I am 46, single, no kids. I am a health care professional. I feel that I'm generally a very good saver and a not so good budgeter - hence the credit card debt payoff I worked through in 2020.So I mentioned that I was planning to move to a health insurance that I could invest in an HSA. Well as I started to research my options they indicated that if you use your plan on average that you should stick with my current standard plan, while low use was recommended for the HSA plan. So now I'm torn. I probably should have chosen the HSA plan when I was younger, healthier, and rarely went to the doctor. Now I'm almost 45 and diabetic. Granted my diabetes is well-controlled now with the help of medication & exercise, but I wonder if it's better to just stick with what I have. Decisions, decisions.
November 26th, 2022 at 05:58 pm 1669485487
November 27th, 2022 at 05:26 pm 1669569968
When I started with my company, we had a choice between a PPO plan and an HSA plan but a few years ago they eliminated the option to choose a PPO plan. But they do give us an amount that covers more than half of deductible on the HSA plan. I have always been able to maintain a positive balance in the account, but I've used more than I would have liked towards paying medical bills.
If you think you could save a positive balance in the account each year, a 20 year time to save and invest could leave you a nice nest egg in the HSA that you will be able to use towards Medicare premiums and copays once you are of Medicare age.
I'm 62 and sorry that my time frame for being able to take advantage of the HSA benefits is now so short.
November 27th, 2022 at 05:59 pm 1669571958
If you think last year was typical, you could try to create a spreadsheet with
- the services you used
- what you paid for them
- the medication you take
-the cost for it
And fill it in for both options,
Then fill in the actual cost for the insurance premium
then look at your tax bracket. If you are in a 22% bracket, everything you pay out of your HSA costs 22% less.
But if you are in a 12% bracket, your savings is less.
I don’t invest the money that is in my HSA - I consider that I got the return in the tax savings when it went in, and if I didn’t have it, I would use post tax money to pay for care in retirement (where I am now),
It becomes tricky because different companies have different negotiated rates for services, and I don,kt know how you know that until you use them.
A benefit of insurance is that even when you pay out of pocket, you pay the negotiated rate.
The savings there can be thousands of dollars.
If you always hit your deductible, that doesn’t matter, but if you don’t that is a big factor and worth exploring.
I find that the bigger the insurance company, the better the rate is.
Good luck with this.
November 27th, 2022 at 11:39 pm 1669592397
December 1st, 2022 at 10:37 pm 1669934230