Budgeting for Senior Care: Strategies for Financing
Staying on top of your own budget is tough enough. Tackling a budget for an aging loved one who needs senior care may seem even more impossible than finding the TV remote after the grandkids visit!
With the right strategies, however, the impossible becomes possible. That’s why we want to supply you with strategies that will make budgeting for seniors far more feasible. One new, exciting strategy in particular is especially effective when it comes to financial planning for assisted living — but we will get to that in a minute.
Senior care budgeting strategies
Whip your senior budget into shape with the strategies below. If you feel overwhelmed after reading through them, don’t fear. It’s okay to start with one strategy and then proceed to another when you’re ready!
Calculate monthly expenses
How much does your loved one’s care cost each month? Add up the expenses and keep that number handy.
Know your resources
You may be familiar with your aging loved one’s personal savings, retirement accounts and Social Security benefits, but are you aware of other available funds or assets that might be leveraged to benefit a senior budget?
One example: A property or properties that could be rented in full or in part.
We have written elsewhere about other resources like life settlements, long-term care insurance, Medicaid, and reverse mortgages — all of which can impact elder care financial planning in a significant way. Read up and learn everything you can about these funding options for your loved one!
Use tools to project future costs
Budgeting for seniors means looking past today’s needs and anticipating what tomorrow may require. Calculate future senior care costs in your geographic region using this free cost projection tool from Genworth.
Maintain an assisted living budget spreadsheet
This is an essential element of elder care financial planning. By logging and tracking expenses, you can help protect assets, identify and eliminate unnecessary spending and implement savings strategies.
We told you to keep that tally of your loved one’s monthly expenses handy. With your knowledge of available resources and a sense of what future costs might look like, you can start to sketch out a senior budget that will account for present expenses while preparing for tomorrow, too.
Set aside money for unexpected expenses
Just as no visit from a grandchild is complete without the disappearance of multiple TV remotes, no budget is complete without a line item for unexpected expenses. When new medical costs arise, being able to access this money means you can focus on your loved one’s health instead of fixating on its financial impact.
An exciting new strategy: AutoGive
As your budget assumes its final form, you may find that your loved one’s financial resources are insufficient to fully cover the costs of senior care.
Before resorting to despair, consider AutoGive — an exciting new funding option and a game changer when it comes to financial planning for assisted living.
With AutoGive, you can invite the family and friends of your aging loved one to form a private group committed to covering the remaining costs of senior care every month.
The wider the net you cast, and the more people who agree to participate, the less each person needs to pay to reach the fundraising goal. If, for example, 30 people join the group and your loved one needs an additional $1500 each month, a contribution of $50 from each member will balance the budget.
AutoGive empowers people to collectively care for a human being who needs help — and this care can evolve with time, too. As your aging loved one’s needs change, you can keep the group apprised of these developments and ask for more money to offset new expenses. Together, you can make a difference in someone’s life — and you can rejoice in it as a group!
Hopefully, knowing AutoGive exists will help you feel better about mapping out a senior budget. Put the strategies we’ve outlined here to work. If there’s a shortfall, there are family and friends who will want to help for the long haul. Create your AutoGive group today to start — you’ll be glad you did.
