Senior Care Academy - A Helperly Podcast
Senior Care Academy is the podcast for caregivers, senior care providers, and families with aging loved ones. Hosted by experienced professionals, we explore essential topics like elder care planning, dementia support, financial advice, and emotional wellness for caregivers.
Each episode offers expert insights, practical tips, and resources to help you navigate senior care with confidence. Whether you're a healthcare provider, a family member supporting aging parents, or a senior adult seeking guidance, this podcast delivers actionable advice tailored to your needs.
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Senior Care Academy - A Helperly Podcast
The Hidden Costs of Delayed Caregiving with Raymond Lavine
Planning for long-term care might be the most important conversation your family isn't having. In this eye-opening episode, Raymond Lavine, founder of Lavine LTC Benefits, reveals why waiting to address caregiving needs creates unnecessary financial and emotional burdens for families across America.
Drawing from his personal experience caring for both parents, Raymond shares powerful insights that go beyond insurance policies to the heart of what matters: preserving relationships when caregiving becomes necessary. "Wife should always be wife, son should always be son—not caregivers," he emphasizes, highlighting how proper planning maintains the integrity of our most important connections.
We explore the three critical questions everyone should answer: Where do you want your care? Who will be responsible for it? And how will you pay for it? Raymond brilliantly reframes long-term care insurance as "a warranty on you," helping listeners understand that humans, like machines, eventually need maintenance—and having a plan for that inevitable reality isn't pessimistic but practical.
The conversation tackles common misconceptions about long-term care benefits, explains how modern policies have evolved to be more efficient, and outlines the various options available depending on your specific needs and circumstances. Raymond's empathetic approach to what many consider an uncomfortable topic transforms the discussion from one of fear to one of empowerment.
Whether you're in your 30s planning decades ahead, approaching retirement, or concerned about aging parents, this episode provides essential guidance for navigating one of life's most challenging transitions. As Raymond powerfully concludes: "Have the conversation." Your future self—and your loved ones—will thank you.
• Long-term care insurance functions as "a warranty on you," protecting your most valuable asset: yourself
• Three fundamental questions everyone should address: Where do you want care? Who will provide it? How will you pay for it?
• Family relationships suffer when spouses and children become caregivers instead of maintaining their primary roles
• Caregiving is a specialized skill that most people haven't been trained to perform
• People delay planning because insurance isn't immediately gratifying and forces confrontation with mortality
• Benefits activate based on inability to perform daily activities, not specific medical diagnoses
• Modern policies have become more efficient with streamlined health assessments and various coverage options
• Raymond's personal experience caring for his father through three extended periods shaped his approach
Have the conversation about long-term care planning now—whether with Raymond Levine, a financial advisor, or another knowledgeable professional. Contact Raymond through LinkedIn or at https://raymondlavineofficial.com/
Hey everyone, welcome back to Senior Care Academy podcast. I'm your host, caleb, and today's episode is one that you're definitely going to want to listen to. We are talking about something that affects almost every family at some point long-term care planning and, more specifically, the real cost of waiting too long to plan. To help us unpack this important topic, I'm thrilled to be joined by Raymond Levine, the founder of Levine LTC Benefits. Raymond has years of experience helping individuals and businesses understand why caregiving benefits aren't just available, but they're essential. He also brings personal insight, having walked through long-term care experiences, both his father and his mother, which give him a powerful and empathetic perspective. I'm really excited to have you, raymond. Thanks for giving us a few minutes of your time.
Speaker 2:Well, good afternoon and thank you for having me on your podcast. I'm delighted.
Speaker 1:Yeah, kind of to jump right in and start off. Raymond, could you share a little bit about your journey? How did you first get involved in long-term care planning?
Speaker 2:A lot of people in my business. If you ask a lot of long-term care, they call me a long-term care specialist. I like to call myself an extended care benefit advisor, benefit advisor. They're all sort of the same theme Everybody. They've been involved with caregiving with their parents, with a spouse or with their partner. There are others that get into it because they're financial planners or they're wealth advisors or they're insurance agents.
