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Good morning, and welcome to the Haven Financial Group Radio Show.
Thanks for listening.
Give us a call at six one two five zero four eighty four hundred or Havenfinancialgroup dot com if you have questions, worries, concerns, anything that's top of the mind. Here this morning again reach out to us please. I'm Larrycolbig, founder and CEO of the Haven Financial Group, Kim Good to be with you. We got Glenn Raimi, who's insurance specialists at our office. Because pretty much everything we're going
to discuss, for the most part, is insurance related. We don't necessarily want insurance, but if we need it, we better have it.
Boy, isn't that the truth?
Yeah, we're going to talk about insurance this morning, and I think insurance is probably especially when we start talking about healthcare and long term care insurance. These are really important things for retirees. And you know, Larry, would you say there's certainly one of the bigger expenses that retirees may face.
I would definitely think so.
I mean, all of the insurance put together, and you know, unfortunately, with all the casualties across the country, insurance is only going one direction. Whether you're talking healthcare insurance, automotive insurance, any type of insurance. It is a major major expense. And you know, insurance is kind of like a safety net retirement. You know, but there's mistakes that people make.
Oftentimes they're may be paying too much, Maybe they haven't explored options that are out there that they weren't even aware we're on the market. That's really what we want to talk about today, and the opportunities. Not that everybody can have everything, but there's maybe certain things they should have or at least be made aware of to avoid some of these pitfalls and insurance mistakes that people make sure.
Absolutely, I think some insurance is more applicable for people's lives than others. Let's take a look at the overview of our broadcast here today. Again, Glenn Raimi is with us, and I'm so happy Glenn to have you with us. In Happy New Year to you, my friend. It's always great to have an expert in the room. We're going to talk about an overview first off about retirement, healthcare and long term care. Then we'll talk a little bit about life insurance and what that means to retirees.
Annuities.
You know that comes with, you know, mixed emotions for a lot of people. Larry and I talk about this all the time, and I know you have mixed emotions, but there are different kinds of annuities, so we'll talk about that, and then finally costly insurance mistakes that we want to make sure people avoid. Larry has told you if anything that you hear this morning rings true to you and you'd like to get more information, six one two five zero four eight four zero zero is how
you reach the folks at Haven Financial Group. Let's talk about that overview, guys. Let's get started with that. So first off, Glenn, if I could address this to you, the importance of you know, healthcare and long term care and when people should start thinking about that for their retirement.
Yeah, so let me share an important statistic with you. I think that will definitely influence their conversation today. So, just using last year's numbers, in twenty twenty four, the average sixty five year old should expect approximately one hundred and sixty five thousand in health care costs and expenses throughout their retirement, excluding long term care cost not counting long term care cost. Right, So yeah, i'd say this
is a major component of your retirement planning. It's going to be part of your budget, it's going to be a part of your emergency fund. As the things that can happen later in life in health, I would like to say again, when we're talking about retirement, we're not talking about the first twenty years, the middle twenty years. We're talking about the last twenty to thirty years of your life, and sadly these own aren't always the healthiest
years of our life. Right, So how are we planning for these expenses and costs that are going to be almost a known in retirement?
Sure?
Absolutely, Well, let's get started with just healthcare. Then we'll kind of transition into long term care, because healthcare is something that I think really is important for anybody who's listening. Everybody really needs to consider the issues associated with healthcare with their health care. So starting with Medicare, this is a very confusing thing for a lot of people as they approach sixty five.
Yeah, no question about it. I often say to individuals that I attend my Medicare classes. Right, this is one of the first times in your life you're going to be faced with choices, more choices than you've ever had to pick between in retirement. Right. For most of us, healthcare comes from our employer throughout our working years, so we might have only one or two plans to pick from the employers paying for it. So obviously that's the plan we're going to take because it's the cheapest one.
We're going to get right. But when we retire now the insurance is on us, and we have new rules to face that have consequences and penalties if we don't act on time, and we have more options than ever to pick between. So I don't blame anyone feeling confused approaching this topic of medicare right as the first time that they were rolling into those programs.
You know, I have some very dear friends who are reaching have reached sixty five, sixty six, and they're spending the month of January working on this because this year is their year. I mean, it's going to take them a full month, they said to get through this. I said, well, that's that's not surprising, because I know how confusing this Absolutely agreed. Yeah, So sixty five is when you can begin to take medicare. So let's start from there, and
let's walk through some of the steps. I realized that, you know, we're just going to sort of gloss over it, but some of the steps that Glenn that people would be taking.
