Although most Canadians identify health and long-term care as a retirement priority, the majority don’t have a plan to pay for long-term care costs.
According to a survey from Edward Jones Canada, 66% of adults in Canada have no concept of the health and long-term care costs they should be saving for in retirement — including 59% of respondents aged 55 and older.
Research commissioned by Edward Jones found that the average national cost of a private room in a long-term care home is $33,349 per year. For those who choose to age in place, basic personal care costs about $30 an hour on average, Edward Jones reported.
These costs have been increasing by an average of 4% a year “and are expected to continue to grow at a similar rate moving forward,” Edward Jones said in a release.
Aging in place also requires additional expenditures, such as paying for costly home alterations, the firm noted.
Edward Jones also found that less than a third (29%) of Canadians are having discussions about their health and long-term care needs with family members.
Twenty-two per cent of respondents aged 55 and older said they don’t like to think about long-term care needs, while 23% said they don’t think health considerations will apply to them.
“When we discuss retirement with our friends and family, we often talk about the freedom we will have to do the things we love with the people we love,” David Gunn, president of Edward Jones Canada, said in a release. “Health and long-term care is often an afterthought, but it shouldn’t be.”
Edward Jones commissioned Leger to conduct an online poll of 1,523 Canadians from March 26–28. Online polls cannot be assigned a margin of error because they do not randomly sample the population.