Speaker 2:Does something happen where they said you know, yeah, this would be a good benefit, good insurance plan to offer to my clients? I do have a thing about that where you know that we all come from different experiences with caregiving. But one of the things you know as time goes on and you know I've been in a long-term care business is that there are a couple of things that I think people need to understand about what this product is and why you know it's a value and a lot of your. You know the people that you have as guests on your program. They're on the other side. They're the caregivers. They're the people that are involved in the day-to-day caregiving.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly, or like operators or like different people that benefit from the long-term care programs or do the things, but they don't know. I I would definitely want to dive into kind of that.
Speaker 2:And that's the thing is, I'm the money person. The problem is it isn't caregiving. The problem is you have a person that needs caregiving and then people's families. So ultimately it's about money, it's about dollars, it's about people's time, it's about a motive. And the other thing in thinking about it is that caregiving is a skill. Parenting is a skill. Yeah, that's true, and when I was in high school and college, I never took a course in caregiving. I mean, of course, if you said I could say the same thing about marriage and a lot of other things, yeah, but but but it's a, it's a skill level. The other thing you know in the beginning to think about it is because the first thing when I have people that you know call me to say how much does it cost, you know what's the premium, you know I don't know if I want, and so they'll give you all the. You know you call them objections, but what I think of is they're not objections, they're just concerns or saying you know what am I doing?
Speaker 1:Things that they haven't been educated on yet. And I think I wonder, with your personal experience I don't know if you want to jump too much into it, but taking care of your parents' care needs, how did that, how did that shape your passion for it? And then also the way that you, since you experienced it, how did that shape the way that you discuss it with people when they come out and like I don't know if I want to pay this premium, I imagine having lived.
Speaker 2:It maybe gives you a different perspective that you're able to share. Well, there were actually certain segments about caregiving. My father needed caregiving for three extended times in his life. The first time when he was in an automobile accident. He was at a meeting in Sacramento and they were driving back in a car in a head-on collision oh my goodness. And the driver, you know, the hitter was killed, but the passenger, you know, they were all injured and he broke his back. I mean you know he was 80. But that was months of recovery.
Speaker 2:The second time he had, he fell off a horse because of his back. So he fell off a horse and he broke back. So he fell off a horse and he broke his hip and he broke his arm and he was out of commission for a year. I mean, he was in a hospital bed for a year. And then the third time he had had a heart condition and he had a heart attack and that was a slow decline. It took about two and a half years for him to die.
Speaker 2:But in that time, you know and it was caregiving by my mother my mother was also a lawyer and you know she had a practice. It's all the things that you know I'm sure your other guests have talked about is that once you're in caregiving it's up close and personal. Yeah, and other than you know intimacy or death, you know caregiving is about as intimate and personal as you're going to get other than death and intimacy. The point is that it involves people and you know I mean it disrupted her life. It's not that she didn't want to do it, but it's hard work, it's every day and the difference between caregiving and being a parent is that you know you can pick them up or you know you have. You know you have legal control.
Speaker 1:They weigh 30 pounds, not 200 pounds.
Speaker 2:Well, even if you're not even thinking about the weight is that they're an adult, they have powers and they have reasonabilities and they know, and you know, if they're not feeling well, they can be curmudgeons. I mean, they can be difficult people. My father he was a good patient, especially with my mother. They had a good marriage and they had a good relationship because they listened to each other and they respected each other. And if he got a little bit ornery, my mother had a good way of putting him in his place. I'll give you another. She knew how to give him perspective.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, that's a good thing, that's a nice way. Yeah, yeah, that I think you said something in there that I thought was interesting, right, like you said, we know that caregiving it's a very hands on intimate, all in can kind of consume your life, and so why do you think so many people delay planning for caregiving and then specifically even like looking into long term care options, when it is something that's so kind of all-consuming once it hits you?
