Sales of long term care insurance policies are down for 29% of the LTC producers who participated in a recent online survey but up for 27%.
The Association for Long Term Care Insurance, Westlake Village, Calif., and Agent Media, a division of Summit Business Media L.L.C., Erlanger, Ky., the parent of National Underwriter Life & Health, have published those figures in a summary of results from a May survey of about 400 agents.
Although 7% said their LTC product sales had been down substantially over the previous 12 months, 5% said their products had increased substantially. About 22% said sales were down somewhat, and 22% said sales had risen somewhat. Sales remained about the same for 45%.
In May, producers were upbeat about the coming year, with 68% expecting LTC insurance sales to rise in the next 12 months–and 19% predicting volume would be up substantially. Just 4% thought sales would fall, but of these, none thought the decrease would be substantial. The remaining 28% thought LTC sales would hold steady.
Asked to identify their biggest problems with selling LTC insurance, 71% cited clients' belief that they could not afford it, 57% blamed client procrastination and 54% blamed clients' belief that they did not need the product.
Other challenges cited: Finding qualified prospects or new clients (38%), clients not understanding the product (15%), carrier rate increases (14%) and a difficult underwriting process (13%).
The most desirable feature for clients in evaluating an LTC insurance product,
