Costs of Senior Care: Assisted Living to Memory Care, with Kelley Smith

*The following is the output of transcribing from an audio recording. Although the transcription is largely accurate, in some cases it is incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors.

The following podcast is provided by care partners living and answers for elders radio. And Welcome back everyone to answers for elders radio and we are here with wonderful Kelly Smith from pet care partners. And Kelly, thank you for being on the show today. Thank you, and you guys are amazing sponsors of our show and we love the last weekend of the month because we always know that care partners comes back and you know, you’ve been so valuable talking about you know, what does it mean when mom and dad’s run out of money? And we talked about spend down, we talk about Medicaid, but really this segment I wanted to talk to you a little bit about let’s just get realistic on how much this stuff really costs, because I think this is one of the things that we all, you know, look at. It’s kind of a, you know, daunting situation, isn’t it? So tell me a little bit about you know, if I were to go look at let’s say pet care partners, and I know that every building is different, I’m going to I’m not asking you for specifics, sure, but if you could give us kind of a general rundown of what is later life care really cost these days? That depends on what you’re looking for. If you go into a place that’s a retirement hmmm, you could very easily be looking anywhere between nine and fifteen hundred dollars a month. Okay, cause it’s a little appointment. Fifty five over community, okay, okay, not really going to be any services, or might be Bingo, but there’s not going to be any care services. Right. So that’s just over fifty five. There you go. Now do some of those places that, when they have between nine hundred and fifteen hundred, do they do have care stuff on site? Some do, some don’t, some do, some don’t. The majority of them don’t, crest. So just that needs to be kept in mind. Then you go into a place that’s independent, assisted living. Okay, so, which means a move? That, yeah, which means another move. Okay, but anyway, if you’re in that, say you’re somewhat independent. Nobody moves into a place because there are a hundred percent independent. Correct. There’s usually some reason they’re there. So independent you’re still paying the same rent as you would if you were assisted living. The differences you’re not paying care fees, but now you’re paying for twenty four hour caregivers, you’re paying for a nurse is salary, you’re paying for everything that happens that building, full time activities, life enrichment, everything, the bus, the car, all those meals and meals are not cheap. No, you want to go good quality meals. Well, exactly, you know, that’s what you hope to get there. So, obviously, if you fresh food, yes, you want fresh, good you know, vegetables and and meats and things like that. Yeah, it’s not cheap. And so so what you’re looking at with them and you move into this type of environment, you’re looking at realistically, anywhere between three and six thousand dollars a month. Yeah, now you look at memory care. Memory care starts and most communities at about forty five sometimes more, depending on the community. It is low. However, what we’ve done is we’ve taken a really good look at all of our costs everything. Okay, caregivers, you know, we paying our caregivers the wages that that Seattle’s been paying them for a long time. The goal is to make sure that we put the investment into things that make the life of the our residents much, much better. So you put that money back into those kinds of things. You’ve also got repairs. It’s set things that need to happen and at home, just like any of the thing, and that’s kind of how we base our pricing. So we are not the most expensive place in town, we’re also not the least expensive place in town. The only thing we really do different is we will allow you to run out of money and stay. That’s the big thing. But you got a plan for that. So you look into memory care. Like we said, forty five five thousand to start. Most of them top out in my communities at about seventy five hundred. That’s still inexpensive, that compared to other compared to other places. It is, however, seventy five hundred, just ten months to seventy five thous yeah, so we’re I’m talking a full year and you’ve spent what most people wish they could make any year. Right. So how do you do that? And the way you do it is, again, is by is by planning a little bit in advance, taking a look at what elsee’s mom has, making sure that you’re preserving those and then again, if she’s got a house, it’s over three hundredzero dollars. I’m telling you, guys, right now, get yourself some advice. An elder law attorney is more than happy to sit down and just kind of go over the ropes with you. Do not talk to an armchair lawyer. Exactly. Your best friend over a beard says what we did with my mom, Momo. No, no, talk to somebody that’s going to give you the proper information to make sure that when that time comes. That is so true, because how many times do I talk to families? Oh, well, we you know, mom, we have all that. Well, we prepared that. Well, it was a lawyer that my mom knows. It’s a friend. And I’m going like, do they have any, you know, knowledge or expertise and elder law? Well, they’re in a state planning attorney. Now that doesn’t necessarily and less they have a specialty in out of the law because, and and here’s the thing, the laws change constantly. So so, you know, depends on how long ago that you did that. You know, it’s so important when you’re at the stage of looking to finance and understand, you know, whatever the situation is. My number one advice is do your best to project out how is mom and Dad Armed Dad. You know what their their ailment is going to progress to exactly, and that’s that’s a hard thing to realize. But if somebody has heart issues or they have vascular issues, there’s going to be things that may creep up later. If they have the early stages of dementia, it may mean Alzheimer’s, it may mean severe dementia. It that’s case you’re looking at a much higher degree of care and those are some things that obviously families have to look at. They do, because here’s the thing. If Dad’s got heart you know, heart disease, but he still he’s still home and