It costs nursing home residents on average about $39 more per day to stay in a private room compared to a semi-private room, or $315 compared to $276.
While some might consider the difference to be relatively slim, it really all depends on average income per resident. Medicaid recipients generally must make no more than $13,590 annually to qualify for aid, according to a national survey conducted by the Kaiser Family Foundation and Georgetown University Center for Children and Families.
There are no income limits for Medicare beneficiaries 65 and older, but some may pay more for premiums based on annual earnings.
About 62% of SNF residents have Medicaid coverage, while 13% are covered by Medicare fee-for-service (FFS) and 25% fall in a mix of Medicare Advantage and private pay, according to a recent report published by ATI Advisory.
Insurance and financial planning company Lincoln Financial Group broke down what different care settings cost beneficiaries, separating skilled nursing facilities, assisted living and home health on its What Care Costs website.
What Care Costs provides average rates based on more than 30,000 different skilled nursing facilities, home health and assisted living sites, on national, state and metropolitan area levels.
Alaska, Connecticut and New Jersey were the most expensive states regarding daily costs in skilled nursing – private room costs alone are $531, $481 and $479, respectively.
Semi-private rooms in the top three most expensive states were $452 (Alaska), $426 (New Jersey), and $453 (Connecticut). That’s a difference of $79, $55 and $26 for each state.
Cost projection averages for Alaska alone are expected to increase to $713 for a private room and $608 for a semi-private room by 2031. Similarly, Connecticut will see private rooms increase to $646 and semi-private rooms to $609 within the same timeframe.
The state’s semi and private rooms have fluctuated in the last four years, with 2019 seeing the highest spike in private rooms beyond $600 per day, while semi-private rooms for the same year dipped below $400.
Otherwise, daily rates for both room types in Alaska stayed between $400 and $600.
“If you compare it to a college dorm room for example, a single room isn’t twice the cost of sharing a double with a roommate, but it is more expensive,” Heather Deichler, senior vice president of MoneyGuard Business Management at Lincoln Financial, said in a statement.
Connecticut and New Jersey can get even pricier if a facility is located in a certain metropolitan area, according to the data.
Private rooms in the New York/Northern New Jersey/Long Island metro area are paying $523 per day for a private room, and Philadelphia/Wilmington/Atlantic City private SNF rooms come in at $440 per day.
Connecticut private rooms in Hartford can run $506 per day, while New London-Norwich private rooms fall below the state average at $381.
The Lincoln website provides a searchable database of long-term-care cost information for states and metropolitan areas across the U.S. The data can be sorted by geography and type of care, and now, care costs can be projected well into the future.
While Lincoln’s SNF data was based on private and semi-private room costs, home health care pricing was measured by hour per visit averages for home health aides, and the cost of a licensed nurse and registered nurse per visit.
Lincoln collected assisted living monthly rates for a studio apartment as well as one bedroom and two-bed apartments.
Companies featured in this article:
ATI Advisory, Georgetown University, KFF, Lincoln Financial Group
