I show you exactly what's going to happen.

The premium's not going up. There's death benefit. We've got those things attached that are not in other policies. And you can't just go buy these type of long-term care policies on the street. I mean, you are on the street, but they're not everywhere. Not everybody is writing these. And so they're less common, which means you're gonna have to either work with Michelle, or you're really gonna have to do some due diligence to find somebody that offers the Cadillac version instead of maybe having —

The Prius.

Well, and that's the thing. A lot of people think — or the old busted 1990, you know, whatever.

I don't know what else to compare it to.

I don't either, and that was probably a bad comparison. But okay, in defense of those policies that are just not that attractive — I'm not a fan of my car insurance. But if I wrecked, I am thankful I have it. I just don't like paying the premiums 'cause I feel like, "Gosh, why am I doing this? I'm a safe driver," until someone hits me. And it's the same thing with those. So I still will defend those, 'cause coverage is coverage. It is a good thing. But if you could get something better for the same price or better, why would you not?

And so the types of policies that I lean to, that even my clients lean to — they're like, "Yeah, I want something," because I don't know if I'm gonna need care. I always tell people, "Tell me how long you're gonna live or what's gonna happen to you, and I'll tell you exactly what you need to do." We don't have that privilege.

So with these policies, they are built on a whole life chassis. I choose whole life chassis because of the ironclad guarantees. I do not — this is the last thing that I want — is to offer an option to someone in their 40s or 50s, and then come back to them when they're in their 70s and 80s and go, "I am so sorry, but your premium is increasing 100%, and now you're too unhealthy to get a new policy. You're stuck with this, and now your premium's just doubled. Oh, and by the way, they doubled last year, too."

Yeah. And that's the difference between buying whole life and buying universal, indexed, whatever, variable universal — those premiums are going up. You're gonna get the letter. It's not gonna be there. And so if you're a client of mine, you want a guarantee. And that's why we do what we do over here for infinite banking, and so you should be doing and thinking the same way for long-term care. Now, if you don't qualify, great. Something is better than nothing. But if you qualify for the Cadillac, let's buy the Cadillac.

And there's other options out there where they do have good guarantees.

If you're gonna buy the Cadillac and you're on the long ride, 'cause it could be lifetime — then I prefer to take that ride in the Cadillac, not the Prius.

Yeah. And look, there's other companies that are good companies that offer these options, and they offer guarantees, but they probably don't offer lifetime. And so I only deal with the one company that offers lifetime now. And the other companies, like I said, something is better than nothing. I talk about it in my book — if you're starving, a half a sandwich is better than no sandwich. If you need something, it's better to have it.

Right.

You're not gonna be like, "Sorry, I'm not accepting that half a sandwich, but I'm starving."

Right. Yeah. So I always encourage people to get what they can. But if you have options and I show you those options and the price differential is not that much, why would you not? Why would you not make sure? Because you don't know what's gonna happen to your wife, you don't know what's gonna happen to you.

And if you don't need it, you got death benefit. You don't get money thrown away.

Correct.

That is the piece that I like about it. 'Cause I don't like the whole use-it-or-lose-it thing. To me, it's gambling. And as you know from yesterday's lunch, I don't like to gamble. Now, Scott and Michelle do, and they won some money. And I watched them and celebrated for them, but I'm not gambling.

Well, it's not like we're big gamblers.

You put in 20 bucks.

We were planning to have fun and be silly, and we just happened to hit.

Yeah. It's okay. So it's definitely a concern.

So what about if someone is in poor health and they are uninsurable? So you have a case right now, that I have a client that is uninsurable. Because either they're Type 1 diabetic or, for whatever reason — I have an eye on the life insurance side of people that are uninsurable for life insurance. But you can insure them for long-term care.

Not all the time, but some cases, yes. Just depending on the condition. So you mentioned Type 1 diabetic. They're gonna have limited options, but there's options. And it's still great leveraging. Meaning I put pennies in and I get dollars out — that's a good thing.

There are some people that might have — I'm seeing more of this, "I got tingling in my feet, Michelle. So I take a medication for the tingling in my feet." If it's not diabetic related, there are still some options that we could do. There are even options that are a guaranteed issue. There are group long-term care policies where you can get it in your business and you have guaranteed coverage.

So I always tell people, let's have a conversation, because there are so many health conditions out there that you don't know what's available. But I don't want anybody to make an assumption that they can't qualify. 'Cause I have some people that go, "Oh, I'm too heavy." And I'm like, "You're not heavy where this is concerned. They're very generous in this way." Or they say, "Oh, Michelle, I've had cancer before." And I go, "Well, how are you doing now?" "Oh, well, it's been five years. I'm in complete remission. I only had one cancer. They took care of it. I had surgical removal. I did chemo and I'm good." "Okay, well, there's options for you."

Don't think just because you had a situation. Here's what insurance companies are looking for. They're looking for stability. So if I have a condition, they wanna make sure that I'm not doing this rollercoaster thing and I don't have it under control yet. So they're looking for consistency and stability. So I just will tell your audience, call me, because there's probably an option for you.

So when should I not call you?

Well, that's a great question. So I do have people that say, "Michelle, my mom's in a nursing home. What can you do?" There's not a lot I can do at that point. I wish that I could. I would recommend, if anybody already has a risk — meaning I'm already using a walker, a wheelchair, I'm already on maybe oxygen, I'm already considered disabled, meaning if I'm on Social Security Disability — my options for you get really limited. If they are already in a nursing home or already in an assisted living facility, I can't get you coverage, because we're already there. It's similar to, my house is already on fire, I need homeowner's coverage.

So how fast can you get me coverage? Because I wanna put mom in the nursing home, and how fast can we get her covered before we go in? 'Cause you know people will ask that. How long do we have to keep her at home, Michelle?

No, if she's already failing ADLs, I can't do a whole bunch. Here's what I would say, and I do have people that call me. I will look up elder care attorneys, elder law attorneys, 'cause I want you to get in touch with them ASAP. I want you to talk to them, because now we're in crisis mode. So there's before crisis, and then there's after crisis. We're already in crisis, and now we're just trying to contain the fire.

