Health Insurance for the Solo Early Retiree
You retired early. Now you have to insure yourself until Medicare - on your own.
If you're single and stepping away from work before 65, your health-insurance situation has an extra complication: there may be no spouse's employer plan to fall back on, no second benefits package, and no one else sharing the research and decisions.
And for 2026, the numbers changed. The enhanced ACA premium-tax-credit rules that applied through 2025 expired, and eligibility is once again generally limited to households with income no higher than 400% of the federal poverty level.
Health Insurance for the Solo Early Retiree is a focused, plain-English guide for a household of one trying to bridge the years between employer coverage and Medicare.
WHAT YOU'LL LEARN
- Why retiring solo changes the health-insurance decision
- Your main pre-Medicare options, including the ACA Marketplace and COBRA
- How ACA premium tax credits work and what changed for 2026
- How MAGI and different sources of retirement income can affect Marketplace assistance
- What happens near the 400% FPL subsidy cutoff
- How to compare COBRA with Marketplace coverage
- How to evaluate premiums, deductibles, networks, metal tiers, cost-sharing reductions and HSA eligibility
- How to build a year-by-year coverage plan from your last day of work to Medicare
- What to know as you approach Medicare enrollment at 65
YOU'LL ALSO GET
- Six worked solo-retiree case studies showing how different income and retirement situations affect the numbers
- A fill-in Solo MAGI Worksheet to help organize the income used for Marketplace estimates
- An annual open-enrollment checklist
- A plain-English glossary
- Sources for finding current premiums, limits and official rules
The goal isn't to memorize one year's numbers. It's to understand the system well enough to revisit your coverage and run updated numbers each year until you reach Medicare.
Written specifically for the solo early retiree - one household, one income picture, one person making the decisions.