2 ways to talk to clients about long-term care

Clients need to know about long-term care but may be reluctant to consider the thought of declining health in the future. MDRT members have seen success with these strategies to address the topic:

Lead with Medicare education

“People who have assets come to my office concerned about their retirement and needing to look at real-life situations. I’m educating them on Medicare, which takes time, and gaining trust meeting with someone two or three times. These are people that have long-term care needs, and Medicare is kind of the door opener because now they know and trust me to do the right job for them.

“They’re usually asking, ‘Do you do other things as well?’ ‘Yes, as a matter of fact I do.’ And then they’re more likely to do business in other areas. But if I went after them at first for long-term care, I don’t know if I’d have the numbers of people that I’m seeing when I started marketing to them with that other product initially.” – Brian Cichy, BS, CLTC, a one-year MDRT member from Oakbrook, Illinois

Simplify the situation

“By default, clients are going to choose one of three choices: Whether they learn about it or not, they’re going to do self-insurance and pay out of pocket, long-term care insurance or life insurance with some kind of long-term care rider. That’s pretty much it. There’s really no other way to handle it. So if they’ve got their head in the ground like a lot of clients do, by default they’re doing self-insurance. My whole approach is, ‘I’m going to educate you about your three choices, and you can make an informed decision about what you want to do.’ And I let them choose.” – Timothy Daniel Clairmont, CFP, MSFS, a 12-year MDRT member from Lake Oswego, Oregon