How do I qualify for long-term care benefits?

How do I qualify for long-term care benefits?

Elliot Matloff (President and Broker, The Matloff Company) gives expert video advice on: Do I need long-term care insurance?; When should I buy long-term care insurance?; How do I qualify for long-term care benefits? and more...

When you open up a long-term care insurance policy, it specifies how and when they are going to pay you. To qualify for benefits with all long-term care policies for all companies in America, typically you have to be unable to do two activities of daily living. They sometimes call them ADL's, Activities of Daily Living, and the typical activity of daily living is bathing or being able to bath yourself, continence, dressing yourself, being able to eat by yourself, toileting yourself and transferring yourself in and out of bed. If you can't do two of those activities, then you qualify for long-term care benefits. Any two out of six activities of daily living, if you are unable to do those, the insurance company says that you are able to qualify now for benefits. If you have any type of severe cognitive impairment like Alzheimer's' or severe dementia, that alone triggers the benefits on a long-term care policy. You have to have proof of that you are unable to do these things and then you are eligible to make a claim.