And so I will get you in touch with people, but I will also help you to do research, 'cause it's very state-specific, and we've got 50 states. So I will help you see, because there's probably a lot of resources in your state to offer help and aid that you might not be aware of. So I can help at least guide you in that direction. But as far as getting coverage, there's not gonna be much that I can do for you.

Okay. Let's get into some policy rules. Some of the things that people don't necessarily love about long-term care is, it's not gonna kick in in time, those sort of things. So let's talk about elimination periods. We've already touched on the ramps and the bars and the adult daycare. So let's talk about elimination period. Can care be collected if a family member is taking care of somebody? And then, if we are making premium payments till, like, 95, do those premiums stop? So let's just talk about some of the bigger rules.

That's good. All of that's good.

So first of all, elimination period. What is that? An elimination period is basically a deductible. So these are, remember, long-term care, not short-term care policies. So if you've just broke your leg, and you're in a cast for six weeks, this isn't gonna pay for that, right? Because there's an elimination period.

So the elimination period typically that you'll find with these policies is about 90 days. Sometimes you'll find them at 60, sometimes you'll find them even longer, but you're talking 90 days. But these policies, especially the newer ones, have evolved so much that they're now offering zero-day elimination period for care at home. So if something happens — but you still have to need care for a period of 90 days or longer — but they'll still start paying. So if you've been diagnosed with some chronic illness, and your doctor says, "Yeah, she's probably gonna need it for a while," these will start paying at day zero.

So if you had home healthcare, or you had your family member take care of you, these policies will start paying at zero days. And oftentimes because of the claim period, they'll end up paying retro back, because you have to file the claim. But they'll pay at zero days.

So let's use this scenario about the family member being paid. A lot of these policies are now paying for family members. So your daughter, she's like, "You know what? I'm not moving my mom in a home, and she's got lifetime coverage. I'm going to take care of her." These policies have a piece of this amount that can be paid, to pay her to take care of you.

So let's say it's $4,000 a month. You can get $4,000 to pay your daughter to take care of you. Here's most likely what's gonna happen. Your daughter's not trained for this, right? She's got a life. So she comes in and she takes care of you, and she realizes, "Holy cow, this is really hard to take care of my mom. It's round the clock."

Mom's mean.

And Mom's mean. And especially if Mom's not feeling good, Mom gets really mean, right? And Mom is gonna be more mean to the daughter than she would to a stranger that knows how to take care of Mom.

Okay, can I stop you for a sec? She could not take care of me and be paid without her being correctly licensed or trained to do that, though, right? 'Cause doesn't she have to meet some requirement in order for it to pay?

Not anymore.

Really? Oh, that's interesting. I thought that they had to have some sort of training or, like, an LPN or something, that okay, that means that they can care for you, and the insurance company will pay.

There's a lot of detail there. So it depends. So without going into a lot of it, I would say some of the policies will pay the full benefits. Some of them will reduce the benefit 'cause it's a family member. They're not trained. It's probably at the beginning of care.

So let's just say the number is $4,000. You can get — and they call them cash benefits. So technically, you can use this cash benefit to pay whatever you want. If you wanted to pay the lawn boy 'cause Scott can't cut the grass anymore, and you can't either, you can use it to pay for that. You can use it for whatever you want, up to a certain amount.

But let's say that you're gonna pay your daughter to do it. She's most likely gonna take care of you for a minute and she's gonna go, "Holy cow, this is hard. I'm gonna bring in professional care." She's not gonna do it for very long. But nonetheless, yes, you can technically pay your daughter.

But can she count as the elimination period?

Yeah, 'cause it's the days.

So if I'm gonna have care at home — like these people do have care at home — the problem is, they don't understand how to use their policy. So if I understood how to use my long-term care policy, I wouldn't have waited until day one to file the claim when Mom and Dad went into the nursing home. I would have actually filed that 90 days prior to getting them into the nursing home, so when they went into the nursing home day one, it kicked in.

They still have to trigger it, meaning their doctor still has to say, "Mary Jo can't bathe herself and get out of bed," or whatever it is.

Yeah. But they already couldn't at home. We were already doing it at home to alleviate putting them in care. But if we're doing it at home, we should be planning ahead to say, "Hey, there's an elimination period on this policy. Let's start using that, and let's get that triggered, so that when they do go into the nursing home and it's $15,000 a month, we don't wait three months to trigger that."

That's what's happened in the past. People will wait to turn on their policy. But here's why.

But it's 'cause they don't know.

Well, they don't know, and they have a limited bucket of money. So if they have a limited bucket, they're like, "Well, I can't turn it on yet, 'cause if it gets worse, I need it for the bad days. So I'm gonna have my daughter take care of me in the early days to save that." When you have lifetime —

But we also know there's a period where we're like, "Shit," like, we're getting to the point where we need to put them in the home. Like I was just talking to a client the other day, and they're like, "Yeah, Dad's getting to the point where Mom's really struggling, because he's kind of getting mean with dementia."

He's combative.

Yeah. And so let's trigger it now, so that we don't have — I just never thought of this till now. Because you have so many people that don't like this elimination period, and we have a mutual client that her mom has a hospice business. And she did not like long-term care because she has seen the negative of it, and she particularly does not like this elimination period. Well, it's not the elimination period that's the problem. It's not knowing how to use your policy and being in contact with your agent.

Well, and she was familiar with the flip phone policy. So she's basing the new ones off — I'm not buying a new car because the old cars had roll-up windows. So she doesn't know that the new ones don't work like that. So you've got a zero-day elimination period when it comes to cash and home healthcare.

So yes, that's why I stay in contact with everybody annually, 'cause I go, "Tell me what's going on with your husband." "Oh, well, he's doing this." I go, "Oh, oh, oh, okay. So when this happens, you call me immediately, because this is when we start the ball rolling." And so I stay in touch with them because they might not realize that that is going to be close to a trigger, whereas I am paying attention to those things. And by the way, their kids don't even know. So the kids wait forever to turn this on.