Of course. So first off, medicare itself right starts typically in the birth month that we turned sixty five. In the first of that month is our starting date, with one exception, if you're born on the first month, they'll
let you start a month early. But the rest of us is going to be the birth month, and it doesn't matter what day except the first that we're born on the first of that month will be our starting date, and Medicare is going to give us a seven month enrollment period three months before my birth month and three months after it to get all of my Medicare in order without fearing about being late or being penalized in regards to that. If we're collecting Social Security, we're automatically
enrolled into those benefits. If we're not collecting Social Security and wanting to start our benefits at that time, which is no problem, that means you have to actively apply for those benefits, either through an account you've created on Social Securities website SSA dot gov or by reaching out directly to a Social Security office to apply for those benefits.
Let me just interrupt you there and ask you this question. If you're already drawing Social Security, so you're automatically enrolled, you said, there are still choices to be made though, and there are still issues that you need to address.
Correct.
Yeah, So let's break down some parts of Medicare for you. Right, So, the government provides us with two components to healthcare, Part A of Medicare and Part B of Medicare. And the simplest terms I can provide to you, Part A is something we prepay into with our taxes as long as we work ten years forty quarters. There's no premium associated to part AS benefits. And Part A is going to
be the in patient benefits of Medicare. And the simplest terms I can give you right your Part B benefit, that's your out patient benefits on Medicare, and that's the one that's going to have a monthly cost to it one hundred and eighty five dollars per month this year unless subject to means testing through IRMA income related monthly adjusted amounts. Then you have Part C of Medicare. Now Part C is actually a private insurance company's health insurance policy,
also referred to as a Medicare advantage plan. You have Part D of Medicare, the prescription drug programs of Medicare. And then depending on whether you're doing advantage plans or supplement plans, there's that last component, the supplement policy within Medicare. Now like to say that there's two paths you go.
Down in Medicare.
You're either going to do a Medicare advantage plan assigning your Medicare benefits over to an insurance company for a package of benefits that are better than what Medicare offers, or you're going to do a Medicare supplement plan in conjunction with a standalone prescription drug plan, often referred to as the traditional path in Medicare. You can only do one of them. You can't do both, so you really
got to decide. That's I say, the hardest decision is always the first one, whether I want to do advantage or supplement, and that's often going to be because supplement plans in Medicare are only one that's typically guaranteed to us in the beginning. We have the short window of opportunity to exercise this right to buy that type of coverage, and if we don't, we could be excluded from that
type of insurance based in our health history. So Larry hears me emphasize all the time the importance of working with someone that really educates you on the differences between these two, pass the pros and cons of them, to make sure you're really going to make a good informed decision about how you want your healthcare to work in retirement. And you're definitely doing yourself a disservice if you're not hearing both of those conversations.
So what we just heard Glenn say, which is so important is working with someone who understands this whole process. Clearly, Glenn understands this, and the experts there at Haven Financial they understand it too, And Larry, you say this all the time. Partnership is what this is all about.
Is as you can tell, Glenn really knows this stuff. In our office, Glenn and Isabella, we have the privilege of helping many people in these insurance areas. Both of them are two of the tops in the state of Minnesota and have been for quite some time. You know, there's a lot of options, and it can be very very complex. There's a lot to consider, and it can be very overwhelming, even for me who's listened to Glenn for many, many many years now. So again, education is
so important. You don't have to be the expert, but know all your options. Get educated first, and then you can make good educated decisions. I know we're going to talk about long term care, Medicare, is a very big expense. But wow, you know long term care is as well.
After last week's showed him at Bob call in from Northfield and unfortunately his wife has been in the nursing home there in Northfield, had been edictine for about the last two months, and he called Number one just he had some really good questionquestions tax wise, things to consider.
Very limited.
He goes, we should have done things differently when we were in the retirement planning stages. Now, Bob can't go back in time and do anything now, but we can learn from other people's mistakes, and that's what I hope the listeners as they're listening would consider absolutely.
Glenn Remy is our guest and he's an insurance expert there at Haven Financial Group. Glenn, we're going to talk about long term care, but we're going to talk about it on the other side of the break that that'd be okay with you.
We'll jump right back in again.
The number is six one two five zero four eight four zero zero. You're listening to the Haven Financial Group Radio show.
Don't go too far.
