Retirement portfolios

[charby]

I'd be even more excited about the wife working till 65 for a benefit like that. :D

I wish my wife had the ambition to get the/a job with the better/any benefits.

[Ben]

While medical insurance was a big consideration, I didn't let it stop my from my early separation at 54. While I often complain here about the annual cost (which went down $1200 when I moved), I'm still glad I didn't wait until 60 to keep the .gov insurance. It has been a small price to be for enjoying life an extra 6 years, and as others said, you never know what insurance is going to do from one year to the next anyway.

I do continue to keep an HSA and use it as an IRA, maxing it out every year and then buying Vanguard total stock and Wellesley with it (the ETF versions, as my HSA only lets me use Ameritrade). I use money out of the bank for any medical expenses and leave the HSA alone to grow tax free.

[MillCreek]

^^^Since I like to learn something every day Ben, so are you essentially foregoing medical insurance and are paying out of pocket via a HSA?  Do you have any sort of catastrophic coverage as a backup?  Or am I misunderstanding, and you have medical coverage from your government position?

[Ben]

^^^Since I like to learn something every day Ben, so are you essentially foregoing medical insurance and are paying out of pocket via a HSA?  Do you have any sort of catastrophic coverage as a backup?  Or am I misunderstanding, and you have medical coverage from your government position?

No, I have health insurance. I lost the gov insurance because I didn't stay until I was 60, but I'm on private insurance - Select Health Idaho, crappy bronze plan. I don't really go to the doctor outside of annual physicals, so it works out okay for me. I would love just catastrophic coverage and then paying for things like physicals with cash, but nothing like that is available to me in my age group. The HSA is basically just another tax advantaged investment vehicle for me.