So I stay in touch with the family. But then when we talk about the 90 days — the 90 days of the elimination period, what you'll find is that might be for full-blown nursing home or assisted living facilities. So what a lot of people don't realize is, usually what happens is there was an event. You broke a hip. We'll just use that as an example, 'cause that's very common. So you fell, you broke a hip, you go into the hospital, you have surgery. That's under Medicare.

Medicare does not pay for long-term care, by the way. A lot of people confuse that. So Medicare does the surgery, but now you have to rehabilitate. So you're moving into a skilled nursing facility for rehabilitation care. It's a nursing home, and that's why people think Medicare pays for this. It doesn't pay for long-term care. It pays for rehabilitation care.

So the wing that is Medicare is usually a big nice room and it's private, because you're rehabilitating, and it pays for the first 20 days, and then it's a copay from 21 to 100. After 100 days, Medicare doesn't pay for anything. So what ends up happening is people aren't ready to come home, or sometimes they don't come home after that. So now that's when they go into Medicaid or on private pay. And now they're hemorrhaging dollars.

If you had that happen, those days in Medicare count toward that 90 days.

Oh.

Home healthcare days count toward that 90 days — which is why we want to trigger that policy as quickly as possible when you're eligible, because each day of home healthcare or each day in the nursing facility for Medicare counts toward those days. And people delay using it.

And they delay calling you. 'Cause they're so busy. In that scenario, they're so busy with figuring out what's happening with the hospital, talking to doctors, blah, blah, blah. But you can't retroactively trigger it. You can't be like, "Hey, we've been here for 30 days already, so can we file this claim and start retroactive at 30 days?"

Well, yeah, because you're proving that you were receiving care. But oftentimes they don't even turn it on, or they don't understand, or the kids don't know. What she was dealing with was an old flip phone policy that didn't cover hospice care or home healthcare.

But the moral of this whole piece is, you need to share this. You need to share this podcast with Mom and Dad, family members, whoever is going to be in charge of that. This piece is super important. Because if you are the one in charge of doing that, or the one helping Mom and Dad, we need to know when to turn it on.

Well, it's no different than having a banking policy, and they have it, and they have the cash, but they don't think about it.

They don't think to use it.

And they're using cash to pay for a tractor. And it's like, "What are you doing? You have this." It's more efficient and a better leveraging tool than just paying cash. But they don't think that way unless you stay in touch with them, or unless they watch the podcast.

And then let's talk about when we do turn it on. So if we have not paid a single premium, and we have maybe a 10-pay, 15-pay, 20-pay, lifetime pay option —

As soon as we turn it on, that premium turns off. So thank you for bringing that up, 'cause that's important. With these policies, if there's two people on the policy, if this is a joint policy, the policy is only in claim status on or claim status off. There's not, like, only one of them's on.

So think of, I go on claim, so claim is on. As soon as claim is on, my premiums are waived, meaning I don't owe that next premium. So if I'm paying five grand a year and my claim goes on because my husband is needing help, I don't pay that next payment.

Now, if claim is off — so let's say that my husband had a stroke, and he needed care for two years, but he rehabilitated, and now he's better. It took two years, but he's better. He can walk. He can take care of himself. Claim goes off 'cause I'm no longer needing the help. If I'm still in my premium paying period, my claim being off means my premium's picked back up. I don't owe back what I missed. It just picks up right there.

And so let's just say Scott goes into the nursing home and claim's on, so premium goes off. Scott dies. Now, I'm still alive, and we're jointly insured. So premium goes on again as soon as Scott passes, because claim is off.

Yes. And then here's what clients will ask me. "But because there's only one of us on the policy, does my premium drop?" No. Because it was priced for both of you to be on there when you bought it. And by the way, now you're 20 years older. They don't even know how to price it 'cause you're 20 years older. So nothing changes, it stays the same. And you probably don't even want a new policy anyway, 'cause you're 20 years older and you might have some health conditions. But we always explore it anyway. I explore it because there could be better options available, so we look at that based on one person.

And, people listening — those of you that listen a lot are gonna catch this. This is almost like a last-to-die policy. There's only one death benefit, and it's when the last one dies. And I absolutely hate those type of policies for life insurance purposes. This is different. This would be the only time that I'm okay with those policies.

Well, and here's why. So let me explain why you don't like it in the normal sense, but it works with long-term care. Because the primary intention is for both of you to have long-term care. So if this paid out when the first person dies, there is no more policy. So now you left the survivor with no long-term care. That doesn't make sense.

Right. So you need a life insurance policy on both people separately, so when the first one dies, you have life insurance. This is going to be long-term care. You need it to go for —

This is primarily long-term care. Secondarily, life insurance. Meaning, it's your long-term care policy that if you didn't need it, it wasn't wasted. It went to somebody. So secondary is the life insurance death benefit.

Let's see, what else we got here? I had a case that I talked to some existing clients a couple of weeks ago, and they don't have long-term care. And I said, "Well, we're coming into millions of dollars," because they happen to be oil clients, and they're coming into a bunch of money because we're gonna drill a well, but we are not gonna have money necessarily going forward. So when we have oil, it's like winning the lottery. And we have a bunch of money now.

So we might have clients too — I have a client that is working with you that, oh, we've got a bunch of money right now. We've got cattle. Cattle prices are high. So we've got all this money, especially these clients with millions. So they're thinking, "Well, what do I need long-term care for when I'm gonna have millions of dollars?"

And I said, "Well, why do you want to pay for it?" I get that you have millions of dollars, but you have millions of dollars coming in. You could do a single-pay long-term care policy that pays out every month, for both of you. You never pay again. So if oil money doesn't keep coming in, you never have to pay again.

But why do you want to pay full price for long-term care when the insurance company can pay with a discounted dollar, much like death benefit? When I'm explaining death benefit to people, I'm like, "You might be buying death benefit for 30 cents." Meaning the insurance company's gonna give you a dollar income tax-free, but you gave them 30 cents for that dollar.

And so I think we need to touch on this. Why, if I'm wealthy, should I still have long-term care?

This is my favorite topic.

This is my favorite.

