Insured Retirement Institute (IRI) Partners with HealthView Services to Address Retirement Health Care Cost Planning Gap

WASHINGTON, May 20, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- With retiree health care costs on a path to exceed Social Security benefits for many Americans, the Insured Retirement Institute (IRI) today announced a partnership with HealthView Services, the leading provider of retirement health care cost data, to help financial advisors address the retirement health care cost planning gap.      

Through the partnership, IRI will offer member companies access to HealthView Prime – a retirement health care cost planning tool customized for financial advisors. The tool will better facilitate the integration of retirement health care costs into retirement plans.

"Incorporating future health care costs into Americans' retirement plans is essential to helping them financially prepare for their later years," said Cathy Weatherford, IRI President and CEO.  "Until recently, advisors weren't always able to provide retirement health care data for individual clients, creating a retirement health care cost planning gap.  The individualized retirement health care cost data that HealthView Prime provides will be a powerful tool to drive informed retirement planning decisions."

According to HealthView Service's recently launched Retirement Health Care Cost Index*, an average healthy couple retiring next year will spend 69 percent of their total lifetime Social Security benefits, or $366,599 in today's dollars, on health care in retirement.  In another 10 years, costs will rise to 98 percent of total lifetime Social Security benefits or $421,083.  For couples retiring in 20 years, 127 percent of Social Security benefits will be required to cover health care costs, while couples retiring in 32 years will need 190 percent of their Social Security benefits to cover health care costs.

Affluent healthy couples retiring next year in the top Medicare surcharge bracket, can expect to pay $621,867 in lifetime health care costs.  In another 10 years, this figure will rise to approximately $752,917. 

"Retirement health care costs are the elephant in the room when it comes to retirement planning," said Ron Mastrogiovanni, Founder and CEO of HealthView Services.  "Driven by health care cost inflation, the elephant will get bigger and crowd out other issues.  We are pleased to be partnering with IRI to offer advisors a tool to help their clients take action."       

Using HealthView Prime, advisors affiliated with IRI member companies will be able to calculate expected health care costs for individual clients in a matter of minutes.  The data is a starting point for conversations about retirement savings and decumulation strategies including Social Security optimization, when to retire, and even relocating to a different state for retirement. 

Drawing upon cost data from more than 50 million annual health care cases, HealthView Prime uses the company's actuary and physician-reviewed methodology to determine average longevity and expected retirement health care costs based on age, gender, health, and time to retirement. 

Under the terms of the agreement, IRI member companies will have the opportunity to sign up for HealthView Prime and will be charged based on advisor usage.  In addition to HealthView Prime, HealthView Services' offers clients HealthWealthLink, a more comprehensive integrated retirement planning tool to assist financial advisors in preparing personalized estimates of retirement health care costs and implementing various retirement strategies to achieve clients' retirement goals.  A one-click version of HealthWealthLink  (http://apps.hvsfinancial.com/hvadvisor) can be used by individuals to calculate average retirement health care costs.   

HealthView Services (http://www.hvsfinancial.com) is the leading provider of retirement health care cost data and Medicare, Social Security, and long-term care retirement planning tools for financial advisors and individuals. 

The Insured Retirement Institute (IRI) is the leading Association for the retirement income industry.  IRI proudly leads a national consumer coalition of more than 30 organizations, and is the only organization that represents the entire supply chain of insured retirement strategies.  IRI members are the major insurers, asset managers, broker dealers/distributors, and 150,000 financial professionals.  As a not-for-profit organization, IRI provides an objective forum for communication and education, and advocates for the sustainable retirement solutions Americans need to help achieve a secure and dignified retirement.  Learn more at www.irionline.org.

* Total retirement health care costs measured by the Retirement Health Care Cost Index include all Medicare premiums, including Parts B and D, Medigap premiums, as well as out-of-pocket costs, including co-pays not covered by Medicare.  The Index assumes that the primary income earner will generate the Social Security average of $1,294 per month in today's dollars and their spouse will generate $817 per month.  While health care costs tend to increase as retirees age, the Index measures the lifetime average of health care costs.  

SOURCE HealthView Services