Your Parent’s $100,000 Insurance Policy Is a Sunk-Cost Trap. Don’t Make the Same Mistake.

Decades of premiums, skyrocketing rate hikes, and administrative hurdles mean that old policy might cost you more than it ever pays out.

In 1998, your parents bought a promise wrapped in a glossy brochure. They paid $2,200 a year, every year, believing they were securing their future independence without burdening their children. Last month, the bill arrived with a 72% premium hike, bringing the annual cost to nearly $6,000 for a policy that caps daily benefits at a rate that wouldn't cover half of a modern nursing home's bill. It is the classic sunk-cost trap: throwing good money after bad because walking away feels like admitting defeat.

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