Unveiling the Remarkable Benefits of Life Insurance

Health Insurance for All!

We believe that everyone deserves access to quality healthcare. We want to let you know that you have the opportunity to enroll in a health insurance plan under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), also known as Obamacare.

As you may know, the ACA was signed into law in 2010 with the aim of making healthcare more affordable and accessible to all Americans. The ACA provides a range of health insurance options for individuals and families, including those who may not have been able to get coverage before. 

Here at Matekel Insurance Agency, we have partnered with leading insurance providers to offer you a range of ACA-compliant health insurance plans that will provide you with comprehensive coverage at an affordable cost. Our plans offer coverage for essential health benefits, such as doctor visits, hospital stays, prescription drugs, and preventive care. 

Enrolling in an ACA health insurance plan can provide you with peace of mind, knowing that you are protected against unexpected healthcare costs. It can also help you stay healthy by providing access to preventative care and regular check-ups.

To learn more about our ACA-compliant health insurance plans, please visit our website or contact us. Our team is here to answer any questions you may have and to help you find the plan that best meets your needs.

Thank you for considering Matekel Insurance Agency for your health insurance needs. We are committed to providing you with quality, affordable coverage that will protect your health and well-being.

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The Single Best Life Insurance Policy You Haven't Considered

Along with term life insurance and whole life insurance, universal life insurance should be on your radar.

Universal life insurance lets you invest your cash value in a few different ways depending on your risk tolerance.

You can borrow from your universal life insurance cash value, or withdraw the cash value for any purpose.

If you want to buy life insurance to protect your loved ones in case of your death, a common debate is whether it's better to get term life insurance or whole life insurance. Term life insurance offers financial protection for a specific amount of time, or "term" -- such as 10 years, 20 years, or more. Whole life insurance, sometimes called permanent life insurance, is a life insurance policy that lasts for your "whole" (entire) life.

There are pros and cons to term life insurance and whole life insurance. Term life insurance tends to have the lowest-cost premiums, but it only lasts for a certain amount of time. Whole life insurance tends to be more expensive than term, but it lets you build cash value so you can earn money from your policy, while also protecting your loved ones in case of your death.

But what if there was another way to get some of the best aspects of both of these types of insurance? This other type of life insurance is called universal life insurance. You might not have considered universal life insurance, or maybe haven't even heard of it. But this type of flexible life insurance policy offers some unique advantages that could make it the right choice for your personal finances.

Let's see why universal life insurance should be on your radar if you're shopping for life insurance in 2024.

What is universal life insurance?

Universal life insurance is a type of life insurance that provides coverage for your whole life (as long as you pay your premiums), with flexibility to make changes in the policy depending on your financial goals and family needs. Depending on which universal life insurance policy you choose, you can make adjustments to the amount of death benefit, how much you pay in premiums, and when you pay your premiums.

Like whole life insurance, most universal life insurance offers cash value as part of your policy. This gives you a combination of financial protection for your loved ones in case of your death, and the possibility of investment growth.

How universal life insurance helps your finances

Universal life insurance is not just a life insurance policy; it's a flexible financial asset that can give you options for your personal finances. While a typical whole life insurance policy pays low interest and has a cash value that grows slowly over time, universal life insurance offers the chance of higher investment earnings. You can invest your universal life insurance policy's cash value in a few different ways to try to get higher growth of your investments over the course of your life. And universal life insurance tends to cost less than whole life insurance.

With universal life insurance, you can also use your policy's cash value anytime, for anything you want -- often without owing taxes. You can take a loan from your policy's cash value (while owing interest), or use your policy's cash value as collateral for a bank loan. Think of universal life insurance as a flexible savings and investment account that also provides life insurance coverage. Depending on your stage of life and financial needs, universal life insurance could be a good addition to your investment portfolio.

Types of universal life insurance

Different life insurance companies might offer a few types of universal life insurance. Here are the most common types, in ascending order of flexibility and most investment options.

Guaranteed universal life insurance

This type of policy is the lowest-cost and simplest form of universal life insurance. With guaranteed universal life insurance, you get fixed premiums, but you won't get cash value. (Without the cash value, you might want to consider term life insurance instead.)

Indexed universal life insurance

This kind of policy lets you put some of your cash value into an equity index account, which pays interest based on the performance of a market index that it tracks, such as the S&P 500. In case the index takes a loss during the year, you won't earn any interest. But if your index performs well, your cash value can earn higher interest than you would get from a typical whole life insurance policy.