'Cause now we're gonna get into some math. So I actually wrote a chapter in my book, it's called "Rich People Don't Play Defense." Rich people play offense. That's how they get their wealth, right? They don't make dumb decisions with their money. They are always looking for a deal.

I talk about, if my husband goes to the store — let's say Home Depot — and he's gonna go buy a rake, and it's on sale, he doesn't walk up to the counter and go, "I got plenty of money. I really wanna pay full price for this rake." No, he's gonna get the half-off deal, and he's probably gonna call his buddy and go, "Hey, they got a good sale going on right now."

That's how wealthy people think. Wealthy people are not sitting around, scared to death that they're gonna burn through all their money for long-term care purposes. They think of it as a math problem. This is math to them, and they don't ever pay retail price for things. Again, that's how they get their money.

So I'll give you some numbers. Let's say we have two 60-year-olds, and these two 60-year-olds are these oil clients, they're about to drill, and they're about to come into a whole bunch of money. They can reposition one time $150,000 — just one time, 150, which is a lot cheaper than long-term care — and that's going to provide them each $91,000 a year forever in care income.

So my question is, where would they have to take that 150? What kind of rate would they have to invest that $150,000 at to guarantee $91,000 a year? They would have to get 61% year over year guaranteed on that 150 to generate 91.

Let me do the math backward. So if they thought, "Well, I can invest this money at 5%," what kind of amount would I have to set aside to make sure my long-term care was taken care of? They would have to set aside $1.8 million, earning 5% year over year guaranteed, to generate the same $91,000.

Guaranteed.

Guaranteed. Which we don't always get that guarantee, right?

And that is before taxes. Because if you're gonna put it in an investment, and you got $91,000 a year coming in, you're paying tax on $91,000. If we put it into a long-term care policy and we generate $91,000 a year, that's not taxable.

Right. And I go through these scenarios in my book. I lay out all the numbers. So $1.8 million earning 5% generates $91,000. But that's just for one person. What if you needed it for two? Well, now you gotta double that. So now we're talking about setting aside $3.9 million at 5% to generate $91,000 for each person that they cannot outlive.

So the problem is, we don't know how long they're going to use this, but then also the ripple effect — that people that just wanna pay for it out of pocket, it doesn't make sense.

I just wanna leave my kids more. If I'm wealthy, why would I want to take that money, and why would I want to lose $91,000 a year of the assets that I have built, for long-term care, when I could have just had the long-term care policy?

So would I rather set aside $150,000 to get 91, or $1.8 million to get 91? Either way, you're getting 91. This one is tax-free. This one I call invisible income.

That one is guaranteed.

This one's guaranteed, and I call it invisible income. Why invisible income? Because it's income that the government doesn't see as taxable. It comes through as an insurance source, therefore it doesn't wreck their tax plan.

So here's what happens. They have this money invested, and they pull that money out. I'm going to make up numbers here. Let's say these same 60-year-old clients, they're living comfortably on $200,000 a year. That's what they have and they spend every dime. But now they need another 100, because now he is going into a nursing home. That doesn't mean her bills went away. She still needs 200. So now they gotta pull out $300,000. The government sees that, don't they?

So the government sees 300, so now you're in a higher tax bracket. We don't even know what tax brackets are gonna be at that time. My guess is maybe higher. So that's just how it goes. So now I'm paying higher federal tax. I'm paying higher state tax. I'm also paying higher Medicare premiums, because I'm in a higher income bracket for IRMAA.

So IRMAA is — what does that stand for? Income-Related Monthly Adjustment Amount. Basically, Medicare premiums are based on your income. The more income you show, the more they charge you. And that's for two people if you're married.

But I just found out from a client — did you know that if he takes, he wanted to take more money out of his IRA —

'Cause they look back.

And his Medicare would have gone up for two years based on a one-year extra withdrawal. So it's not like he pays extra for one year. Nope. It's two years.

Yep. So here's what — I'm gonna boil it down to this simple. They're gonna pull out $1.35 to $1.60 to get $1 that they need to spend. That, I don't care how much money you have, that does not make sense.

Yep. And wealthy people don't want to pay taxes.

Wealthy people don't do that. So I go back to, it's a math problem.

And we figured it out in the discounted dollar scenario that I like to use. And they would be paying 21 cents for every dollar of care. 21 cents. You're gonna give the insurance company 21 cents, and they're gonna pay the care facility a dollar. So why would we not want to? That's like saying, "I'm too wealthy to have life insurance." Are you?

Well, and some people say that, and here's why. You've got financial professionals out there that tell clients, "Oh, you got plenty of money. You don't need insurance." And that would be the equivalent to me going, "Hey, you've got plenty of money. You don't need health insurance. You can just drop your health insurance and stroke a check for cancer. Stroke a check for that heart surgery. You're gonna pay $2 million. You got $2 million. Just pay $2 million out of pocket." Why on earth would you do that?

'Cause wealthy people still have catastrophic insurance.

Yes. That would be, in my opinion, that would be malpractice, to have a financial pro say, "Drop your health insurance. You can write a check for cancer." But yet they get away with it when it comes to Alzheimer's. And not everybody gets cancer, but there's a 91% chance that you or Scott will end up needing long-term care. That's almost a sure thing. So if someone tells you you don't need long-term care insurance, in my opinion, it's malpractice, especially if you have wealth. I can't wrap my brain around the math.

And let's go to the opposite of, I have nothing. I have a house and I have a couple cars and I don't need anything. And I don't need any long-term care because I don't have anything to protect.

So wealthy people, and farmers and ranchers in particular in the agriculture industry, we want long-term care. They understand why they want long-term care. But outside of that industry, it is a tough, tough sell, I guess you could say, because people are like, "Well, I don't need it. I don't have anything to protect."

Well, an example of that would be my mother-in-law is having to care for her aunt, because they didn't have any children. So they had quite a bit of money saved up. He went to the nursing home. They used a lot of that money for him to be in the nursing home. She went to an assisted living facility. Everything was great and fantastic. Assisted living was very inexpensive compared to the nursing home where she was. Very inexpensive.