We're gathering more important insights and retirement ways Devin The Haven Financial Group Radio Show we'll be right back. Stick around, you've got questions, We've got answers. Your tune to the Haven Financial Group Radio Show with your host Larry and Kim Karragan. Now back to the show.
Good morning, and welcome back listeners to the Haven Financial Group Radio Show. I'm Larry Koalvig, founder and CEO of the Haven Financial Group on with Glenn Raimi, our insurance specialists at the office here talking about all the different types of insurance.
Healthcare.
Really major expenses we're going to focus on long term care came in this session in this segment. So again, if you have questions six one, two, five, four, eighty four hundred or Havenfinancialgroup dot com check out all the classes. We're really on it again this year. We've had full classes, two estate planning classes this past week which were full. Again all these retirement puzzle pieces, trying to simplify them to the best of our ability.
Absolutely, and there's a lot of information here, folks, and we understand that, and Larry understands that as well. We're just sort of scraping the surface. But again, as Larry mentioned, if you have questions about this, these educational seminars you can find out more at Havenfinancialgroup dot com or you can call six one two five zero four A four zero zero. Okay, Glenn, let's talk a little bit about
long term care. This is a very frightening thing for a lot of people because the first thing you think of is high expense.
Yeah, no question about it. A long term care costs or not insignificant. I'll just use my state's median costs as an example, right, So the state of Minnesota will tell us that the median cost of full time not twenty four hour a day, is forty hours a week. Home healthcare is currently almost seventy thousand dollars. To stay in an assisted living facility full time is sixty thousand
dollars a year. And to be in a nursing home today median cost is one hundred and twenty thousand per year and that's just as of today.
Absolutely, are there ways to what kind of insurance can you buy?
What can you do to acquire.
This kind of help and not necessarily be responsible for those kinds of bills?
Yeah, So if I can be brief here, because there's a lot to that question that you have there, right, I don't want to overload the audience today. So somebody say this number one, you should have a plan. Whether that plan includes insurance or not, is beside them. You should have a plan. There's a seventy percent likelihood we are going to need some form of help before we've passed away. Do we want that to be from our spouse or family members or do we want to pay
for that care for someone else. There's a fifty percent chance we're going to spend time in a nursing home, right are we preparing and planning for that? Now? There's traditional long term care insurance, the first products that were reduced to try to help this cost and as the market expanded, now there's life insurance with writers. There's hybrids that are life insurance and long term care plans combined together. And there are asset based long term care options that
are simply releveraging savings for long term care events. So many different options, pros and cons between all of them, but any one of those could be a fit for your scenario and trying to protect yourselves from these costs.
Absolutely, and of course these are all discussions that can be had with the experts here and haven financial and no doubt they change Glenn, depending on what your situation is.
Right, Yeah, So don't forget that these are an underwritten product. And for people don't know what I mean by underwritten, right, health reviewed. You have to qualify for these plans. We can't wait till the diagnosis happens and then buy these insurance policies. So again, this has to be planned in advance. The industry will say plan in your fifties because your health might not have changed by now. But realistically, most clients and it's okay to plan in your sixties for this event.
Sure, one of the things that Larry I know, says frequently, and I feel confident Glinton, you will agree with this. If your long term health care is a plan that you'll live with your kids, think again.
Yeah, or at least I hope you've had the conversation with them, right, Do they know that they're part of that plan?
Right?
It is a family decision almost because all family members can be affected by this.
Right.
Do we want to have mom or dad with us while they're in their retirement years so that we can be caregivers or do we want to try to plan so that isn't the event that we have to deal with in those circumstances.
Absolutely absolutely.
All right, let's change gears just a little bit here and talk a little bit about life insurance.
So you just mentioned this, Glenn. You know, life.
Insurance has changed and there are all kinds of different writers and that can benefit your life while living and not just after you've passed away.
Absolutely, absolutely, So I usually try to break down life insurance for my clients in the following way. Right, we have term insurance, right, renting insurance for a specific period of time, great for our working years, great for debt liabilities, to cover a debt that's finite. We need it for this long, for this protection. Term is a cheap way to be able to protect ourselves against that. Now we talk about other reasons people carry life insurance into retirement.