Speaker 2:Let me just transition. I'll sort of do a sort of a weave, but I will get to the point of your question of you know why don't people do it? I'll give you the first authentic thing is who wants to, who wants to buy insurance, and what's so exciting about buying insurance or thinking about it? What's so exciting about thinking about caregiving? I mean, you know, if you say, yes, we're going to go on vacation, yes, you know we're going to get you a, you know, a really interesting car, you know it's going to get you motivated.
Speaker 1:But thinking about insurance and caregiving, yeah, let's pay for insurance and hope we might use it eventually, kind of thing. That's true. That's true.
Speaker 2:That's right. But you see and here's the difference is that when people think about insurance, they think of it as sort of like a fast food. You look at the menu, you pick out what you want and you pay. Or if you go to a restaurant, you're picking out of the menu. You have an idea of what you're doing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're like oh, I'm feeling like whatever, like Italian, let's go to this restaurant, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you want the side, or you want the dressing on the side. You want onions in it. Do you not want an onion in it? You know you want sour cream and with long-term care benefits. This is another thing that if you're not aware or confused, they'll go to where the last. You know. I mean a typical question. I know, you know I do Sometimes. It's you know what does it cost, you know what am I getting, but it's not fast. This is kind of benefit. It's not fast food. You know you really have to be patient about it and you know and this is where you know you know people always talk about you know, well, you know insurance salesmen are, you know, being salesy or all. It's really. It's empathy, it's you know.
Speaker 2:The first question I asked is you know, why are we having this conversation? What is it that you want to accomplish? I don't say why do you want to buy a long-term care benefit? I mean, you know, sometimes I might, depending on the situation, but is, why are you even thinking about it? What is? What is it that you think? How? How do you think that this might help you? I mean, you know you can ask a lot of questions about it. But I want to find out what's your story about? You know, caregiving Do you have one, you know? Is this something that concerns you? Have you had a parent or your spouse, or have you been advised to do it? So you know, I want to be empathetic to find out. Why do you want to do that?
Speaker 1:I'm not going to give you statistics, I'm not going to, you know, worry you or say you know, look, it's going to. Yeah, scare tactics kind of thing. That's right, it's almost. It's almost like long-term care and, I guess, insurance in general. But long-term care insurance, it's like I think of it's in essence, you're buying yourself security in the long run. Um, which is security is as intangible but also kind of like air, like if the air is around us, we don't think about it because it's available. But as soon as you don't have security, as soon as something-.
Speaker 2:Or you don't have air, or you don't have air. Yeah, You're like oh everything is not okay.
Speaker 1:It's the same, I think, where you lose that security aspect because you didn, because you didn't kind of you didn't opt into long-term care insurance, and then the air's out of the room and you're like, holy crap, this is thousands and thousands of dollars every month. What I know, that's one big one is the financial risk. But what are some of the biggest risks families face when they, like, don't have a long-term care? Maybe policy, but also plan in place.
Speaker 2:Well, there are three things that I tell myself and I tell people. The first is where do you want your care? Where do you want it? Do you want it at home, and have you organized your home? You know, have you done home improvements, or you know what have you done in your home or what do you need to do in your home that you can stay in your home and it can be done? And the second is who's going to be responsible for your care? Do you want professional caregivers to come in and do certain things? Do you want your family to be full or part-time, which I don't recommend because there is an economic cost.
Speaker 1:there is an economic cost and not to, not to mention the emotional, like I am a big believer that wife should always be wife, son should always be son, not wife and caregiver. Son and care, like being able to keep that relationship, minus all of like the, the logistics and like that come along with kind of caregiving and the like in your privacy, kind of winning. So anyways, but I'll let you keep going.
Speaker 2:Right, but it depends on, you know, the relationship with the family, what people are willing to. You know what responsibility, because it is, look, even if it's it's, it's not family free, it's not friends free. You know you're going to always be doing something, but the thing is that, well, that's. The third thing is how are you going to pay for it? Because, as I was saying earlier, I don't have caregiving. You know, I don't have a degree in caregiving and I don't, you know. I mean, I have an idea of it and I've done it. But there's certain, sometimes medical things. Or you know, if you need to transfer somebody, do you have the physical ability to do it? And, depending on you know, if you're single or you have a spouse or partner, you know they may not be able to do that, or there may be things that they need to take care of. Or you know if somebody you know is licensed as a nurse or something you know that can give you injections.
