We can help you navigate your insurance options.

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Do you need help navigating the marketplace exchange when it comes to your health insurance? Are you asking questions like:

• Am I eligible for a subsidy or not? 
• What happens if my income increases or decreases while I am on a subsidy?  
• Which carrier offers the best plans and how can I check this myself? 
• Is there a supplement plan that will help with the deductibles and co-pays? 

Reach out to us today. Together we can navigate the choppy water when it comes to personal health insurance programs.  

Short-term care insurance is exactly what it says: the same kind of care provided by long term care except for a year or less. This can be used in tandem with a long-term care policy and the reason it can be important is that long term care comes with a 90-day waiting period so shelling out money for the first few months may not be favorable as this too can delete precious assets. 

A big advantage of a short-term care policy is the underwriting process. Usually, it's just a few basic questions and then its issued.  We can look at riders that will pay claims arising from a stay in the hospital as well as accident insurance all wrapped into one. This is a great alternative for people that cannot get approved for a traditional long term care policy.

All those years spent putting just a little extra in an IRA, or socking money away to a brokerage account has paid off. It is almost surreal that all that sacrifice and hard work did what it was supposed to do. If the roof needs replacing, you can actually do it, maybe even send funds to help the grandkids get an education. So, the daily grind has paid off, but what if it were wiped out from a critical illness? Alzheimer’s disease, a stroke, or even a slip and fall or a vehicle accident can debilitate a well-structured portfolio and devastate a lifetime worth of work.

Traditional long-term care is just that. A “traditional” insurance policy. Simply speaking you pay a premium and when you have a loss the insurance company pays the claim. No different than if a tree falls on your house and the insurance company “Indemnifies” you for your loss. The last ten years has seen a shift away from the traditional long term care module, to a life insurance ‘Chassis.” The main benefit here is that a well-structured permanent life insurance policy has the capability to have access to funds that were originally deposited in the form a premium, to structured withdrawals over time recouping some or all of the money that was deposited. Life insurance policies are structured so that there are no rate increases from the insurance company, which has been the case in the traditional arena in past years. 

If a time arises where a claim needs to be initiated this is done through a series of riders that allow access to the death benefit. If no claim is initiated ever in the lifetime of the two spouses, then upon the death of both, the tax-free death benefit goes to the estate and is distributed according to the estate plan. Strategically there is a counter to every negative situation here, and here is an example: Client has a traditional long term care policy and never uses it over the life of he and his wife. The client has been insured in the case of a loss, never has to use the insurance which may be seen as a drawback, since the premium dollars paid will never generate a benefit. In our situation the death benefit from the policy will go to the estate which will be distributed to their heirs and depending on the time frame, may have been able to withdraw money while they are still living. 

You as a client have the ability to use qualified funds in this strategy as well. Let's say perhaps you have an IRA that is not getting used in the retirement strategy and is earmarked for something to leave to the children or even to self-insure a long-term care scenario. The IRA can be deposited into the account and periodically withdrawn to limit the tax consequences over a 10-year span of time. If a claim needs to be made the premium payments will stop. The real benefit is getting ahead of triggering an unforeseen taxable event if the money needs to be withdrawn for long term care or skilled nursing requirements immediately. 

Run your situation by us with a quick conversation about how to protect your life savings from a critical illness. We will look at multiple carrier's and coach you on the application and underwriting process. We work together in this process and scour the market for the most cutting-edge solutions for your situation. Get started by booking an appointment today. 

 In today's uncertain world we may find ourselves wondering what would happen if a sudden tragedy was to befall us and our families were left with hard times ahead. So many options are available to the consumer it can be exhausting just trying to figure out what is right for your situation. Do I need a term policy or a permanent policy? Do I need to figure out how to get money back from a life insurance policy or do I need to wait before this is necessary? How do you want your life insurance to mature with you, and how can we tweak these things to enhance your later life? 

There is a huge amount of podcasts, TV infomercials, books and articles arguing for the right way to do this and all claim to have the right answer. These pundits of different strategies are usually trying to target a specific market and then try to get the upper hand by criticizing an opposing strategy. 

The truth of the matter is most of the time all of them are right it just depends on your situation and how you want to proceed. Many times as life throws us curveballs we need to adjust our original plan and move in another direction.  

Hospital indemnity plans are supplemental health insurance that is designed to be paired with the current insurance plan in place. This is usually done in the case of an individual who is in a Medicare advantage plan or “Part C.”  Medicare Part C plans are attractive to people because in most cases they come without a premium to pay. The “flip side” of the coin is that they are liable for co-pays from hospitals and doctor offices up to cap that is decided by the plan. Unfortunately, many people in these advantage plans do not have a game plan to take care of the co pays that can reach near $10,000 in some cases. 

Hospital indemnity pays a set amount for every day the individual has an overnight hospital stay. These dollars are paid directly to the individual and can be used to pay the hospital co-pays. We like to structure these so that there is extra money to help recover from the accident or sickness they have endured that put them in the hospital in the first place. 

The Medicare advantage marketplace can change rapidly from year to year and hospital indemnity will greatly lessen risk exposure from a large hospital bill. These are affordable plans and some of the carriers will offer guaranteed issue in certain age ranges.

Commonly called “Executive Bonus” plans for over a century, this is still a unique strategy to help retain an employee whose performance is contingent with the company's growth. There is a huge amount of flexibility that the owner of a company has with these kind of plans which are also called Section162. There are no restrictions on how they are administered, the company can allow 2 people out of 500 employees, or all 500 employees to be involved. It doesn’t matter like a traditional qualified plan like a 401k which has to be administered to ALL employees within the set schedule developed by an administrator. The administrator of a traditional 401k charges to make sure things such as discrimination does not occur, the plan is not “Top Heavy” meaning certain people are being compensated more than others, and files all necessary paperwork to the IRS and other governmental agencies that is necessary. 

None of the above exists with a bonus plan like this. Here is an example: Dan has been working for XYZ Pharmaceutical company that produces a drug that treats several kinds of cancer. Dan outperforms every other sales rep in the company year after year. The company's owner realizes there are many other cutting edge pharmaceutical companies out there that may have more opportunity for a commissioned based sales rep due to the profitability of the new drugs they are producing. XYZ can't afford to lose Dan as revenue would decline significantly. XYZ offers Dan a Bonus that is in the form of a equity indexed universal life insurance policy with a $50,000 premium. The money is bonused to Dan to pay the premium, Dan arranges underwriting from the carrier and is approved. XYZ pays the premium directly to the carrier on Dan’s behalf and issues a second bonus to him in order to help pay the tax liability associated with the bonus. 

The company owns the policy so sets up a vesting schedule that stipulates that Dan can have access to the cash value of the policy after 10 years. Dan continues his employment with XYZ Pharmaceutical company and now has several options available to him. One option is to create a tax-free source of income that would supplement his other qualified plans and savings. His income stream would come with a death benefit that would help in the event of an untimely death. Secondly, he could let the assets in his policy continue to accrue and use them in the event of a long-term care situation. Lastly, he could keep the policy until he passes away and create a sizable estate for his kids, grandkids etc. 

Our planning is uniquely centered around each individual's situation and is custom designed for you and your employee. Let us help you continue to win in this competitive job market. Reach out and have a conversation with us.