She fell, broke her hip, I believe, and now into the nursing home she goes. Well, they're also finding out she's doing much better in the nursing home 'cause she's eating like she's supposed to. It's just a better option for her. So she is in the nursing home, and it's so expensive that we are now out of money.

So my mother-in-law was telling me that she has to get five years of bank statements. 'Cause I made a snide comment and I said, "Oh, she's gonna lose her private room." 'Cause now she's gonna go on Medicaid, and she's gonna have a roommate. And she didn't know if that was gonna happen or not, 'cause of the facility that she's in. But she has to get five years of her bank statements. Like, I'm like, "That's insane."

I guess I never thought of what all the paperwork was gonna be for Medicaid. And you and I were talking about this before we started recording. Like, long-term care just basically turns on with, "Hey, a doctor said you lost two of the six." It's just gonna turn on. Medicaid says, "Yeah, we'll turn on, but you got some paperwork to do." And you get to go run down to the bank and pick up five years of bank statements, and then you get to go to the Medicaid office. And I've never done any of this, but I'm assuming the Medicaid office is not technically savvy, so I can just email those all there or upload them to some website. 'Cause, you know, it's government.

It might be easier, but I would lose my mind at five years of bank statements. I lose my mind when I have to apply for a bank loan, and they're like, "Can you give me three months of bank statements?" That's annoying.

Yeah. It is. So there's a lot there too. I actually write about Medicaid and Medicare in my book. The chapter's called "Entitled to What?" Because Medicare is an entitlement program. Medicaid is not an entitlement program. You don't just get it 'cause you paid in. And I have some people that go, "Oh, well, I paid in. It'll pay for me." No. It's means-tested. It's needs-based. So you have to show that you don't have money.

I'm generalizing here. It is designed for people that don't have any money. They don't have income and/or assets in order to pay for themselves. It's designed to pay for poor people. And so what they're doing, because there is a five-year look-back, they're asking for five years of bank statements and any kind of paperwork, because they need to see what you did with your money. Because if they see that there were any improper transfers — basically, I moved my money into your name, or I paid you a large lump sum — they will assess a penalty period. So that penalty period is how much time before they will actually start paying, if you repositioned money and you shouldn't have.

And so there are things that are countable assets that they will include, and then some things that are okay. Like, you're allowed to pay for your burial. They want your plot to be taken care of, and that's not included. That's not considered, like, I just paid money on something unnecessary.

So there's a lot of detail to it. The problem with Medicaid is it is state-specific. Most of the rules are the same, but you're also based on the counties. So you're dealing with some people that are working for the county, and they're very strict and they want every single detail. Maybe some aren't so much, or they've had a change in the guard and all that kind of stuff. Technically, it is a five-year look-back for people to qualify for Medicaid, and they're going to assess a penalty or not.

Look, let me back up. There are people that are not going to be candidates for getting a policy in place, because they can't afford it, or they don't have assets. If they do have income or have assets, something is better than nothing. So let's say they only bought a two-year policy — which I would encourage, even a shorter policy, because that buys the family a lot of time. It relieves a lot of pressure. It keeps them at home longer instead of going into Medicaid, right? So they might be able to keep at home a little bit longer.

But that also could help to satisfy some of that look-back period. So if they had done some kind of improper transfer and they had five years of coverage, that could help bridge that gap. So look, always explore it. Don't just say, "Well, I don't have any money."

And for someone to say, "I don't have anything to protect" — you have a spouse that you might want to protect, because it breaks them when they have to care for you. You have an adult daughter that is raising her own children. Maybe you want to protect her. You don't want to be a burden on her.

And look, there are a lot of daughters out there that say — and I talk about this in my book — you know, you should take care of your parents. They raised you. You should. And I don't disagree. I have one kid that says, "Mama, I will never move you in a nursing home. I will take care of you." And I say, "Bless your heart, you don't know what you're saying." 'Cause it's hard. And I have the other one that says, "Mama, I'm not taking care of you." And I go, "Smart girl. Don't do that." 'Cause I don't want to impact her life.

But you can have joy and feel grateful and privileged and honored to take care of your parents, and at the exact same time, feel frustrated and anger about the position that you're in. You can feel all of that all at the same time, and it's okay. So I'm telling your people out there, if you feel that way, don't feel guilt and shame.

And it's not just about protecting assets. As you sit here and talk about the nursing home, it is, like, the one thing that I dread in life. I don't get scared by a lot of things, but I do worry about going to the nursing home and nobody coming to see me. And you're just left alone forever.

It happens.

And so I want to stay home as long as I possibly can. And so that means my long-term care was purchased so my butt can stay at home. I don't want to be stuck away in some filthy, smelly nursing home that you're pushing a button and somebody ignores you, and the kids don't come see you. That policy for me is not just about protecting assets. It's about being able to make sure that I'm cared for at home. So there are different reasons. If you say, "I don't have anything to protect," great, fine, fantastic. Where do you want to be cared for then?

Yeah. I have one client that ended up buying a smaller policy — not for affordability reasons, but they were like, "I'm going to take care of him. But I know I'm gonna need help and I know I'm gonna want a break. I want to go see my grandbabies."

So these policies will also pay what's called respite care. It's basically giving you vacation. So let's say your daughter says, "Nope, I'm gonna do most of it. I want to take care of my mom. I love her. Maybe I'm a nurse, I'm a natural caretaker." That's fine. But you're gonna want a break. You're not gonna want to do this 24 hours a day.

So even if your parents had bought, let's say, $2,000 in care benefit per month, $2,000 pays for a lot of breaks. Maybe you only want to do it four days a week and you need a break three days a week. Well, it will pay for a professional to come in and do that caregiving three days a week. You don't want to do this 24 hours a day. You're going to want to go to the mall, or go have lunch, or go exercise, for Pete's sake. Take care of yourself.

So a lot of people think it's all or nothing. I gotta get the full amount or I don't get anything at all, and that is just a bad way of thinking about this. Again, you're buying a lot of breaks, you're buying a lot of relief, you're buying a lot of time.

