Hi friend,

I want to share a number with you today that stops most people cold. It stopped me, and I have spent 20 years in and around healthcare and financial services.

Here it is. According to Fidelity's latest estimate, a healthy 65-year-old retiring this year will spend an average of $ 185,500 on healthcare over the rest of their life.

One hundred and eighty-five thousand dollars. On healthcare alone. Even with Medicare.

And before you tell yourself that is somebody else's problem for somebody else's retirement, I need you to hear the rest, because this number isn't standing still, and most people are planning for a version of retirement that doesn't actually exist.

Let me name the belief that quietly sets so many people up to fail.

More than half of people approaching retirement assume Medicare will cover basically all of their healthcare costs. They picture turning 65, enrolling in Medicare, and never thinking about medical bills again.

That is simply not how it works. I say this as someone who has spent years inside Medicare operations, so please trust me.

Medicare is a wonderful program. It covers a great deal. But it was never designed to cover everything. Premiums, deductibles, copays, and coinsurance run through it. In fact, in that $ 185,500 estimate, roughly half comes from cost-sharing: the copays, coinsurance, and deductibles you pay when you actually use care. The rest is largely monthly premiums. This money comes out of your retirement income year after year, on top of the program itself.

So the picture most people carry in their heads, where Medicare means free healthcare, is a myth. And building your retirement plan on a myth is how good, hardworking people end up blindsided at exactly the age when they can least afford to be.

What concerns me even more than the number itself is this. It is the speed.

This year's estimate of 185,500 dollars was 7.5 percent higher than the year before. And that annual jump has been speeding up. It rose around 4 percent one recent year, about 5 percent the next, and now 7.5 percent. To put it in perspective, when Fidelity first started tracking this 25 years ago, the figure was around 80,000 dollars. It has more than doubled.

Why does this matter so much to you, especially if retirement is still years away? Because healthcare inflation tends to outrun regular inflation. The cost of staying healthy in retirement is not just rising. It is rising faster than almost everything else. Which means the longer you have until retirement, the bigger that eventual number is likely to be by the time it is your turn.

This is not a reason to panic. It is a reason to plan, starting now, while time is still on your side.

Now brace yourself, because here is the part that genuinely keeps me up at night.

That 185,500 dollars does not include long-term care.

Not nursing homes. Not assisted living. Not home health aides. None of it. All of that sits entirely outside the estimate, on top of it.

And this is not some rare, unlikely scenario. Someone turning 65 today has nearly a 70 percent chance of needing some form of long-term care at some point. Seven in ten. And this type of care is staggeringly expensive. A single year in a nursing home can cost more than most retirees earn in two full years. Medicare largely does not cover ongoing long-term care, whether that care happens in a facility or right in your own home.

So the real number you may face is not 185,500 dollars. For many people, it is considerably more. I am not telling you this to frighten you. I am telling you because you cannot prepare for a cost you do not even know exists.

Because this is my world, I want to clear up one thing that trips a lot of people up, and I am going to be straight with you.

Some of you will choose Medicare Advantage instead of Original Medicare. And there's real appeal: your upfront costs are often lower, and you don't have to buy a separate supplemental policy. That is genuinely attractive.

But don't mistake Medicare Advantage for a free ride. It is not. You will still hit deductibles and copays every time you need care, and those add up quickly. These plans have a legal cap on your yearly out-of-pocket costs, and for 2026 that cap can exceed 9,000 dollars, though many plans cap it closer to half that. But even $ 4,500 a year is real money when you are living on a fixed income.

Here is the nuance most people never hear. If you stay relatively healthy, Medicare Advantage can work out cheaper. But if you develop a chronic condition that needs ongoing care, it can sometimes end up more expensive than Original Medicare paired with a good supplemental policy that strictly limits your out-of-pocket costs.

I am not telling you which to choose. That decision is deeply personal and depends on your health, your finances, and where you live. What I am telling you is this: neither path is free, and the "cheaper" one on paper is not always cheaper once you actually get sick. Go in with your eyes open.

I never want to leave you scared. I want to leave you equipped. So here is how to turn this sobering number into motivation instead of anxiety.

If you are in your 30s, 40s, or 50s right now, this is your golden window, and I am asking you to take it seriously. Push yourself to save more aggressively for retirement than you think you need to, specifically because healthcare is a cost most people forget to plan for. Medicare will carry a lot of the load. But you will need your own money to cover the rest, and the rest is six figures.

Here's a specific tool many people overlook. If you have access to a Health Savings Account through a high-deductible health plan, it may be the most powerful retirement account you are not fully using. The money goes in before taxes, grows tax-free, and comes out tax-free when used for qualified medical expenses. It is practically built for exactly this problem. Yet many people who have one leave the money sitting in cash instead of letting it grow. If that is you, that is a fixable mistake worth fixing.

One small step, like always. I want you to simply add healthcare to your retirement picture, because most people have left it out entirely.

If retirement is years away, take one action: increase your retirement contribution by one percent this week, or, if you have access to an HSA you haven't been maximizing, look into funding and investing it.

If retirement is close, take a different action: find out whether your current or planned coverage truly protects you if your health changes, not just while you are well. That one question can save you tens of thousands of dollars.

Just one step. That is how a scary number becomes a solved problem, over time.

Healthcare is the single biggest retirement cost that people fail to plan for, and the one most likely to catch them off guard. But you are not most people, because now you know. You know the number. You know it is climbing. You know long-term care sits on top of it. And you know that the years before 65 are when you build the cushion that makes all of it manageable.

That knowledge is the whole advantage. The people who struggle are not the ones who saw this coming. They 

assumed Medicare would handle it and never looked closer.

You looked closer. That changes everything.

Talk soon,
Najma Zanelli
Explore Offerings
Founder, NAZ Global Consultancy
Follow me on IG: @najma_zanelli
Email: [email protected]

P.S. Know someone in their 40s or 50s who assumes Medicare will cover all their healthcare in retirement? Forward this to them. That single wrong assumption is one of the most expensive myths in all of retirement planning, and clearing it up for a friend might be worth six figures to them.