Long term care insurance (LTCI) policies are very much different from most of the other kinds of insurance. As a result, even the foundational features of these policies require taking some time to understand before making your final decision. But what about all the other options and features that are not built into the policy and require you to pay extra to get them? In my opinion, LTCI policies are best kept simple. If you have done your homework on setting up the foundational features of the policy, you have already done 90% of the work in most cases. It is always a very good idea to explore those other options if you feel that you can afford to spend more on your care, but you also need to examine whether they are truly going to be cost-effective in your case.

One good way to do this is to narrow down your selection to the two to three carriers that you feel most comfortable with and get quotes on a straightforward policy setup with no extras or options added. Next, add the options where you might be interested in one at a time and get a new quote. This will tell you exactly how much extra you can expect to pay for these options. Once you it all figured out, it’s much easier to decide if the options you are considering are really worth pursuing further.

Here is a list of some of the most popular options in Long Term Care Insurance policies:

1. Return of Premium:  This will allow you to recieve back all or some of the premiums that you pay into the policy if you either decide to cancel the policy or if you die without using all of your entitled benefits. This is often a very expensive option.

2. Survivorship.  The benefits of this option can vary from carrier to carrier, but typically it says that if the policy premiums have always been paid for a specific period of time, often ten years, and one spouse dies, the surviving spouse’s policy is considered paid up with no further premiums required.

3. Restoration of Benefits. This provision restores all of the benefits paid out for care if a policyholder fully recovers and does not suffer a relapse for a specified period of time (usually six months).

4. Waiver of Home Health Care Elimination Period:  This one reduces the elimination period (the amount of days that you pay for your own care before the insurance company starts to pay) to zero. This can only mean that it starts to pay from the very first day of services rendered if the care is received at home.

There are other options that can be considered when shopping for LTCI too, but in my experience the most common danger is getting bogged down in these extra features that really do not impact the total quality of your future continuous care nearly as much as the foundational features. That’s why having a knowledgeable and experienced agent help you with the process can often reduce much of the confusion surrounding these options so that you can select the policy and features that suit you best.