Meeting the cost of residential and nursing care in old age is a growing issue for many people in the UK. As life expectancy continues to lengthen, more of us can expect to require some form of long term care.
While the state can help with some costs, eligibility for help is limited and many people find themselves over the threshold for support so it is important to be aware of financial options available to you.
The cost of a room in a care home has rocketed by 9.3 per cent in two years, with the average room costing £28,367 per annum, a survey of 165 private care homes found. The average cost of a room is more than double the average pensioner income of £13,799 and the gap ‘continues to increase’, the survey said.
More than three million middle aged and retired people have effectively given up saving for their old age believing there is “no point” because it will only be taken away to pay for care.
One recent study estimated that more than a million families have had to sell their home in the last five years alone in order to pay care bills for loved-ones.
With council budgets under intense strain, more than 450,000 frail elderly and disabled people who would have received state support for the care even a few years ago are now shut out of the system, academics at the London School of Economics have calculated.
(Source: The Daily Telegraph)
Cedar House Financial Services specialises in the provision of long-term care solutions for clients of all ages and needs;
Long-term care planning
Care at home
Most of us would like to stay in our own homes – and local authorities try to enable this for as long as possible.
The average cost of home care is £15 an hour. So just two hours of daily home care could amount to almost £10,950 a year. Live-in care can start at around £27,612 a year.
Residential care
The cost of residential care can vary hugely by location and depending on whether an individual requires nursing or not. The table below shows average regional weekly care home costs around the UK for 2011/12 – with and without nursing care.
On average an individual can expect to pay around £27,144 a year for a residential care home, rising to over £38,000 if nursing is required.
People are living longer
The costs can be end up being greater than originally anticipated. While the average life expectancy for an individual going into long term care is around 2 and a half years*, this allows for severely sick and disabled people requiring nursing care admitted straight from hospital and therefore receiving state funding.
If we remove this group of care residents from the statistics, our experience suggests that the average stay in a care home for a self-funder is actually more like 4 years, with a 1 in 8 chance of living over 7 years.
(Source: Partnership assurance).
Cedar House can help plan for the future by calculating the present funds required to cover long-term care in the future. As independent advisers, Cedar House works with all the major investment providers and has access to over 20,000 funds.
Our experienced team will assess each individual’s attitude to risk to select a fund(s) to suit. The funds will be continuously monitored and reviewed with our clients’ on a regular basis to ensure your investments perform to the individuals expectations.
Cedar House Financial Services works with all the market leading suppliers of insurance products to fund care fees and offers a range of plans that are tailored to an individual’s needs. By taking health into consideration, Cedar House is able to provide enhanced levels of income to help meet care fees payments.
For help with your Long-term Care Planning, please be in touch with Cedar House House Financial Services.
Lloyd Kafton