All right, Michelle, let's get into some strategies on how to pay for this. So we have a mutual client now that said, "Hey, Mary Jo, can I just use my cash value to pay for the policy?" And I'll be honest, I had not even thought of that before, because I didn't ever really look at the premiums. I don't sell long-term care, so it's not something I noticed massive savings on. I do know that my policy is a 20-pay because it cut the premium in half versus 95. But I didn't ever look at single pays, and we never sat down and actually looked at strategy.

Long story short, I said, "Well, yeah, you totally could. You could put extra in year one, 'cause when I structure a policy, we can put extra in year one, and we could borrow against that and pay for your long-term care, if that makes sense."

You're kind of getting two birds with one stone.

Yeah. And so I ran the strategy, and I called you up like, "Michelle, I have a strategy." So we laid out the strategy for you guys a little bit. So we have two different scenarios here.

One is, we have a mutual client that, because of his health condition, he has to buy a policy separate from his wife. So this would be a single policy, and it's $4,000 a month in care with an inflation rider of 3%. So I don't know if you guys can see that, but the dog is doing her thing. She sometimes thinks she's a bull and she's gonna charge people.

Okay, this is one person, and it's $4,000 a month of care, and you put a 3% inflation rider on that policy. I did, and I'll tell you why.

With this one real quickly — it's because of the health condition, because I don't know if qualification is gonna be a problem later on, so they might not be a stacking candidate, meaning to add on.

Because of the health.

Because of the health. Yep.

And so normally Michelle's not doing an inflation rider on somebody that is this age, but in this scenario we are.

So the premium for him is $73,000 — no, one time. Single premium. Sorry. This is not gonna help any of you if I can't get this crap right. Okay, so his single premium for $4,000 a month of care with an inflation rider is $73,000 one time. Single pay.

Or he could pay yearly till he's 95, and he is 39, so he could pay yearly $4,200 a year. So his total out-of-pocket to 95 would be $224,000. Now, that's if we're not on and off with care, right?

But if he borrowed from his cash value — and this particular client already has cash value sitting there that he's not using. So if you're a client that is listening and you don't have cash value you're using — he could borrow $73,000 of cash value, and he could pay for Michelle's policy. If he paid that back over 20 years at 5.5% interest, let's say his policy's at 5.5, his total out-of-pocket would be $122,000. Total. Over 20 years.

That is half. That's $100,000 less than what he would pay the insurance company till he's 95. And his payment would be $6,100 a year back to his policy.

Okay, so there's a couple things there. You're like, "Yeah, but Mary Jo, it would've been $4,200 to the insurance company." Yep, sure would've been. But if he wants to pay less, he could pay less. If he wants to pay more, he could pay more. If he has a good year, commodity prices go up, and he's like, "Yeah, I came into some money," then great, fantastic, he could pay more. He could miss a payment if he needed to. So commodity prices go down, all of a sudden he has to buy out dad, or he has to buy a new piece of equipment. He could just pay less. Not a big deal.

And he has a guaranteed $48,000 a year in care income for six years, plus the 3% each year. He would have access to his cash value. When he paid that $6,000 back, he now has access to $6,000 that he can borrow back again. So it's not like it's money that's gone that he doesn't get to access. And he has more death benefit, which is also super important.

I love it. I absolutely love it in this scenario. It might not work in every scenario, but this one in particular — because once the money comes to my policies, the long-term care, it's done. It's parked. And there's not a lot of flexibility. There's a lot of benefit. It's rich, and it's sexy when it comes to the long-term care stuff, but there's not flexibility in making the premium payments. They have to be paid. But what you've offered him is flexibility in paying it back, because mine's already taken care of. So he's got a lot of different opportunities that he could do with your types of policies as far as it being the payer. I love it, and it saves a lot of money over the number of years that he would be obligated to pay.

That's insane.

It's insane. So I love the math. Again, we're getting down to the math. We're not talking that he doesn't need the long-term care coverage. It's, what is the best way to fund it that offers him the most flexibility? And yours does it, and saves quite a bit.

Yep. And we have another one. So this is husband and wife. They're 45 years old. Michelle quoted them $6,000 a month per person for care. So it's $6,000 a month of coverage, and $12,000 a month if they both are in at the same time. So we talked about that earlier, that it's $6,000 per person.

If they paid a single pay premium of $68,000 — one time. Oh my gosh. How come I screw that up all the time? $68,000 one time. A single pay of $68,000, they've got their $6,000 a month of care. A five-pay would be $100,000. A 10-pay was $101,000, and the pay to 95 was $204,000. These are what they would total. So over five years it would total $100,000; 10 years, $101,000; pay to 95, $204,000.

So this is the insured that called me and said, "Mary Jo, why would I pay $100,000 over five years when I can just pay $68,000 one time?" So if we took — now, she would need a new policy, 'cause she doesn't have existing cash value. So if she took a new policy and we put enough in there year one, she could borrow $68,000 in 10 days at 5.5% interest.

Over five years she would pay back the policy, and her total loan repayment would be $79,620 over five years. If she did the five-year plan with Michelle, out of pocket would be $100,000. If she did 10 years to the policy and she borrowed the $68,000, paid it back to her policy over 10 years at 5.5% interest, it would have cost her $90,000. 10 years with Michelle would be $101,000.

30 years, if she said, "You know what? I'm just gonna pay this back over 30 years," she would have a total out-of-pocket payment of $140,000 to her cash value, interest, everything. Instead, with Michelle, it would have been $204,000 to pay to 95. So it's a huge savings.

If you have to do payments because of cash flow, you do payments, okay? But if we have the ability to do a single pay and we can borrow cash value and then make the payments back and have that flexibility, why not?

And here's the one thing we looked at with her, on her policy. We didn't write this down, but do you remember — if she would put that premium in, and that's growing income tax-free. Uninterrupted compound interest and dividends. Now granted, she's having to pay premium every year. And we had to make sure that she could pay premium every year, which she could.

But she was going to anyway.

Right. She was going to start a policy regardless, because they have extra cash. At the end of the day, when she was, like, 85, I wanna say it was several million dollars or something in cash value. Do you remember?

I don't recall exactly what it was. We looked at so many numbers yesterday.

