Whether you are single or in a committed relationship, it is hard enough to take care of the challenges of day-to-day living without having to worry about planning for the future. Despite your hectic life, many of you have taken the time necessary to plan for retirement and for your life insurance needs. Unfortunately, not enough people have taken the time to evaluate the need for long-term care.

Long-term care is the service provided by someone helping you manage your day to day routine. Typically this would occur if you could not perform several activities of daily living (commonly referred to as ADLs) on your own. These ADLs could include eating, dressing, bathing, toileting, or ambulating. Cognitive impairments such as Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s could also warrant long-term care. Those receiving this care could reside at home, an assisted living facility, or a nursing home.

Several factors affecting the population today make long-term care, and the costs associated with this care, a growing concern. According to a study by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, approximately 40% of those aged 65 and over will need some form of long-term care during their lives. With AARP’s estimates of nursing home costs averaging over $56,000 per year and stays lasting longer than 2½ years, you can see the potential for your retirement assets to suffer greatly if you required nursing home care. Worse yet, the costs could escalate should you require in-home or assisting living care prior to or after your stay in a nursing home.

To complicate matters, domestic partners have several disadvantages regarding long-term care not faced by a traditional married couple. The first disadvantage involves providers of care. Historically, children provide the first line of care when a parent requires assistance around the home or with the cost of a nursing home. Estimates by Medicaid state that 70% of the care offered to the elderly community comes from family. Because the majority of gay and lesbian couples do not have children, they must plan on paying for their care.

Medicaid presents the GLBT community with several obstacles. In order to qualify for Medicaid, you must spend down the majority of your assets and turn over most of your income (including pension and Social Security income). If you were married, Medicaid would allow your spouse to stay at your home. Medicaid would also permit you to maintain additional investments (the greater of $18,552 in assets or half the couple’s joint assets up to $92,760) and income (at least $1,515 per month and may allow $2,319 per month—amount varies by state) to provide for your spouse’s day-to-day expenses. However, domestic partners are treated as two individuals. As two individuals, Medicaid will not exempt any of your income (including your pension) or investments to provide for your partner. Additionally, if you own your home jointly, Medicaid may require that you sell your home. This could force your partner out on the street with minimal assets. As you can see, if you want to rely on Medicaid, you must take steps to protect your assets for your partner.

The other issue develops when both parties rely too heavily on the pension income received by one partner. Due to corporate and government reluctance to recognize gay and lesbian couples as beneficiaries on pension plans, many domestic partners find themselves in a difficult situation should the recipient of the pension pass away. In a previous article, "Pension Planning for Gays and Lesbians," I wrote that few companies will allow non-spousal beneficiaries on pension plans. This means that the person receiving the pension income cannot pass that income (or even a portion of it) to someone other than a spouse. If one person receives long-term care and the other has a pension plan and passes away, the survivor may have to receive Medicaid benefits to cover his/her nursing home costs. The reduction of income could even force the survivor to move from his/her home to a nursing home.

If you want to protect your assets, your income, and your right to choose your options for care, you may want to look into long-term care insurance. When shopping for long-term care insurance, make sure you compare "apples to apples." All too frequently policies proposed by insurance agents and group policies appear to cover all of your needs at a discounted rate.

Insurance agents will often show you insurance estimates that include discounts for which you may or may not qualify. Group policies often provide reduced benefits to minimize their costs. I suggest finding a trustworthy advisor who can thoroughly explain your options. Your advisor should offer coverage through a reputable company, present proposals without health discounts (hopefully you will qualify for those later), and who can compare his/her policy against your other private and group policies. Most importantly, you should trust that this advisor will let you know if another company’s policy is better for you.