Variable universal life insurance

If you have a higher tolerance for investment risk, variable universal life insurance could be the best choice. This type of policy lets you invest your cash value in stocks, bonds, and ETFs. You get the potential for bigger investment gains, but you also have to accept the risk of investment loss; if the markets go down, your cash value could suffer losses, too. Variable universal life insurance might also be more expensive than other types of universal life insurance.

Who should choose universal life insurance

Universal life insurance can be a good choice for a few situations. Do any of these feel familiar?

You feel frustrated paying money every month for term life insurance and getting nothing in return, unless you die; it feels like you're throwing money away

Whole life insurance seems stodgy and expensive; the cash value doesn't grow enough

You like the idea of getting additional savings and investment options as part of owning a life insurance policy

You want flexibility to change your life insurance policy's details, such as a higher death benefit, or paying the premium from the policy's cash value

Bottom line: You don't have to be limited to the usual term life versus whole life insurance debate. Universal life insurance can give you additional investment choices and flexibility for getting the most out of your life insurance policy.

How some people escape the steep Medicare surcharge on premiums known as IRMAA

Most people on Medicare will pay about $2,100 in Part B premiums this year. But high-income beneficiaries will get socked owing as much as $6,708 instead, due to the surcharge they’ll pay known as IRMAA (Income-Related Monthly Adjustment Amount)—except, that is, for a select group who are IRMAA exempt.

Who are those people and how can they avoid paying the IRMAA surcharge assessed for Medicare beneficiaries whose 2022 modified adjusted gross incomes exceeded $103,000 ($206,000 for couples)?

They’re former workers for the federal government and sometimes ex-state government employees.

When the IRMAA surcharge doesn’t kick in

But their exemption isn’t really about a way for them to skate pass the IRMAA surcharge, which was enacted by Congress in 2003. They don’t owe it because they’ve chosen not to enroll in Medicare Part B due to continued coverage from the generous Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, the nation’s largest employer-sponsored group health insurance program. (Part B is for doctor bills, outpatient care, home health care, medical equipment and preventive services.)

 “Our federal health benefit program started in 1960 and Medicare didn’t start until 1965, so we always had lifetime coverage as federal retirees,” explained Tammy Flanagan, principal of the Retire Federal consulting firm in Bradenton, Fla. “The majority of federal retirees still don’t have to take Medicare.”

Former federal employees can keep their federal health insurance after 65 for as long as they like if they had that coverage for at least the last five years of their career and were eligible for an immediate federal pension.

That pension plus Social Security can sometimes be enough to lead to an IRMAA surcharge for former federal workers in Medicare.

Roughly 20% to 25% of former federal workers eligible for Medicare don’t enroll in Medicare Part B and aren’t subject to a potential IRMAA surcharge, says Flanagan.

How IRMAA works

IRMAA’s surcharge is a sliding scale that, in 2024, starts at $244.60 a month for people with 2022 income between $103,000 and $129,000 and goes up to $559 a month for incomes of $500,000 or more.

The ones who’d owe IRMAA if they took Part B “just don’t like the idea of paying up to $500 a month or $1,000 a month for a couple when they can just have their health insurance the way they always had it and pay just the going rate for their federal health plan,” she says.

State and local government employees hired after March 31, 1986, are required to enroll in Medicare at 65, but earlier hires aren’t.

Retired U.S. Postal Service employees will need to make Medicare Part B their primary coverage, however, starting in 2025. That’s because the Postal Service Reform Act of 2022 demands it.

That change could be a foot in the door toward eventually requiring all federal retirees to enroll in Medicare, says Flanagan, a former employee benefits specialist at the FBI. “I think Congress is certainly going to look at that,” she added.

 Incurring the wrath of Medicare beneficiaries

The federal retirees’ exemption from IRMAA irritates some Medicare beneficiaries who owe the surcharge.

“We do get a lot of people who, in general, don’t think much of federal employees. We have this reputation of being lazy and all the other things you hear about the federal workforce,” says Flanagan. “But to tell you the truth, we do work hard.”

Federal workers, Flanagan also noted, sometimes receive lower salaries than they’d earn doing similar work in the private sector.

But fewer and fewer private-sector retirees can keep their employer’s health insurance after leaving their full-time jobs.

In 2022, only 7% of private-sector workers had jobs at employers offering health insurance to retirees, down from 25% in 1997, according to a recent report from the Employee Benefit Research Institute.

 Drawbacks for declining Medicare Part B

Although former federal workers who choose not to enroll in Medicare Part B will save the cost of its premiums and a possible IRMAA surcharge, there are potential drawbacks, too.

