Always Open Season at CHM

It's almost November, and this time of year millions of Americans are going hunting, not for wild game, but for healthcare plans.

Hi, I'm Rob West. Yes, the healthcare hunting season, commonly known as open enrollment, kicks off on November 1st. Lauren Gydeck is our guide today, and she's packing a great alternative way to meet your healthcare costs. Then it's on to your calls at 800-525-7000. That's 800-525-7000.

This is MoneyWise Live, biblical wisdom for your financial decisions. Well, Lauren Gydeck is vice president of communications and media at Christian Healthcare Ministries and underwriter of this program. At CHM, they specialize in medical cost sharing, a different way to meet your healthcare needs, and Lauren, welcome back. Thank you so much, Rob. It's a pleasure to be back on the program with you.

Well, it's always great to have you. All right, Lauren, what is the open enrollment period this year? Well, Rob, I'll start out by saying that Christian Healthcare Ministries does not have an open enrollment period, but that being said, open enrollment, you know, it's something that happens once a year toward the end of the year.

This year, I believe it is November, mid-November through early January, and it's the time when people are searching for, you know, a healthcare plan or a different healthcare solution. So, you know, you'll want to check with your employer on that. Or if you're an entrepreneur, you know, Christian Healthcare Ministries serves a lot of entrepreneurs as well. Or if you're employed, we do that too. Yeah. And when we talk about health insurance, the open enrollment that applies here is really that time where they can make a change in their plan, is that right? Correct. Yeah, especially if you have an employer-sponsored plan. You know, with Christian Healthcare Ministries, we serve individuals and families.

So, you know, we do have some group solutions as well. But, you know, this is the time of the year when people are shopping because, you know, if somebody does join an insurance plan, then they're locked into that essentially for a year, whereas it would be different if they were to join CHM. Yeah.

And let's talk about that for a second. As you said, with CHM, there is no open enrollment. So talk about what CHM offers to those looking to cut the costs for their healthcare needs.

Yeah, absolutely. So Christian Healthcare Ministries is not an insurance plan or program. We are a medical cost-sharing ministry. And so the end result is truly the same because at the end of the day, you know, your medical bills are taken care of. But the way that the ministry works is a little different.

We don't have contracts with our members. It is a faith-based solution to healthcare costs. So like-minded Christian believers all over the country join this program. You know, it's a membership-based program, and we exist to help them take care of their healthcare costs. Yeah. And there's a huge legacy here. In fact, I know CHM was the first of the health-sharing ministries. And I'd love for you to talk about some of that history and just the size and scope of the amount of dollars that have been shared to this point. Yeah, absolutely.

I'd be happy to do that. So Christian Healthcare Ministries has been around longer than any other health cost-sharing program. We've been in existence for over 40 years. And during that time, you know, we have served well over a million people. Currently, we have over hundreds of thousands all over the country in every state. We also have missionaries who work in other countries getting the gospel out there. And it's a real pleasure to be able to come alongside them in their work of serving the Lord, but having an affordable solution to their healthcare costs, making that possible.

Well, that's what families are looking for. And Lauren, how many billions with a B have been shared? We have shared. Are you ready for this?

I'm ready. It's over 8 billion, 8 billion with a B, dollars in medical bills since our inception. Wow, that is amazing. All right. Well, after this break, we're going to take a deep dive, Lauren, because I know folks perhaps are hearing about this for the first time, or maybe they've heard about it but don't understand it. So we'll talk about what it is, what it might look like in the way of cost, but also why it's a biblical alternative to covering the cost of healthcare and why that's so important to you and your team at Christian Healthcare Ministries. We're talking with Lauren Gidek, Vice President of Communications and Media at Christian Healthcare Ministries, an underwriter of MoneyWise. When we come back, much more on health cost sharing with Lauren Gidek.

Stay with us. Delighted to have you with us today on MoneyWise Live. Joining me today is my friend Lauren Gidek. She's Vice President of Communications and Media at Christian Healthcare Ministries, where they specialize in medical cost sharing. CHM is an underwriter of this program, and Lauren, we're so grateful for our partnership. I know you and the team at CHM have served hundreds and hundreds of our listeners here to MoneyWise, and including some of our team members here at MoneyWise Media, so this holds a special place in our hearts. As I mentioned before the break, a lot of folks may not be familiar with medical cost sharing, so I'd love to just get into some of the details and have you explain how a program like this actually works.

Yeah, I'd be happy to do that. So what we have in place is three different programs. We have our gold program, our silver program, and our bronze program. And the bronze and silver programs are pretty simple. They essentially help with your hospitalization costs. So, you know, if you break your arm and you happen to go to the hospital for that, or if you need a surgery, those would be silver and bronze kind of specialty. Our gold program is more inclusive.

There are more options there, and that is, I'll just use that as an illustration. So for our gold program, it's $235 per unit per month. And when I say unit, that means, you know, like mom is a unit, dad is a unit, and then all dependent children together are a unit.