Whether that's part of their final expense planning, right, funeral cost being paid for through life insurance. Whether this is related to income replacement, loss of that first Social Security check when the first of us passes away. Maybe this is part of legacy planning. We want to gift upon our death, and what's one of the most tax beneficial
ways to gift, Well, that's life insurance. Because the death benefits one hundred percent tax free, right, or it might be part of a tax situation we have because we save so well for retirement, we have a state taxes that we have to worry about it. Right, are we life insurance in the vehicle to protect against those And we can use either whole life policies with very fixed parameters fixed cost, fixed benefits, fix interest rate, return on our cash values, or universal life policies that are more
flexible with flexible premiums, flexible death benefits. And also all of these more permanent options can come with those writers connected to things like our previous topic long term care.
How important you know there's a lot of people who don't believe in life insurance.
Yeah, go ahead. How important do you see it as being?
Well?
I always when I sit down with client for the first time, you're going to hear the same question for me every time with those clients, which is, if we're having life insurance, what's the goal?
Right?
This is a tool financial product meant to solve a problem for us that happens upon our debt, right, whether that be the debt or the income or any of those other topics I mentioned, Right, So I always say, what is the problem you're trying to solve here, and what tools can use to solve that problem, and life insurance might be one of those tools available to us.
Life insurance also, of course, is based on your health in most cases, and so that is something that I'm sure that you suggest people address pretty early.
Exactly another underwritten product, right, another thing that our health is a factor for now. I know a few of you might have seen some commercials out there before for no health question applications for life insurance policies. These are going to be very modest, small life insurance policies with typically high premiums for the amount of benefit that you get. So if you want a good deal on your life insurance, right, being in better health is always going to be the better scenario.
Sure, absolutely, So give us a sense of what life insurance you know, if you've followed the good scenario and you're in good health and you're looking to buy some insurance that maybe is going to replace an income or is going to take care of debt, what are we talking about?
Well, so I say two vehicles to use. As I mentioned earlier, in those circumstances, we need permanent life insurance. Term won't solve the problem because term doesn't guarantee the insurance is going to be for us with us at the time of our passing, depending on how long we live.
So whole life and Universal Life are two of those vehicles that are more permanent in that regard, and I mentioned earlier whole life is a very fixed product, very fixed parameters as far as your premiums, interest rates, and death benefits are concerned. Universal Life comes in three different categories, guaranteed, index, and variable. I just want to touch very quickly between the index and the variable.
Right.
We often see clients coming in with old life insurance policies that we review to make sure they're in solid established footing right, And the policies that often have the most problems in retirement years are going to be the variable ones. Because that variable as a term used to describe what your cash value is. Is it variable? Can it go up or down based on markets? Right? And
a variable policy is unprotected from market adjustments. So I to say to a client, do we want to risk our life insurance having a bad market year we watch the cash value deplete by thirty percent? What is that going to do to the longevity of that insurance policy. When that happens, other products like index universal life insurance policies have mechanisms that insulate us from those negative market years. We'll still try to capture the upsides when those market years are good.
Kim.
If I may add, because that's a lot of information and a lot of good information, And I know listeners might be saying, oh, they're trying to sell us life insurance.
Just listen.
No, don't get life insurance if you don't need life insurance. But what I know is, and Glenn and I both because we see it on a weekly basis, is a lot of the listeners you have life insurance, you've had it for a long period of time, you maybe did it for a reason back twenty thirty years ago, and you haven't looked at it or revisited it. We encourage life insurance reviews to make sure because that it's not
going to eat it's eat itself up. It's going to do what you wanted it to do when originally you got it. Glenn and I see it all the time. If you don't need life insurance, don't pursue any life insurance, but make sure you maximize what you already have maybe that's a final expense policy, maybe it's a replacement of a spouse's income. Or for listeners that have a lot of qualified IRA money, and the rules changed a few years ago for legacy planning.
With stretch iras.
We have a lot of higher networth people and that he doesn't even you don't even need to be high net worth. Where life insurance retirement plans are a great means of legacy planning. And many people have never even explored. Many of the listeners probably never even heard of that lurps life insurance retirement plans. So explore the options. How does it factor into your long term planning? Get a life insurance review. Make sure you're not paiding way too
much for insurance. The cost of the cost of insurance. A lot of people are, don't you deserve to find that out and over time maybe you've just been paying way too much. So understand the options that are out there, developed the confidence. We'll take you through and we'll simplify the process what may seem like a very complicated one. But I'll tell you this, Glenn and Isabella are very strong and there's no cost to do that.
All right.
