Retirement: Have You Budgeted Enough for Your Medical Expenses?

If you’ve wondered how much money you have to save for your medical expenses in retirement, well… it’s probably a lot more than you think. Medical expenses are way, way, WAY outpacing inflation, so unfortunately, chances are pretty good that you haven’t budgeted enough.

How much can you be off? The Toledo Blade covered the story of one woman who thought she had been doing well in saving for her retirement:

Holly Knight started financially planning for retirement long before making the move this summer.

Calculations that the Point Place resident received last year showed she would need $500 to $550 a month to continue health-insurance coverage through COBRA from her last job, as communications director for Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary in Monroe.

The plan allows Ms. Knight, who has colitis, to get a $600-a-month prescription for $40.

Yet insurance costs have gone up, so that coverage now costs Ms. Knight $756 a month. Efforts to find an option in an era of federal health-care reform did yield an alternative after her initial application for a $469-a-month plan was denied, but the offer would have cost $1,200 a month, more than twice what she had budgeted.

“I really had this planned out pretty well,” said Ms. Knight, 63. “It was really a very hard kick in the gut when I got the denial. It was a wake- up.”

Chronically Ill Await Provision of Law

Have you started saving for your retirement? Tell us about it!

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