We did. But let's just talk about that piece, that now her money is earning compound interest and dividends. So she paid this out of pocket to the insurance company and paid back her loan. She had access to the principal, again, in 10 days. So she lost the interest portion of it, but she also had earning uninterrupted compound interest and dividends over her lifetime. It paid for itself. It was kinda like getting free long-term care. Kind of.

It's like going to the P&C guy, and he's like, "Hey, you want some life insurance? Because if you do your car, your home, and your life insurance with us, then we can give you a multi-policy discount and it's basically free." I sold that every day all day long when I worked in P&C, because as a P&C agent, if we could do multi-policy discounts for people, the discount was so low that they got life insurance for free, essentially.

Yeah. But it's what we're doing.

Because we're cost saving. If we can run it through a policy first, and if it makes sense, it's definitely a strategy to explore.

It's worth the numbers. Because here's what it is. It's not that there's not a value with them sending $4,000 a year each year to my policy to get $72,000 a year access to, for life, for each person. That makes sense, right? $4,000 to get $72,000. I'll take that. But what if it's even better than that?

And that's what you're showing is — because once the $4,000, well, I'm just using that as the example, the $4,000 comes to my policy, it's done. It's not earning more. It doesn't have any dividends paying. It's not doing anything. And the death benefit's limited. But what if it could go through yours first, then come to me? Over in yours, they're picking up a million dollars more in death benefit. And it's the same premium. And they're making the same payment.

Yes. What we looked at is, we're making the same yearly payment back to our cash value loan as we were giving you. Like, sadly, you guys, I'm not here to ever lie to you. I did not ever think of it, because I never had to look at it. But thank God I have smart clients. Because we worked on one of our mutual clients last night. And I was like, "Michelle, I'm emailing him right now. Because he could save so much money, and he's got this money sitting in his policy. So we gotta call him back." We're calling you after we're done here.

And again, the caveat is this might not work in every scenario. It's just another way to think about it.

Oh, my gosh, it is the reason why Michelle and I can work together. And another benefit of working with Michelle if you work with me. Because, you guys, here's the thing — I'm not making any money off of Michelle selling policies. I am not splitting commission with her. Well, okay, I take 1% commission so I can see your stuff in my system, okay? But I am not here to sell long-term care for Michelle because I make extra money.

But when we can — it's so beautiful that we can work together and go, "Hey, what about this strategy? Oh, my gosh, that's gonna be so much better for the client financially." So if we have to talk with every client, we talk to see if the strategy's gonna work.

Why wouldn't you explore it?

Right. And running numbers is kinda easy. A single pay versus a 20-pay is astronomically different. So if we have the option to do it, let's do it.

And a single pay is always gonna be the least expensive way, I should say, to do it. It's no different than buying a house. If you paid cash for a house, you get the best deal on the house. If you have to mortgage it over years, you're gonna pay more for it, but you still get the house. So making the payments isn't the problem, but if you're younger, it means that you're making those payments for quite some time. So it can really add up. So by pursuing these other options — how do we minimize the out-of-pocket cost over a long period of time, but still get what we need?

Because we are in agreement with this. People can build up their farming business, do all that kind of stuff, do their banking policies, but you still need to protect it. And I put a video out there talking about, you can do all the trust work, all the wills, all those things that you want, and they work when you die. But what if you don't die? That's the problem. What if death is not the problem? What if you're living a long time, but you're not able to care for yourself? That's when the dollars start hemorrhaging, and trusts don't work. Wills don't work. None of that stuff is even in play yet, because you're still living.

So we have to not only help them with their banking strategy and all those things, but we have to protect it. So long-term care is the bow that wraps around the entire plan, to insulate it, to make sure that whatever you're planning on passing on at death actually happens.

It's not one or the other.

It's both. And so, yeah, I'm pretty excited about that strategy, because we can save people a lot of money — and they're recovering their payments back to themselves so they can reuse it in cash value.

Well, and you know what? I'm gonna double down on this. You've mentioned it, we mentioned it twice — the flexibility that it offers your ag community. Because they need the flexibility. They don't have the consistency. There's ups and downs. Whereas mine requires that every single year, if you're gonna do a payment. But by doing it your way, it gives them that flexibility as cow prices rise and —

If you have to miss a payment or whatever. You know, it's the same reason that I write my business with OneAmerica, and I've talked about this. They have the flexibility in the premium. They don't have this averaging stuff. They don't have a bunch of stuff that other companies have, and I need that for my farmers. I need to know that in a bad year they've got some wiggle room.

And their minimum is ridiculously low.

Right. So it gives that kind of flexibility. So when we can flexibly pay our long-term care policies, if this strategy works, it's definitely worth exploring. Otherwise, we just make the payments to the long-term care policy over a period of time like we would've anyway without knowing Mary Jo, and we go on about our business.

That's right.

So let's close with — what have you found? This has been fun to watch, because you've been pretty busy with farmers since our last podcast. A lot has changed for Michelle. She's written a book. After our last podcast I'm like, "How come you don't have a book?" So she wrote a book. So she's got a book. She's learning about the farming community. And you're really enjoying that community — compared to, not that you don't enjoy other people, but it's very different from non-farmers. And it's been fun to listen to. So what are you learning?

Well, I'm learning as much as I can and it's been wonderful. Here's what I will say, just generally speaking, about the agriculture community that I've been working with. These people are just fantastic people. They love their families. They want to do what's right. They are hardworking. They are hyper-focused on legacy. I think everything that they're doing now, they always think about the next play or the next move.

And ultimately I feel like — and again, this is generally speaking — I feel like they are recipients of what someone else had built, and they're trying to expand on that. So protecting that is really important. Not that it's not important to just the general public, but it feels like to me they're hyper-aware of that responsibility.

So what I have found, which has been eye-opening to me, is that I have more younger farmers in the farming community that are interested in long-term care, proactively reaching out, than I have ever imagined. Usually what happens with the general population, they're calling when they're in their 60s, and maybe it's because they listen to Dave Ramsey and he said you don't need it till your 60s. Well, there's a problem with that. It's more expensive, and you might have some health conditions that might limit your options.