The number is six one two five zero four eight four zero zero. If you have questions about life insurance, if you have questions about retirement planning, Even Financial Group would love to sit down with you a no cost meeting to discuss what it is you're thinking about what you'd like to do and accomplish in retirement. Again that number six one two five zero four eighty four zero zero. Thelen Ramy is with us. He is the insurance expert, one of them there at even Financial Grower. And we've
got more discussion about insurance coming your way. Coming up next, we're going to talk about annuities and are they the.
Right thing for you. You're listening to the Haven Financial Group Radio Show.
Ready to find your financial safe haven. Your dream retirement is in reach. Don't go away, The Haven Financial Group Radio Show will be right back. Are you worried that your financial strategy might be missing something, Well, you're in the right place. Larry Klvig is back and ready to help you find your financial safe haven.
Good morning, and welcome back to the Haven Financial Group Radio Show. I'm Larry Kolvig, founder and CEO of the Haven Financial Group. Celebrating our ten year anniversary this year. Great to be on with Glenn Ramie, our insurance specialists, where this whole discussion today is about insurance. We like to hate insurance companies, but man, if we need it,
we better have it. It can be expensive, but whatever you do have, check it out, make sure it's the right insurance for what you're trying to accomplish.
Absolutely, we're going to talk about annuities.
Now, a lot of people that has a real negative connotation, Larry, and they hear annuity that they're like, no, not for me.
But I know that you have.
Said right here on this broadcast that annuities are good for some people.
If you know what you have.
You said it very eloquently, Kim annuities, and the listeners go, oh my goodness. So now we're going to talk about annuities. Well, guess what all annuities are through insurance companies? All annuities, and I'll discuss the four different types. Nobody first of all has to have an annuity of any sort. A high percentage of people that are listening do have them, and I would say, based on a lot of history of talking through this that probably seventy five percent do
not know which one of the four they have. I think that's a great starting spot. There are immediate annuities that are oftentimes transferring your moneys over to an insurance company and they're guaranteeing a certain payout. Some annuitized can which can be very surprising and probably something you don't want. There's variable annuities that are up and down with the market. They're funds inside the stock market, stocks, bonds, whatever it
may be. Oftentimes not the best investment options. They come with higher costs, and what people should understand is what are you paying and why are you paying it? And for many of the variables, three to five percent is not abnormal. You get three years into it and you go, what in the world that I do three years ago?
Rightfully?
So there's also fixed and fixed indexed annuities. The keyword starts with fixed. But I'll tell you this, they're not all created equal. People do annuities for income to kind of offset if you don't have a pension, but they can also be used for accumulation per purposes much more in the last ten to fifteen years because they were only used for income back in the day for many, many years. So for those that you maybe have bonds in their portfolio will use it as a bond replacement.
Again, there's lots of.
Different reasons why we think they can be a powerful tool as part of an overall portfolio, depending upon circumstances. If you're trying to protect some of your principal in your investments, great reason you're worried about market volatility. You don't want the risk of the stock market, the ups and the downs. I encourage in any listeners the first quarter. I don't have the dates. Check out our website. I'll be teaching the Truth about Annuities class. I'm not aware
of anybody teaching this. I have done several of them. They're very well attended where we cover annuities in depth. Just remember you don't have to have any annuities. You should review the ones you do have and make sure that you're not missing some opportunities just because you're unaware of what you currently have.
Well.
I don't want to be too overly simplistic, but I do want to step back for just a second, and I want you to explain to people how using the terminuity. I realize there's all different kinds of annuities you've You've just laid out the four different kinds, but how do they work.
Well, you transfer an investment asset over to an insurance company, it can be IRA money, ROTH, IRA money, non qualified brokerage accounts. All annuities mentioned have are through insurance companies. They all have terms to them meaning a set period of time. They're not as liquid as money in a checkbook, so there's liquidity discussions that should be had. I mentioned
the four different types. Insurance companies are the only companies if you have a fixed or fixed index that can guarantee you can't lose any money, Whereas the variable annuities are in the market, so they're variable.
That's why they're called variable.
