Pool of Money

A pool of money is the total amount of benefits available within a Long-Term Care Insurance policy. This is also called the lifetime limits or maximum lifetime benefits. 

This limit is usually defined in terms of "dates of service," or years, or a dollar amount, but never both. When you purchase the policy, you'll have a choice of exactly how many benefits you want. 

This lifetime limit represents the total initial amount your policy could pay towards care. However, this amount can grow with inflation. You can choose your inflation percentage when you first purchase the policy.  

Most policies are "pool of money" products. This means there is no set time limit on benefits, despite benefits often being described by a time period. In other words, this means benefits are not "use it or lose it." Your benefits will never expire. 

Some policies offer an "unlimited lifetime benefit." This means the policyholder could never exhaust the benefit from the policy. However, this feature costs more than traditional benefits.