Today, we’re going to talk about how in-home care is less expensive than you think. There is affordable eldercare. What you hear everywhere you go is, “I love to stay home, I just cannot afford it.” Well, you don’t know until you ask. You don’t know until you look at your specific circumstances.
So, today, let’s talk about what’s really affordable eldercare and what’s really not. Everyone is in a different financial situation. That’s a fact. But what you have to do is compare apples to apples. You have assisted living, nursing homes, independent living, you have private duty caregivers, you have companies like mine that are licensed and bonded, or you have family members. So, unless you have a family member and unless you’re on Medicaid, you’re going to have to pay someone.
The option is, “What’s the best thing for me? What is the best value for me?” Value is important here. You’re not buying a car. You’re not looking at price only. You’re looking at your mom and your dad. So, when you look at price, that’s one thing, that’s one ingredient, for sure. But we’re looking a lot of other things. Security, we’re looking at safety. We’re looking at dependability and peace of mind. Especially if you’re child that lives out of town, peace of mind, you cannot put a price tag on peace of mind.
If you have a good company overseeing the care of your parent, you can go to bed at night knowing that you’re doing the right thing. What pays for this care? That’s the first question. Well, private funds out of your own pocket, long-term care insurance or a VA benefit are the three ways to fund affordable eldercare. So, those are going to be your options for non-Medical In-Home Care.
Today, we’re not talking about skilled Home Health Nursing and therapy where Medicare pays, or Medicaid which is very limited and you have to meet certain means testing. So, if your mom… and just take your mom today and say, “She needed help with medication. She needed help with a bath. She needed help with just a few things,” she is the typical person. The person that needs bedfast care and those kind of things, that’s not what we’re talking about today. Even with 24-hour care, do some of those people stay home? For sure, they do. But the typical person who needs a caregiver is one who can still do some or a lot on their own. They just need someone to help them do the other things.
You can have someone come in and cook, clean, bathe, run errands, do the laundry, you name it. Compare that cost to breaking a hip. Compare that cost to not taking your medicine correctly and ending up in the hospital. Compare that cost to not knowing that your mom has had a mini stroke and then she ends up having a worse stroke because nobody’s there with her. You can’t put a price tag on those things.
When you look at money, let’s look at more than just money, let’s look at investment. Eldercare is an investment, not only in their health and their quality of life, but if you proactively address these problems, in the long term you’re going to save yourself money.