They can offer income payouts or as I mentioned, can just be for accumulation purposes. Glenn will also at some point potentially that they can be used for long term care, which we already discussed. Some annuities have long term care writers that can be very beneficial. If you can't qualify it for traditional long term care, it might be a different means to protecting against long term care. But look at all the options and we break it down. I
call it an annuity review. If you're listening and go, well, I know I have one, but I don't know which one I have, and be careful with all the negative. There's a lot of financial marketing. You know that people have heard it. I hate annuities. You should hate annuities. Well, guess what which ones do you have? Is it appropriate? They're not appropriate for everything. I just had somebody in last week from Saint Louis Park. Somebody had put almost
all their investments in annuities. Well, that doesn't even pass the smell test. That's completely inappropriate and was not the right decision. I'm not saying anybody did them wrong, but again, it can be part of an effective, diversified, efficient portfolio.
Why does someone want an annuity though.
Too A couple of reasons. Very simplistically. They want to guarantee X amount of dollars. They're income planning for them. If you're married, for you and your spouse income planning. My wife and I will not have any pensions. We can create our own, self directed by using an annuity for income. The second, which most people are not familiar with,
is simply accumulation purposes nothing to do with income. I want to maybe supplement some of my bonds with something that has some more of an upside with principal protection and no management fees, which bonds do. So again, there's a variety of reasons that you always review the pros and the cons with anything. The fixed annuities they're more conservative, they're not designed to keep up with the markets. You got to paint the picture of what they're actually potentially
going to do. It's not robbing the bank, it's not winning the lottery. It's used for this purpose only, and again it can be does not have to be used in everybody's portfolio.
Larry, what are the tax implications with an annuity?
That's a great question.
Kim iras and roth iras are already tax deferred no matter what investment they're in. Anyways, non qualified after tax moneies brokerage accounts, if that sounds more familiar, Any non qualified moneies that are used in an annuity grow tax deferred, unlike if they're in the brokerage or in a bank CD it's tax deferred. Now when you take a non qualified annuity, when you take money out, those gains will be taxed at ordinary income tax rates, unlike a brokerage
account which would have long term capital gains tax. So understanding those differences. Does it make sense? Why does it make sense? It's again it's having somebody explain it because, as I mentioned, seventy five percent of annuity holder account holders, they don't know which one they have, right, And that's her recipe for a problem, or if a potential for problem that I don't think you signed up for, Larry.
What about legacy? You know if you pass away, what happens to your annuity?
Well, most of them, not all of them.
The principle passes on to your beneficiaries, just like any other investment.
OK.
I'm always careful though, because if you have an income annuity that might annuitize, you gave up control of that cash value. Your beneficiaries might not get anything, and that might be a major surprise. I've just in the last month I had a lady come in. She had me review. She was actually from Lakeville, a retired teacher. She had two variable annuities. She didn't know it. She I said, are you receiving income? She goes, I am, And I looked at it and I said, well, I hope your
kids are beneficiary. Is no w to plan on getting this. They won't receive anything. And by the way, you need to live till the age of ninety two or ninety three for you to get all your money out. Well, I'm not saying saying anybody did anything wrong, but she was unaware, and I'll quote her. She goes, Larry, I knew I should have never signed that. Now, thankfully she was a good planner, she had other investments. She's going
to be fine, but it had annuitize. She had given up control and she literally has to live that long in order to get all their money out.
So there's no way to go back. You guys can't know.
There is no way. It's an irrevocable decision. We don't see them as annuitization as much as we used to, and there's not enough time in the show. That might be beneficial to some, but in far more cases it doesn't make any sense whatsoever.
Okay, So two things for our listeners that I want to remind you, because as you can see, Larry is laying this out and there's a lot associated with annuities. The first is Larry offers an educational class and as you've heard him say, he doesn't know anybody else who does this. You go to Havenfinancialgroup dot com. Larry when's the next you know, do we have one coming up here pretty quick?
There is?
I think it's in March. It'll be in March and April. There'll be a couple of different options. They're very well attended. If you don't want to wait for that, because you know what, I think I have a variable, I don't know what. I have set up a time to come in have an annuity review discussion.
There's no cost to it.
And again, what would be a better understanding of now I know, can I do anything? Or if I'm stuck? Well, at least now I know I'm stuck.
Yeah, absolutely the number six one two five zero four eight four zero zero. Unfortunately, I would say that lovely woman who came to see you maybe made a mistake when she signed that. And when we come back here on the Even Financial Group Radio Show, we're going to talk about the costly mistakes that are out there you need to be aware of and you want to avoid when it comes to insurance and retirement.
You're listening to the Haven Financial Group Radio Show.
