Friends pay close to $8000.00 and they feel it is worth it to be someplace warm for the winter months.
....$8000 travel health care expense in after tax dollars would cost in the range of $10,000 (at the 25% tax bracket) to $11,000 (at the ~37% tax bracket) range. That's an expense that I will bet 99.9% of retired Canadians couldn't afford year after year, because the average annual retiree *household* income before taxes is only in the $42,000 range. So, after federal/provincial income tax, an $8000 extra (after tax) health insurance hit would likely be catastrophic for the vast majority of elderly Canadians. Complicating this, is the hellacious exchange rate entre CAD and USD. It is more favorable in Europe and Latin America for Canadians to travel....but this aspect can change over time.
John & Angela wrote:
You can also consider snow birding in Spain. No health insurance needed but you will have to pay out of pocket for ANY service or treatment. Their schedule of costs is comparable to Canada's so you will get most of it back from your province when you submit the bills and it is not expensive to begin with. I would get a repatriation policy though.
The other thing you can do is get a non US extended health care travel plan. It is quite a bit cheaper if you guarantee you won't set foot in the US.
Costa del sol in Spain is an excellent snow bird destination. We'll continue to winter in the US until we retire but will switch to Spain at 60 when we retire.
....this would be precisely our plan, too (and IS the plan currently for nearly all our retired friends!); however, we would continue extended retirement forays into the USA till about ~65, before going "Plan Europe".