Speaker 2:I mean, the point is there are times that it makes sense to hire a you know, a competent and skilled professional. Well, you know a competent, skilled caregiver to do things sometimes I don't want to do. I just don't want to do it or I don't know how to do it. Yeah, I mean, it's the same as do you want to clean your house? Do you want to hire housekeeping from time to time? Cleaned your house, do you want to hire you know housekeeping from time to time? Or do you want to, you know, spray wash the driveway? Some people do it and they like it. Some people, you know, have that skill and they're okay with it. But if it's something you need to do or you've got to do all the time sometimes, I'd rather it may not necessarily be less expensive, but it certainly is good for my mental health.
Speaker 1:You have to have that mental to-do list of like oh my gosh, I have to get around to doing this, that's right.
Speaker 2:That's right. So those are the three things when do you want your care, who's going to be responsible for the care and where are the funds going to be to do that? And that's where you know sort of the. You know people wait for, for, for, for. For a lot of reasons not not. The biggest is that it isn't something that people you know train, you know have the habit of thinking about. When you get a car, you know what do you? What do you think about? You think about, you know the car, you think about payments you think about and you think about car insurance. And you know, you know and, or you want a home or a. You know, you think you think about that. Or it'll say, yeah, you got to have, you got to have the insurance. But the thing is, with caregiving insurance, you know what I something I came upon a couple months ago. You know what caregiving insurance is. It's a warranty on you.
Speaker 1:That's a good way to say it, yeah.
Speaker 2:I mean a personal experience. Our refrigerator motor went out and so you know a couple. You know it took two visits one to evaluate it, then order the parts and today, you know today, he put a refrigerator and we didn't have a warranty and I got off okay. But the point is, humans are mechanical too and our warranties expire or they need to be updated from time to time. So I think long-term care, it's a warranty that something is going to happen. You're either going to become frail, you're either going to have an accident, you're going to have an illness, or you have a cognitive and cognitive is in my world is sometimes when they say well, you know, how long will I need, what kind of plan do I need and how long will I need it. One of the things I'll ask them is you know, do you have cognitive issues in your family? Because you know you can last a very long time with a cognitive issue.
Speaker 1:Eventually you die because of heart issues or things, but mental health— yeah, if you have even dementia and things like that, you can be around for a decade.
Speaker 2:That's right. Like a long time, think of Reagan.
Speaker 1:I mean, he lasted a long time. Yeah, yeah, that's benefits. There's one person that I can think of, and this was years ago, she. I can't remember what she had, but basically she was wheelchair bound for most of her life and anyway she turned 60 and she's, like, I've been paying for these long-term care. I don't know what, I don't know how they work, or da da, da da. So I would love to just what are some misconceptions around it that you've heard or maybe unknown, that people are afraid of that you always have to overcome that. We could just get out of the way for all the people that are listening. Yeah.
Speaker 2:I'll give you two words. I forget. Now let me explain what I forget. You know, I mean, I'm a consumer too and I buy insurance. But what happens when, if the question is people that own long term care benefits, they're not sure what it will do, sure what it will do, it's because they forget. And the reason they forget is because you know it's not a just-in-time benefit and it's a warranty for the future. I mean again, in warranty you don't say, gee, I hope you know my appliance won't break down, but if it does, or my car, a lot of other things, you have warranties. I mean, of course, that's why you know we own AAA, or you know you own things or health insurance. You know the reason you own it is not because you want to be unhealthy, not because you want to be ill, but when you do and you will that you want to make sure that you're transferring the risk to somebody else yeah, so that you can go. You know somebody else so that you can go. You know the illness itself is miserable enough.
Speaker 1:But you don't want to have this massive bill, that's right At the end of all.
