Long-Term Care Insurance Calculator

How long-term care insurance is priced

Long-term care insurance premiums are set at the moment the policy is issued and are based on four things: your age, your health at underwriting, the size of the benefit pool you buy, and whether that pool grows with inflation. Unlike health insurance, the price does not step up each birthday once you own the policy. That is why the same coverage bought at 55 costs roughly half of what it costs at 65, and why waiting is the single most expensive decision most families make on this topic.

The calculator above models a traditional reimbursement policy. You choose a daily benefit, which caps what the insurer pays per day of care, and a benefit period, which sets how many years of that daily maximum you are entitled to. Multiply the two and you get the benefit pool. A $200 daily benefit with a 3-year period creates a pool of about $219,000. Most policies today are pool-based rather than strictly time-based, so if you spend less than the daily maximum, your coverage stretches longer than the nominal benefit period.

What the average policy costs in 2026

Published industry averages for a policy with roughly $165 per day of coverage and a 3-year benefit period look like this for a healthy applicant in standard health:

Women pay noticeably more than men because they live longer and file the majority of claims. Couples get a discount of roughly 30 percent per person on the theory that spouses provide some care for each other before a claim starts. Adding a 3 percent compound inflation rider to any row above increases the premium by 50 to 70 percent, which is why the numbers in the calculator can look higher than the headline averages you see quoted elsewhere.

The five levers that move your premium

• Issue age. Every year you wait after 55 adds roughly 3 to 6 percent to the annual premium, and the curve gets steeper after 65. It also raises your odds of being declined outright.
• Daily benefit. This should be anchored to real local prices, not a round number. In much of California, eight hours a day of in-home aide care runs $240 to $290, while a semi-private nursing home bed runs $330 to $400 a day. Buying $150 a day when care costs $280 leaves you covering the gap.
• Benefit period. The average claim lasts a little under three years, so a 3-year pool covers most scenarios. Unlimited coverage is expensive and increasingly hard to find because insurers pulled back from it after years of underpricing.
• Inflation protection. The most consequential choice on the application. Without it, a $200 daily benefit bought at 55 buys roughly the equivalent of $80 of today's care by the time you are 80. With 3 percent compound growth it keeps pace with most care inflation.
• Elimination period. Think of it as a deductible measured in days. Moving from 90 days to 30 days raises the premium by around 12 percent; moving to 180 days saves about 10 percent but means paying out of pocket for six months of care.

Traditional policies versus hybrid coverage

Traditional standalone policies are use-it-or-lose-it: if you never need care, the premiums are gone. They are also subject to rate increases, and many policyholders who bought in the 1990s and 2000s have seen cumulative increases above 50 percent. In exchange, they deliver the most coverage per dollar.

Hybrid policies combine life insurance or an annuity with a long-term care rider. Premiums are locked at issue and cannot be raised, and if you never file a claim, your heirs receive a death benefit. The tradeoff is cost. A hybrid typically requires a single premium in the $75,000 to $150,000 range, or annual payments two to three times higher than a comparable traditional policy, for a smaller pool of care dollars. Roughly three-quarters of new long-term care coverage sold today is hybrid, largely because buyers are tired of rate increase letters.

A third option worth knowing about is a state Partnership policy, available in most states. If you buy a qualifying partnership policy and later exhaust the benefits, you can protect a dollar of assets from Medicaid spend-down for every dollar the policy paid out. That makes partnership plans particularly relevant for middle-asset families.

What the policy actually pays for

Modern policies are care-setting neutral. The same daily benefit can be used for in-home aide care, adult day programs, assisted living, memory care, or a nursing home. Most families use their benefits at home first, which is where the coverage overlaps directly with what you would otherwise pay privately. Run your expected out-of-pocket number through the home care cost calculator and compare it to the daily benefit you are considering. If you are not sure how many hours of help would be needed, the care hours estimator gives a defensible starting point.

What policies do not cover: care provided by a spouse or by family members in most contracts, care outside the United States beyond a limited international benefit, and any condition that was not disclosed during underwriting. Medicare is not a substitute either. It pays only for short, skilled, post-hospital stays and stops entirely once care becomes custodial.

How to use this estimate

Treat the output as a planning range rather than a quote. Carriers price the same applicant differently by 30 to 40 percent depending on their reinsurance position and state filings, so it is normal to get quotes on both sides of the figure shown here. Before you apply, gather your medication list and recent medical history, because underwriting for long-term care is stricter than for life insurance and a single condition such as a recent stroke, Parkinson's, or early cognitive impairment usually results in a decline.

For the full breakdown of premiums by age and how they compare with simply paying privately, read our guide to long-term care insurance costs in 2026.