So that has been amazing to me, is that we have a younger population. Maybe those are the ones that are inheriting the farming business or whatever it is, and they are very aware of what's happened to mom and dad or even grandma and grandpa. And they're going, "I wanna take care of this while I'm younger." That is impressive to me. To have younger people going, "I need to do this now."

The second one that is really impressive to me is more men have been interested in this. Historically, it's been women, and here's why. Generally speaking, women are the caregivers, and they're the ones that need cared for longer. So women are hyper aware — like, "Hey, I know this is gonna be a problem because I took care of my mom, and I don't want that. I don't want my kids taking care of me." So it's been more of a women's issue. Not necessarily the case. More men are starting to need care just as much as women these days.

But to have men calling me going, "I want to protect my family," that is super cool. I'm just saying super cool, like I'm — groovy. It's so groovy. But it is super cool to have men calling me going, "I need to take care of my wife. I need to make sure that my kids are taken care of, and most importantly, I need to make sure that there's a farm or a ranch still there if something happens to me." They're aware of the price. They are aware that they are land rich, and oftentimes cash poor.

Most times cash poor.

And so if the worst thing happens, what does that do to everything? And so that is what's impressive to me, is that they are paying attention to these things. I think versus the older generation, where they kind of swept it under the rug like, "Well, somebody'll deal with it." I'm seeing younger men that are going, "I don't want that to happen. I'm going to do the proper planning now so that that doesn't happen to my family and my farm later." And I love that.

Yeah. I also think it's a testament to the people that listen to this podcast. Because they are very proactive. So the farmers that are not listening are the ones that are not proactive.

And we in the agriculture community — and Michelle will experience this as she gets further and further into this community — but there is so much whining and crying and bitching and moaning about how everything is so hard, and it's gonna be so hard, and people don't care about leaving it to the next generation, and the boomers are the worst people on the planet, right?

This is proof that that is not what's happening. That there are 60-year-olds and 70-year-olds that are looking and saying, "Hey, how are we passing this off?" It is also proof, when I talk about there is going to be a 20-year lag. In 20 years, we're gonna see a whole different agriculture community than what we have now, because those people taking over are planners, and they are looking for different ways. And those people are the ones listening to the podcast.

And so that's coming, and it's slowly developing, but it is nice to see it from a different perspective of who is calling you and who is doing some of that planning. Because I still have boomers calling me for life insurance. In the general agriculture community, you hear so much negative, and there's some positive stuff happening.

There is some positive. Again, I think that that's what's been so impressive to me. Because maybe you guys — when I say you guys, you in the agriculture community — you're only within your own community, so you think that everybody thinks a certain way. I've been used to working with people in all communities, and I'm telling you that the general population, they don't think like what I'm experiencing your farmers and your ranchers thinking. Their kids move all over the country, and it happens here, too. But they're all over the place, and they're like, "They'll deal with whatever."

That's not the feeling that I've been getting from these folks. They are making sure that they are giving their families choice and dignity and options, and they're doing everything that they possibly know — via listening to your podcast, they're doing everything that they know is within their power to make sure that it's protected.

And it is about saving a legacy, creating generational wealth. That is extremely important in agriculture, and I don't see that in other industries.

No, I don't either. They know their value.

And so it's exciting. It's exciting to hear how many you've met with and how many people have gotten long-term care policies. Yeah, it's great. I'm excited about it.

They know how devastating it can be when you have to start piecing off the farm 'cause you have no other choice.

That great-great-great grandpa settled.

Well, and Medicaid is not just gonna look at your income. Your land is an asset. And so you have to spend that down in order to get Medicaid. Or, there's a lot of people that say, "Well, I can go to an attorney, and I can just put it in someone else's name." That comes with its own complications. By transferring assets and getting things out of your control —

Yeah, that's a five-year look-back.

Well, it's a five-year look-back, but also when you give up control, because it has to be completely out of your name. You put it in your kid's name, they get divorced, now what?

And most people don't wanna lose control.

They don't wanna lose control. And by the way, here's where I'll say this. You don't live your entire life not ending up on government aid to end up on government aid. That's not your only option. You have other options where you can have choice and dignity, and it doesn't cost that much. So if you do proper planning ahead of time, Medicaid is not your only option. It's your only option if you wait, potentially. So do the proper planning now, and you don't have to worry about government aid. You don't have to worry about selling off pieces of the farm or giving up control over your property. You don't have to do that. There's other options.

And we're gonna end there, folks, because that was perfectly said. Hey, Michelle, where can they find your book and make an appointment and all that good stuff?

Yeah. I hope that they enjoy the book. It was fun writing it. Amazon is where I have it right now. It'll probably be in different places in the future, but right now, Amazon. You can go to my website at careincomeplanning.com. There is also gonna be links if they want to schedule a meeting with me, in the podcast notes.

Yeah. In the show notes we have a specific link to schedule a meeting with Michelle. And maybe we could just throw it on her website as well. Like, if you heard about it on Farming Without the Bank, you can use that link. It is helpful to use that link so she knows that she's talking to a farmer.

Very helpful.

When you schedule with her. Otherwise, if you don't, and you just go to her website, that's fine. But thank you for coming. I appreciate it.

No, thank you. It's always my pleasure to come and be with you. You're so much fun and so welcoming, and I love what you do for your people, and I love to be affiliated with that. I just think it's amazing.

Awesome. Well, thank you. All right, guys, you know the routine. maryjo@withoutthebank.com. If you have comments, questions, concerns — if there is a topic you want to hear or somebody you want interviewed, let me know. If it is in alignment with me, I will be happy to do that. If it is not in alignment with me, I'm not sending you someplace that I don't trust, or to people I don't trust, or to do things I just don't know about. So let me know, maryjo@withoutthebank.com.

Otherwise, if you don't have your policy, maybe you should get the book and read it and get a policy. If you are a client and you want to say, "Hey, how do we do that strategy together? I've got some cash value I'm not using," then let's look at that avenue. Okay, you guys, you have a fantastic rest of your day.