Speaker 2:That's right. I mean, how many do you know? You take your car to the for maintenance and then you get a call from a customer service. Hi, Caleb, you know I want to talk to you about your car. What's the first thing you think about? How much is it going to cost?
Speaker 1:Yeah, how much maintenance is turned into a $3,000 visit.
Speaker 2:That's right, that's right. So that's what these plans do. Is that? It's not going to make, not going to solve, it's not going to make somebody better, it's not going to make somebody healthier, but anyway, getting back to the reason that people forget is that if you get into a car accident, it's a car. Your fender is bent or your lights are broke. Of course it's more difficult now. When I was young, you didn't have all this electronic stuff. Now you know the most expensive. The reason car insurance is much higher is because cars don't have the kind of bumpers and it's the electronics, I mean it's the circuit boards and all the sensors that they. So that's what brings up the cost.
Speaker 2:So with long-term care benefits, people forget that it's about activities of daily living. Now, you know I'm not going to give you this insurance language, but activities of daily living simply mean it's not the illness that you have, or the accident or the illness. It's what has it done to you that you have mobility issues or transferring issues, or you can't drive or you can't transition? It's if that's what the illness has done, then you qualify. Now the easy one, if you're at a certain point, is cognitive, all you know. If the doctor says, look, this person has, you know, call easy one if you're at a certain point is cognitive. If the doctor says, look, this person has call it dementia, call it whatever, alzheimer's, but you reach a point where you need somebody to, you need caregiving assistance.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you need caregiving assistance. So so you don't. So that's the only one where you don't need two out of the three. If it's diagnosed you have cognitive and you're at that that stage, then then you don't, you don't need anything else. But that's what people forget or they haven't been explained. So the way I do it is I do a summary sheet. You know, you don't even, you don't even have to look at the policy. I mean, I'll have the policy number, I'll have the phone number, you know the insurance company, you know what this is, I'll have the. You know the claim forms. It's actually a good idea every couple of years.
Speaker 2:You know, not only just with long-term care. You know your other insurance. Just take a look at it. Or you know if you have an insurance agent now, it used to be, you had insurance agents. Now a lot of things are done online. You can't do that so much with long-term care.
Speaker 2:But again, it's not a takeout of a menu. Yeah, Because they're short-term. There's hybrid, there's traditional, there's subscription. There are a number of different variations of the same thing. There are a number of different variations of the same thing. So it depends on you know how long you want to plan, you know how much you want to cover in expenses. There's inflation benefits to it.
Speaker 2:So, you know, maybe AI someday, you know you could say, look, I want you know, here's my health history. And so you know, say yeah, you know, here are three ideas. Maybe AI will figure it out someday. But in a way, actually it is easy for me because there are more software programs that I have access to that you know I can do it quicker and faster. Sometimes, you know I forget, so you know it's nice to be able to look at it. It quicker and faster. Sometimes, you know I forget, so you know it's nice to be able to look at it. But the other thing is that it used to be for health assessment.
Speaker 2:This really annoyed people is that they'd have to get doctor's records and that sometimes could take two or three months and that upset people. And then you know if you were to decline, that got them even more upset. Like what do you mean? You know you're not going to insure me. Well, you know we didn't know or had it in the doctor's record, so we need to explain it. But they become much more efficient about that. It's not perfect. I mean you know everything I'm going to say it's not perfect, but it's certainly. You know people that complain about warranty. This is a good warranty product. It really is.
Speaker 2:If you have the right one, you've got to have. You know, and the same with you know, if you get homeowners insurance but you don't get the right type of it, they'll say, well, we didn't cover this. Or you know you didn't get this rider. You know the insurance company is not going to pay if it doesn't fall within. You know the parameters of what of what you purchased. But in most cases, if, if, if, if I have done what I always try to do to you know, find out what is it that somebody, you know what will solve your caregiving needs. How will you pay for it? And you have the plan.