he’s doing okay, chances are he might be all right. He really could. MOM gets diagnosed with Parkinson’s. Okay, now you’ve got to start thinking about what’s the future going to look like in Can dad continue to care for her in that environment? Mom’s been diagnosed with dementia. First of all, what kind of dementia? Ask questions. Don’t be afraid that to back that doctor into a corner if you need to, but you be aggressive about knowing what you’re doing. Sure that not only that the doctor educates you what kind, but then your responsibility as a family member, whether it’s a spouse or whatever. Do Your own research. Yeah, get on and learn about out the disnits right and be realistic. It’s like the fact that you don’t think that you know, and I we’re all in denial because, for because there are family members that. But I think one of the things, the most responsible things that family can families can do today, is really be realistic about what could happen. Plan for the worst, hope for the best, you bet for the best, but something else families should happen, something else families need to do, Suzanne. That I don’t think is talked about enough, and that is okay. So you did all your research. Mom Has Parkinson’s. We’ve talked to Dad, we’ve gotten anything together. Who talked mom? Has Anybody’s sit down with mom and said what do you want? Because you have to take that into consideration. I can’t tell you how many times we get kids that come in and they’re worried about mom and dad. Mom and dad are sitting over there looking like can’t wait to get out of here because this was never discussed. This is not what they want. Good Point. They they have a right to have a say in this as well. Absolutely they do absolutely do. So. We are talking again to Kelly Smith from care partners living and you guys, I have this amazing concept number when you do independent living, which you have available. Yep, you guys also do assisted living, which is wonderful, and you have amazing communities which are mostly, I know, Vineyard Park communities. Are Most of them like calm vine your park is our is our biggest footprint and love that. Thank you. They’re beautiful communities. And then you have the cottage cottages, and the cottages is a special type of a concept that I think is amazing because you really have dialed into the home living aspect where they don’t feel like they’re in an institution and large facility, which can be alarming to somebody that has Alzheimer’s. It’s really a home environment and I love the idea that when you go to a cottage like that or have a loved one they’re they feel like they’re in their own you know, in a nice little home. Yeah, which is that was the idea. You have to do the research on dimension. You have to know what makes these folks feel secure and what you do know is it doesn’t really matter what the diagnosis is you know Umbrolla. The umbrella is dementia. Everything underneath it are all the different types of the Alzheimer’s Association. You about how a heart attack is. There’s a hundred different types of dementia, but but the majority of the ones we see are Alzheimer’s are vascular in most types of my mom had vasculator, so it’s tough one. You get it, but they all decline differently everybody. It’s all very different. But it’s also understanding that almost every one of them go back in time. So the cottage concept is like a little village, little houses, but there’s a little family that lives in that house and you got your own room and you can living room from one building. You can go visit your friends over there, you can go outside. We played baseball last weekend with a bunch of the residents down and rent and we had a big party great fem of the Barbecue. We’re doing that on the thirty all you’re doing that on prety. Check out the website because they’re doing a big barbecue and ribbon cutting on the thirty of for rent and. But I’m just saying we involve the residents and activities that make them feel needed. When you were in a home with a bunch of other people, mom cooked or dad did the lawn work. Are they had things they did. We make sure that we incorporate those things into their daily lives and it can’t be. The Nice thing about the cottage is, is this not overwhelming, which I even remember with my mom. She would go when she lived in a larger facility. She didn’t have she was like ninety percent with it, which was great, but she still was a little bit confused. I noticed the bigger community which she lived in the bigger community. It was overwhelming. Times she liked to go eat in the in the other dining room. That was more quite well, you have to take in their personalities to just because somebody has dementia, what if they’re also an introvert? Yeah, or hard of hearing, which was my mother. Yeah, yeah, we’ve had that happened. We had a loved one, we call him our loved ones because we fall in love with them, which, like everybody else, go to the hospital and they called him such completely unresponsive. We can’t get her to do anything and my nurse goes up and looks at her and goes worse or glasses on her hear, he hates. Are you kidding me? I don’t. But if they don’t know where, we do, and that’s the other part is we’ll be getting to learn these residents so you can care for them proper right. So, Kelly, how do people reach you? They can check out our website. I think that’s the smartest way to do and that’s care partners livingcom. You can see all the communities, there’s pictures, testimonials. You can also go to the admissions to page and meet meet the admissions team. That’s kind of fathers. Pictures of them on there. I’m the funny looking one in the bottom. You’re awesome and and I think, I think the other thing that’s really important to is is it you guys have communities all the way from Marysville down to lacy. Yes, so again covering the most of greater puget sound. We are just so excited to have you guys and have your communities and you guys have been so supportive of our show and we love what you do and really about, you know, being aligned with our values, which is really about educating and being there. So just pick up the phone, Call Care Partners, ask there’s no question that’s stupid. Ever, Lord now so Kelly, thank you so thank you for having us. The preceding podcast was provided by care partners living and answers for elders radio. To contact care partners living go to care partners livingcom