Don't go too far. We're gathering more important insights and retirement ways. Devinent the Haven Financial Group Radio Show. We'll be right back, stick around, you've got questions, We've got answers. Your tune to the Haven Financial Group Radio Show with your host Larry Kulvig and Kim Karagan. Now back to the show.
Good morning once again, and welcome to the Haven Financial Group Radio Show. I'm Larry Kolvig, founder and CEO of the Haven Financial Group, on with Glenn and Raymy today are insurance specialists at the Haven Financial Group and Kim. You know, there's a lot of information covered today. It may seem overwhelming. There might have been some terms that you didn't people didn't understand. It's okay. You don't have
to do it alone. You know, we can explain things and oftentimes even for myself, it can take one, two, three, a variety of different times and then refreshers. And that's what we want to spend time doing, is help people understand why or why not, the pros and the cons, the good and the bad, and specifically in this segment, to avoid some of these costly insurance mistakes that people make in retirement.
And unfortunately we see it far too often.
Absolutely, and that's the time when unfortunately we can't go back and rectify those mistakes. A lot of times because time is of the essence. So let's talk about some of the mistakes that you, guys, between the two of you, that you have seen people make and that you really hope people can avoid. Glenn, let's start with you, what do you think is the number one mistake people make when it comes to their healthcare.
Not planning for the entirety of their healthcare cost. Oftentimes people will budget in the premiums. Well, we have to pay per month to have insurance, but that is not the only for going to occur in that healthcare right. I have clients that have certain medications that meet the limits of their policy now starting in twenty twenty five of two thousand dollars, So did they incorporate an extra two thousand dollars guaranteed per year cost in their budget
and their retirement planning? And to go back to a topic we were talking about earlier, the long term care cost. Again, do we incorporate that cost into our retirement planning or are we again sticking our head in the sand hoping that it doesn't happen to us?
Sure?
I think also another mistake, and again, these are those constant deadlines that you don't know if you don't do this on a regular basis, but it's got to be missing the deadlines for all of these different things. Enrollment which we just came through in the fall, and I realize now that there's another opportunity at the beginning of the year for some different kind of enrollment. Talk us just through a little bit of the head.
Yeah, so we talked about when people need to enroll into Medicare right based on there's turning sixty five. And one of the most confus using things about that is when don't I have to do that?
Right?
And the only scenario you're allowed to delay your Medicare without penalty is because you have other insurance, either through the federal government through programs like Trycare and VA for people that have served in our military, or for individuals that are still working. But not just any job. It has to be a larger employer twenty or more wourth time employees have to be at that company for me
to be allowed to delay my Medicare without penalty. Right, So are we in a position where we're even allowed to not take those benefits? We're trusting sixty five. Another real quick one, I'll mention. Here is individuals that might think, because I don't take any prescriptions today, I shouldn't have to buy a drug plan today, right, I shouldn't have
to pay for something I'm not going to use. And now remind clients, it's not just about a penalty which you will incur by not having a drug plan in place. It's that they don't allow you to sign up whenever you want to. So if you chose to delay that insurance option, well in June, if you get that health diagnosis that says you have a new thousand dollars per month of medication you have to pay for to stay alive, and you thought, well, I don't need it because I
don't take any medications. Right, you don't get to sign up for insurance for a July. You're locked out of that market till January first, incurring the costs those medications and further penalties for not having had that insurance in place.
Glenn, I have a question for you related to the sixty five and Medicare. If you're still working and you're getting your employer's benefits, you can stay on that.
What about your spouse?
Maybe you're so starting interrupt Kim so sorry.
No, no, no.
So your spouse is on your plan, they can still continue to stay on your plan.
As long as you are insured by someone's employment, your own or your spouse's allows you delay your medicare.
Absolutely, Let's talk about long term care. You said, one of the biggest pistakes that people make is just not making a plan and not taking care of it. But let's say that you have some kind of plan. Where do you see things going awry?
So often it's going to be is it enough? Did we bridge the gap?
Right?
Are we preparing for how long we might be in a facility now? To help individuals with what that number might be? Well, the average stand in a nursing home is three years, so do we have at least three years of benefits in our long term care? But god forbid, we're not just a physical impairment happening to us, but we have memory issues. Right. We might be physically healthy, but our memory is going right, and now we need supervision to make sure we're not a harm to ourselves
or others. And that window of memory care might be six to eight years before passing away. Again, are we really planning for all of those costs or doing something about it. So again, did we plan and if we planned it, was it enough for planning for that event?
Glenn briefly comment on how Medicare it should not be confused with long term care.