Speaker 2:Now again, some, you know, some people say, well, how long should I have a plan? You should have a two-year plan, should have a six-year plan, should have a lifetime plan. Of course, all you know, the longer it goes, the more money. You know it's pretty. Then you know, then you're in a money. It's like you know, going. Yeah, you know you want a corvette. You know you pay 120 000. Do you do? You do you want a, a truck?
Speaker 2:that has all the trimmings and that's another 120,000. Or you know, you know, maybe you don't need, you know all those trimmings, but do you, just you know, do you want to lease a vehicle that will get you from one place to another?
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly, that's a. Really I love the analogy and kind of theme throughout the whole thing of comparing it to like an automobile warranty. The time has flown on this episode but one. A few last questions, but one is what personal professional goals are you working on that's moving forward in this space? Are there projects or like specific things that you're super excited about?
Speaker 2:Well, I, just last year I published a book with Chris Voss. It's called Empathy and Understanding Business. I'm also subscribing to, you know, like longevity plans, and also there's also a company that I subscribe to where when I get people's health assessment information that it will help me to figure out what plans or what their health situation, what I can do for them and I can do it more efficiently. Of course, the other big thing is that I've really been involved with the Black Swan Group in negotiating and in negotiating. It's made me a much more interesting person, a much more you know of skills, where you know I don't worry about objections and I don't want it's. You know it's asking people, you know it's again, it's empathy. Or you know somebody you know is not you know wants to argue with me. I say, look, it seems like you know this is what I'm doing. It's just not your vision, it's just not what you're doing. You know it's not what you want. Oh, yeah, it is. It is what it is. Well, you know, I don't argue, I don't argue, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so these are. You know, it's Black Swan Group Methods. In fact, I'm going to Chris Voss, who's the founder of Black Swan Group. He's going to interview me in September, and so those are just you know, and I'm doing podcasts. So these are things, you know, that I really like to do and I'm enjoying it and it's making me say hopefully, I think it's making me a better person.
Speaker 1:So if those are some, of the things that I'm that's awesome is if you could leave our listeners with just one lasting message about why planning for caregiving and getting long-term care insurance, why it matters not just like financially, but for the people that they love as well.
Speaker 2:What would you want them to remember in one or two sentences. Have the conversation, whether it's with Raymond Levine or you know, if you have, you know a wealth advisor, or you have you know somebody that you know is, you know is knowledgeable about long-term care benefits, or you know, selfishly, you know, have the conversation, that's it. Have the conversation.
Speaker 1:I love that. I think that's great advice, raymond. And then the last question is who should reach out to Raymond Levine? How do they get a hold of you and things like that?
Speaker 2:Well, you can contact me, Raymond Levine, on LinkedIn. You can go to my website, wwwlevine, l-a-v-i-n-e, l-t-c-i-n-s dot com, and those are the two best places. I mean. You can also find me on the search engine. Just put Raymond Levine and I should come up in the search engines.
Speaker 1:Sweet, sweet. I've loved this conversation, raymond. It's been insightful. I think it's something that more people should talk about. Just like how you don't think about air until it's gone I think it's you don't think about long-term care and insurance until you're in that situation. You're like crap. I should have started thinking about this 20 years ago.
Speaker 2:You know a quick story about that you talked about. You know, when I was in basic training at Fort Bliss, texas, there was one where you have a gas mask day and you know they are very specific. One of the good learning experience is that they will make sure when they're teaching something, that you're going to learn it and they're not kidding around. And if you think that you know, oh, I'll just put this gas mask on and I'll just do it any way I want, what they do is they put you, they put us in a, in a in a bunker, and they release the gas and I'll get it. You know it. It stings you, you. You never forget that experience. But then you also learn how to you know how to put it on your gas.
Speaker 1:That's right. That's awesome. No, it's been a lot of it's. Yeah, it's been a lot of fun. I can't recommend you enough for people that are looking into kind of long-term care and, and, yeah, follow you on LinkedIn things. But, yeah, thanks for spending this half hour with myself and just being open and sharing your insights.
Speaker 2:It's been my pleasure. I've I've be authentic. I actually I had fun. I'm having fun.
Speaker 1:Good, good, good Sweet.