We've done it all for our young adults - employer based insurance, insurance through the university and now a family ACA plan. We have unsubsidized ACA and the insurance cost for our 23 year old is an additional $300 a month. We'll keep him on it until he is 26 even though he is eligible for employer-based health insurance. He works for a small start-up and it seems expected that he would not go on the company's health care until age 26.

It depends on the state but a young adult relative tried to sign up for ACA and ended up on Medicaid instead because her assets/earnings were too low. It wasn't good insurance.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My DH is self employed so our insurance rates are high. We saved money by putting our DC on the college health insurance plan…cheaper plus it had better coverage. It lasted through the end of summer of graduation by which time DC was working and went on own plan with the new job.

This is what we are doing. With all three kids in college. College plans seem to be excellent Each is about $3000 per year Way cheaper than family insurance for a self employed

This only works if you don’t have other kids at home that you still need the family plan for. We are paying it either way so many as well keep the oldest kid on it.

If the adult child is not independent (i.e they are not earning enough to cover more than 50% of their living expenses), then under the insurance marketplace, you have to use the HOUSEHOLD income (which would include the parents' income if the adult student is still dependent on the parents for living/college). If you tell the ACA marketplace the parents' income, then the adult child isn't going to qualify for any reductions in prices.

You're looking at about $300/mon premiums with about $1000 deductibles.

It would be cheaper to put them on a family insurance plan if your employer offers it. I've looked it up for my DD (20, in college) because our Tricare coverage ends at22 yrs old. DD may be going part time or may not have a job yet when she finishes college at 22... so I've looked for options. We do not use employer provided insurance b/c we have Tricare. It would be expensive to buy a family plan (on top of Tricare) just to get insurance for DD. So, I looked into the ACA to compare it to Tricare Young Adult (which is also about $300/month).

How is it that you think a college student can get very very low cost insurance via ACA?

We have kept ours on our insurance and are still claiming him because he’s in college and we are paying his living expenses. Once he has a job if his own with benefits, he can move to that.

The ACA is taxpayer subsidized and I’m not looking to pass my college student’s healthcare expenses on to random taxpayers. I’m not a ‘90s welfare queen either.

Once you stop covering a kid who is over 18 can you add them back on to your insurance if you need to? I’d check that out before dropping them.

Almost every recent grad that I hire stays on their parents insurance until they are 26.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:ACA will save us $$$$ when last kid goes to college because we'll be "self & spouse" vs "family" premiums.

If you have BC/BS, it is not the huge savings one would expect.

Yes, this is my experience. When I got divorced, I had one minor child and a few under-26 adults. The difference in cost between 'self plus one' and 'self and family' was not much-ex and I agreed to split the cost even though we legally don't have to cover the adults. We let them stay on until they are booted off at 26.

Ours is $1,000 per month savings.

Wow I'm the PP-for us it's like $50! In that case, I'd help the adult dc apply for ACA. One of my over-26 kids is on an ACA plan.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:ACA will save us $$$$ when last kid goes to college because we'll be "self & spouse" vs "family" premiums.

If you have BC/BS, it is not the huge savings one would expect.

Yes, this is my experience. When I got divorced, I had one minor child and a few under-26 adults. The difference in cost between 'self plus one' and 'self and family' was not much-ex and I agreed to split the cost even though we legally don't have to cover the adults. We let them stay on until they are booted off at 26.

Ours is $1,000 per month savings.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Does the coverage through age 26 apply even if the kid is out of college and has their own job that provides insurance?

Yes. They can make their work insurance their secondary or not take it if allowed by the corp they work for.

I thought their direct insurance through an employer would always be the primary over a parents coverage.

Anonymous wrote:Does the coverage through age 26 apply even if the kid is out of college and has their own job that provides insurance?

Yes. They can make their work insurance their secondary or not take it if allowed by the corp they work for.

Anonymous wrote:Does the coverage through age 26 apply even if the kid is out of college and has their own job that provides insurance?

It’s until, but yes, they just decline the insurance through work. Similar to how my spouse declines his work insurance because mine is better. I have hired at least a dozen sub 26 year olds since this change and not one took the insurance through work until they turned 26.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:ACA will save us $$$$ when last kid goes to college because we'll be "self & spouse" vs "family" premiums.

If you have BC/BS, it is not the huge savings one would expect.

Yes, this is my experience. When I got divorced, I had one minor child and a few under-26 adults. The difference in cost between 'self plus one' and 'self and family' was not much-ex and I agreed to split the cost even though we legally don't have to cover the adults. We let them stay on until they are booted off at 26.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My DH is self employed so our insurance rates are high. We saved money by putting our DC on the college health insurance plan…cheaper plus it had better coverage. It lasted through the end of summer of graduation by which time DC was working and went on own plan with the new job.

I am just wondering because I see all those commercials on tv with the guy who pays $9/mo for an ACA plan. I wonder why all college kids would not be on that! It is cheaper than absolutely anything, even coverage through a parent's job (aside from a few very generous employers perhaps)

Don’t be a sucker.

Do you actually think any kind of decent coverage is available for that price?

Yes, I am sure it is the cheapest bronze obviously, the worst ACA plan, and we had it for years. Deductible is high but coverage is decent. We never went anywhere near deductible. Obviously we’d help with that if something happened, but without known needs cheapest premiums are best.

And I should also say my employer plan now is not good anyway, just a lot cheaper than ACA with no subsidy. For one young person with low income, a ACA plan would be a lot cheaper thanks to subsidy.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My DH is self employed so our insurance rates are high. We saved money by putting our DC on the college health insurance plan…cheaper plus it had better coverage. It lasted through the end of summer of graduation by which time DC was working and went on own plan with the new job.

I am just wondering because I see all those commercials on tv with the guy who pays $9/mo for an ACA plan. I wonder why all college kids would not be on that! It is cheaper than absolutely anything, even coverage through a parent's job (aside from a few very generous employers perhaps)

Don’t be a sucker.

Do you actually think any kind of decent coverage is available for that price?

Yes, I am sure it is the cheapest bronze obviously, the worst ACA plan, and we had it for years. Deductible is high but coverage is decent. We never went anywhere near deductible. Obviously we’d help with that if something happened, but without known needs cheapest premiums are best.

As someone who had insurance through the exchange in their 20s, please don’t kick your kids off if you can afford it. Even with a low monthly payment, the deductibles and co-pays make getting care SO expensive.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My DH is self employed so our insurance rates are high. We saved money by putting our DC on the college health insurance plan…cheaper plus it had better coverage. It lasted through the end of summer of graduation by which time DC was working and went on own plan with the new job.

I am just wondering because I see all those commercials on tv with the guy who pays $9/mo for an ACA plan. I wonder why all college kids would not be on that! It is cheaper than absolutely anything, even coverage through a parent's job (aside from a few very generous employers perhaps)

Don’t be a sucker.

Do you actually think any kind of decent coverage is available for that price?