“Federal retirees who do not enroll in Part B face a late enrollment penalty” if they later decide to sign up for it, says Diane Omdahl, president and founder of 65 Incorporated, a Medicare advisory firm.

That late-enrollment penalty is pretty stiff itself. Your monthly Part B premium might go up 10% for each full 12 months you could have had Part B but didn’t enroll.

Flanagan says, “I get calls from people in their 70s and 80s saying, ‘Hey, I want to join Part B, can I get in?’

Her answer to these federal retirees: “Well, yeah, you can get in, but it’s going to cost you a lot of money with the late-enrollment penalty.”

Advice for former federal workers

Flanagan advises former federal workers to think long-term when deciding whether to forego Medicare Part B and avoid a possible surcharge. “When Medicare pays first and the Federal Employees Health Benefits Plan is a secondary payer, you pay nothing” in out-of-pocket expenses other than premiums and prescriptions, she says.

In effect, the Federal Employees Health Benefits Plan becomes the equivalent of a Medigap policy bought to supplement Traditional Medicare.

As Flanagan wrote in the trade group magazine for federal workers and retirees, when Medicare is the primary payer for a retired federal worker, the Federal Employee Health Benefits Plan can then often take care of Medicare’s deductible, co-payments and co-insurance.

A few private insurers reimburse part or all of federal retirees’ Medicare Part B premiums, which can sometimes ease the IRMAA sting, too. The largest reimbursements are typically offered by the more expensive plans, Flanagan noted.

For state-government retirees, “some entities, like CALPERS [the California Public Employees’ Retirement System] will increase the reimbursement for those who are subject to IRMAA, says Omdahl.

Alaska, New Jersey and New York also reimburse Part B premiums and IRMAA surcharges for their state government retirees in Medicare.

Is an Indexed Universal Life policy right for me?

An Indexed Universal Life (IUL) insurance policy combines life insurance coverage with a cash value component that is linked to the performance of a stock market index, such as the S&P 500. Here are some benefits of getting an IUL policy:

• 1.  Life Insurance Coverage • Death Benefit: Provides a tax-free death benefit to your beneficiaries upon your death, ensuring their financial security.
• 2.  Cash Value Growth • Market-Linked Growth: The cash value grows based on the performance of a selected stock market index, offering the potential for higher returns compared to traditional whole life insurance policies. • Floor Protection: Most IUL policies include a floor, typically around 0%, which means that even if the index performs poorly, your cash value will not decrease due to market losses.
• 3.  Flexibility • Premium Flexibility: You can adjust your premium payments and the amount allocated to the cash value component, allowing for greater control over your policy. • Adjustable Death Benefit: You can increase or decrease the death benefit (subject to underwriting and policy terms), making it adaptable to changing financial needs.
• 4.  Tax Advantages • Tax-Deferred Growth: The cash value grows on a tax-deferred basis, meaning you don’t pay taxes on the gains as they accumulate. • Tax-Free Loans and Withdrawals: You can take loans or withdrawals from the cash value, often on a tax-free basis, if structured correctly.
• 5.  Retirement Income • Supplemental Income: The cash value can be used as a source of supplemental retirement income, providing a potential tax-free income stream through policy loans and withdrawals.
• 6.  Potential for Higher Returns • Index Participation: By linking the cash value growth to a stock market index, IUL policies can potentially offer higher returns compared to other permanent life insurance policies, such as whole life insurance.
• 7.  Protection from Market Downturns • Cap and Floor Rates: While there is a cap on the maximum return you can earn, the floor ensures that you do not lose money due to poor market performance, providing a balance between growth potential and protection.
• 8.  No Direct Stock Market Investment • Reduced Risk Exposure: Your cash value is not directly invested in the stock market, reducing the risk compared to direct stock market investments. The insurance company credits interest based on index performance, without your cash value being subject to market volatility.
• 9.  Estate Planning • Wealth Transfer: IUL policies can be an effective tool for estate planning, allowing you to transfer wealth to your heirs in a tax-efficient manner.
• 10.  Living Benefits • Accelerated Death Benefits: Many IUL policies offer riders that allow access to the death benefit if you are diagnosed with a terminal illness, chronic illness, or critical illness, providing financial support during difficult times.

*While IUL policies offer many benefits, they also come with complexities and potential drawbacks, such as caps on returns, policy fees, and the need for careful management to avoid lapsing. It's important to consult with a financial advisor or insurance professional to ensure an IUL policy aligns with your financial goals and risk tolerance.