health care for early retirement

Today we will be answering questions from Mr. Skeptical (who may or may not be one of my family members) on Health Savings Accounts (HSA). I hope you find this blog post useful and the Q&A format easier to get through than an article laden with IRS statutes, random dates, and dollar amounts.

The Affordable Care Act (ACA) has been an important healthcare option since its inception in 2010. In 2022, enrollment hit an all-time high with 14.5 million consumers purchasing coverage through the ACA federal or state exchanges.

In this article, we’ll discuss an overview of the ACA system and things to consider if you are considering this coverage. Then, in our next post, we’ll put financial strategy to work by looking at one component of the ACA system – premium subsidies – and discuss how to optimize income to better take advantage of subsidies that reduce your out-of-pocket costs for monthly premiums.

Short Term Health Insurance Plans are health insurance plans that fill that short term gap in health insurance coverage you may have anywhere from 3-6 months up to a year. These plans were more recently in the news when President Trump signed an Executive order in August 2018 allowing these plans to cover individuals for up to one year versus the previous 3-month regulation, however, these plans have been in existence for decades.

Let’s discuss how this health insurance option might work during your pre-Medicare years and what things you should consider when evaluating this option.

Concierge healthcare may be the newest of these pre-Medicare choices; it’s certainly the most rapidly changing. It stems from the dissatisfaction of patients and practitioners alike with the current healthcare system in the United States. Instead of long waits for an appointment where the physician may only have 15 minutes to see the patient, uncertain costs, and insurance haggling, concierge care seeks to do things different, and better, for all parties involved.

Continuing with our health care for early retirement blog series, our next featured article discusses a strategy known as Healthcare Sharing Ministry plans.

The main benefits associated with this type of plan include discounts on healthcare, limited out of pocket costs and predictable monthly payments. It should be noted that these plans are not considered insurance. More on this a bit later.

Maybe you’ve heard of COBRA as a back up health insurance plan if you were to ever lose your job, but have you considered how COBRA can also help you make that transition into retirement a little easier?