Increasing Long Term Care Costs in Naples and Miami

In Florida long term care costs are increasing faster than national costs especially in the Miami and Naples areas.

At present the median annual rate of a nursing home in Florida is $83,950 according to Genworth Financial’s 2011 Cost of Care Survey, but residents in Miami are paying out $89,107 every year for a nursing home’s semi-private room while the price tag of private rooms reads $96,725.

In Naples, the rates of nursing homes continue to skyrocket, too. Semi-private rooms here would cost $231 or $85,775 per annum while private rooms are at $284 daily or $105,850 annually.

Meanwhile, the assisted living facilities and in-home care in Miami surprisingly have lower rates. Families with loved ones in Miami assisted living centers fork out $2,250 monthly, a big difference from the state’s average monthly rate which is $2,663.

Now Floridians who are receiving in-home care pay a home health aide an hourly rate of $21 on the average to assist them with the activities of daily living (ADL) such as eating, bathing, dressing, toileting, continence, and transferring or walking from one point of the house to another.

Home health aides in Miami, on the other hand, charge $19 per hour. Homemaker service, which is another form of long term care (LTC) focused on household chores such as cooking, laundering, housecleaning, and running errands among others, is offered for a lower hourly rate of $18 in Miami as opposed to the state’s average $20 per hour.

While Miami tried to make up for its expensive nursing homes, Naples does not seem to be going in that direction and would rather stick to its high LTC rates. In fact, most assisted living facilities in this area charge a whopping monthly rate of $4,600.

On the other hand, the hourly rate of a home health aide in the Naples area begins at $25 while that for homemaker service begins at $23.

Staggering Florida Long Term Care Costs

Without conducting an in-depth research on Florida LTC you’ll probably think that the expensive LTC facilities are located somewhere in Tampa, Palm Beach or any other populous area so Naples definitely turned out to be a surprise revelation.

Jacksonville residents also dread the prohibitive cost of care in their area. According to an annual LTC study which was conducted by a group of LTC specialists a private nursing home room in Jacksonville, Florida would cost $241 daily or $89,790 annually.

Just like in other parts of the country the cost of care in Florida is, indeed, increasing but only at a faster rate. Families and individuals who are still active at work are advised to plan for the possibility of acquiring this kind of service in the future.

No one can really tell if he will need LTC someday, but it’s better to have a good plan in case you would rather than wait for the day to face high Florida long term care costs head-on and risk losing everything that you’ve worked so hard to acquire.