Yeah, I say all the time that Medicare is about recovery and recuperation from a healthcare event, right, not the lifetime maintenance of our health care needs. So Medicare says, if you are hospitalized first for three days or longer, you're eligible for up to one hundred days of nursing home refer to as skilled nursing benefits for rehab. But the statistical average actually paid by Medicare is twenty seven, not one hundred days. And that's begin because it's about recovery.
The moment that therapist and that facility says is patients plateaued. They're not getting better anymore, no more measurable improvements. Medicare is going to cut that therapy off. And I might need help permanently with what happened to me, And now I'm on my own for those care costs and needs.
And what about first if I don't know how you even plan for that, Glenn, how long you might need that? But let's think about this too. What do you think that people plan for inflationary issues associated with that, because that could be fifteen years from now.
No, not often not the insurance industry and the products they are available with those kind of mechanisms that you can put into police. But there's individuals that have static benefits. So again, I talk to clients who might use that life insurance model as a plan for their long term
care without writer. Let's a fixed benefit. If I sell someone one hundred thousand dollars life insurance policy today that has four thousand per month and long term care benefits for them, well, twenty years from now, it's still one hundred thousand dollars policy with four thousand dollars in benefits. Have we adjusted for the purchasing power we've lost over that time because our benefits weren't changing over that time.
These are tough, tough issues, and again issues that maybe you don't even know to think of, right because you've never done this before.
Yeah, I would agree.
And a couple that I'll briefly point out that I've seen and we've seen for years is as mentioned earlier, complacency, human complacency, not reviewing your life insurance, just being complacent, you haven't even looked at it in twenty years. Failing to update beneficiaries. It sounds so elementary, Kim, but I see it on a weekly basis. People that have accounts that have no beneficiaries, so I don't know who to put. Well, put somebody, you can always change it. I've seen ex
spouses as beneficiaries, unlike family members as beneficiaries. Make sure they're current and make sure you have something on the note of Medicare and healthcare, again, human complacency, not shopping it out every year. You know, there's numbers out there that Americans pay roughly up to seven hundred dollars a year too much for the healthcare because they never got a second opinion. And you know, the sales type of
meant the sales approach. Somebody sold you something. Well, salesmen sell something Oftentimes maybe you don't need where If they're educating you, laying out all the options rather than trying to push one company, maybe that's a better way to make don't get sold something, but you get something that you can actually benefit of. Those are the really some big mistakes that we see.
Sure absolutely well, listen We're not trying to.
Be gloom and dumers here today by any stretch of the imagination, because these are all issues that can be worked out in a positive way for everyone. But it's hard to make these decisions on your own. We started this show out by talking about partnerships.
You know, there's.
Deadlines, there's changes. It's a constant, always evolving industry, and you need somebody who studies this on a regular basis, like Glenn, like Isabella there in the office, and like you, Larry.
Yeah, we covered a lot of insurance today. I realized that. But really at Haven Financier Group, where our focus is on all the retirement puzzle pieces, Yes, insurance was the focus today and it's a big one for a lot of people. But we're now coming into tax season. We do lots of tax planning. That's added value that we offer at Haven Financier Group. Lance is our CPA. He's gearing up for lots of tax preparation, successful tax preparation
because we've done planning. He loves to explain things state planning, stuff, wills and trusts. You know, I mentioned we had two full classes. Carrie, Anna and Keith are state planning attorneys, wealth management, stress testing those portfolios. You know, what does the stock market have in place this year? Where are you in the timeline of life? Are you well positioned,
ill positioned, or maybe don't know? And then are you paying too much for what you're getting and you're not getting the quality time with those that you maybe have partnered with, And what does a partner really look like? Are you getting that partnership, are you getting the assistance, are you getting the information? Or you're saying I only think I got together once a year last year.
That is just simply not enough.
Right.
So, if we have struck a chord with you, as you've listened to us this morning, first off, thank you for being with us. And secondly, give them a call there at Haven Financial Group six one two five zero four eight four zero zero is their number.
Set up a free consultation.
Go in, meet the folks there, enjoy a lovely cup of coffee, a way warm cookie, and talk to the experts there about what it is you are trying to accomplish in your retirement. You can also go to Heathanfinancialgroup dot com.
Glenn, It's been a delight as always pleasure, Thank you, sir, very much.
I'm great to be with you. We look forward to next week. I have a blessed week.
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