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Long Term Care Blog

Mass Mutual To Exit Traditional Long Term Care Insurance Market

by Jack Lenenberg

Mass Mutual Long Term CareAnd another one bites the dust.

The traditional long term care insurance arena which once flourished with over 100 underwriters 20 years ago is now down to 9 companies.

Mass Mutual has made the decision to stop offering for sale all traditional long term care insurance policies effective January 28th, 2021.

Mass Mutual has made the decision to leave the traditional LTC arena due to low traction with sales on its Signature Care 600 policy series released in 2019.  This is not surprising news as I thoroughly discussed the non-competitive pricing of the Mass Mutual Signature Care 600 LTC insurance policy series when it was priced in 48 states in 2019.  This policy was priced to be completely unbuyable in the marketplace so of course long term care insurance sales were not generated for Mass Mutual in 48 states.

For residents of California and New York however, this news is very important, however.

In California and New York, Mass Mutual still has available its Signature Care 500 Policy series which is 2013 pricing, and this Mass Mutual  policy series still offers unisex rates.  For female New York and California residents these LTC rates are (by far) the most competitive in the country for traditional LTC insurance.

So, if you live in 48 states you will not lose sleep over the fact that this policy is disappearing on January 28th.

If you are female and you live in California or New York, you should quickly move to apply for coverage if you have been considering traditional long term care insurance.

To provide you with an understanding of your savings if you are a single female in NY or California, here are current rates for comprehensive long term care insurance benefits of $150.00 day, 5 year benefit period, $273,750 pool of money, automatic lifetime compound inflation protection.

  • Mass Mutual $301.03 month
  • National Guardian $409.00 month
  • Thrivent $446.17 month
  • New York Life $774.40 month
  • Northwestern  $863.26 month (6 year benefit period, 84 days EP)

As you can see, for single female applicants the Mass Mutual traditional long term care insurance costs are still well beneath market in California and New York.

In the 48 other states the Mass Mutual pricing is $534.14 month for these same insurance benefits, so you can understand why the current MassMutual long term care insurance sales are completely non-existent.

What is insanely crazy, however, is the Northwestern Mutual pricing and the New York Life pricing!

God only knows how the Northwestern Mutual and NY Life agents sell their long term care insurance policies.  

(Well, I know what they do.  They don't include automatic compound inflation protection.  New York Life and Northwestern Mutual try to sneak in future "Purchase Offers." to unsuspecting consumers)

But that is a blog post for another day. 

What does this news mean for current Mass Mutual long term care insurance policy holders?

This news will not impact you whatsoever if you are a current Mass Mutual long term care insurance policyholder.

Your in-force policy will still continue to be serviced and administered by LifeCare Assurance, the third party administrator for Mass Mutual long term care insurance based in Woodland Hills, CA.

What does this news mean for Mass Mutual insurance brokers?

Mass Mutual will obviously have a huge fire sale in California and New York beginning now.  You can expect its agents to contact existing clients to move forward before January 28th 2021.  If you live in California or New York, you should listen, especially if you are female with the older Signature Care 500 policy series still offering you unisex rates.

If you live in any state outside of New York or California you should not pay attention to the removal of the Signature Care 600 policy series as you will not be missing anything once it disappears.

Once the Mass Mutual traditional long term care insurance policy is retired, Mass Mutual will still offer hybrid long term care insurance policies to consumers.  This is where the marketplace has been moving to in the past 8 years.

Shift to the Hybrid LTC Market

Hybrid long term care policies combine long term care benefits with a cash value insurance policy, either life insurance or annuities.  Hybrid LTC policies offer long term care benefits if care is needed, and a life insurance benefit if not.  

Unfortunately for Mass Mutual its hybrid policy options CareChoice One and CareChoice Select have been utter failures in the hybrid long term care insurance brokerage arena as currently structured and priced.  Still, I am sure the Mass Mutual brokers will still pitch these policies, as will Fidelity Investments which has a marketing agreement with Mass Mutual (and New York Life).

MassMutual will also offer accelerated death benefit riders for chronic illness beginning this November.

Find Your Best Long Term Care Policy Option

I have been an independent long term care insurance adviser since 1998 working with consumers in all 50 states.

I can hep you explore all of your options with the available underwriters including OneAmerica, Nationwide, Securian, Lincoln, Pacific Life, Brighthouse, Global Atlantic, Mutual of Omaha, National Guardian, Northwestern Mutual, New York Life, Mass Mutual and more. 

If you are considering long term care insurance and you would like to receive personalized analysis and recommendations of the best policies to consider for your needs, please call me today at (800) 891-5824. Or complete your online quote request form.

Let's work together.

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