So there's a maximum of three units per family. And at gold, that's $235 per month, silver's $135 per month, and bronze is $90 per month. And then getting back to what's included in the gold program, in addition to hospitalization, we have a wonderful maternity program available through gold, and then there's some other things included in there, physical therapy, prescriptions in some cases, and that sort of thing. And this is really helpful, especially now with the economy the way it is, inflation sky high. A lot of folks in our audience are looking for ways to stretch their budget, and that's why having an affordable solution to cover the cost of health care is critical.

Oh, absolutely, and I will say this, you know, inflation is affecting everyone. But at CHM, we have cost savings tools in place, you know, first for the ministry, so we can continue, you know, our 40-plus year tradition of satisfying over 100% of medical bills, eligible medical bills that we receive. And then we also have cost-saving options for our members. So we do have a telemedicine program offered at no additional cost. You know, medical bill discounts come into play, you know, folks can get their medical bills reduced, and that helps everyone keep the cost down. And then also folks can actually earn credits toward their membership by referring others to join. So we have a really nice referral program baked in there as well.

Yeah. What about the paperwork involved? You know, when I actually go to have a health care provider provide a service to me, what's involved in getting that covered through the sharing?

Right. So it's actually just a matter of a few simple forms that you would need to fill out and send to us along with your itemized medical bills. And I should probably back up a step and say that, you know, as a CHM member, you know, you have sufficient to receive bills for a health care provider, you know, and then you would send those to CHM by way of the forms that I described and send your bills over to us.

And what we would do is we would go ahead and check and make sure that there's no issue with the bills, there's no duplicate entries, there's no, you know, charges that shouldn't be there, scrubbing the bills essentially, and then, you know, working with you if you need help getting discounts on your bills. And then we would turn around and actually send the funds out to you as a patient and you pay your health care provider. So it's neat because, you know, everyone is actually aware how much their health care is costing them. And when they know what they're being charged, they can, in some cases, they can shop their health care.

And that also helps keep costs down for everyone. Yeah. Well, and because you're essentially self-pay with CHM behind you sharing back to cover the costs, you can really choose any medical provider because there really are no networks, right? Yeah. I'm glad you brought that up. And I had mentioned earlier, you know, CHM is not an insurance company, but the end result of getting your medical bills taken care of is the same.

So you're absolutely right. We don't have a health care provider network that you have to follow. You know, you can go to any doctor or hospital that you want to go to that you and your doctor decide is best.

If you need to go have a surgery or something, you can go to the hospital of your choice. As long as the treatment falls under what we call our CHM guidelines, we share 100% of those eligible costs. Very good. And then we talked about that this is a biblical alternative, and that really is part of the distinctiveness of CHM. Will you talk about that piece of it?

Yes, I'd be glad to. This is something else that folks are sometimes pleasantly surprised to learn. You know, with CHM, you're not just a number. You know, you're a person, you're an individual, you are a child of God. And because of that, it's very important to us to, you know, help folks feel like they're part of a community, that they're part of a Christian community that is praying for them. You know, our members share scripture verses with each other.

They encourage each other. And there's all sorts of ways to do that, but we have some that are built in. You know, for example, in your monthly billing statement, you will receive a prayer card. And it has on it the name of a person who has requested prayer. And, you know, they give us permission to do that, of course. But you can pray for that person. You can get in contact with them and just lift them up, support them spiritually, and help them to walk through what is, in some cases, some of the most difficult times of their lives. Wow. So you really are a part of a community, the body of Christ coming together in more ways than just covering each other's bills.

I love that. I'm thinking about, Lauren, the person who's maybe starting a business. It seems like CHM might be a great option for somebody venturing out on their own, huh? So if you're an entrepreneur or you're someone who has their own business, what's really nice about CHM is that it's portable and it's flexible. So you can take it with you wherever you go, whatever new business venture that you embark on. And we also don't have a provider network. So that's a really nice feature for folks who are more transient and are looking for certain levels of care.

You can just take it if you go to a new job, if you start a new business. Very good. Lauren, why don't we finish today by just telling folks the process for signing up and what happens when they call?

Yeah, absolutely. It's really easy to sign up for Christian Healthcare Ministries. You just go to our website, which is chministries.org, chministries.org. And most people do sign up online on our online application, so you can just click that Join Now button. Also, you could call us if you have questions.

It's 1-800-791-6225. Awesome. Well, Lauren, we always appreciate your time. Thanks for stopping by today. Oh, thank you so much for having me. Have a great day. You too.

Folks, if you want to learn more, go to chministries.org or call 800-791-6225. We're going to pause for a quick break when we come back. Much more on MoneyWise Live just around the corner. Stick around. Great to have you with us today on MoneyWise Live. I'm Rob West, your host, taking your calls and questions today on anything financial. The number to call, 800-525-7000. That's 800-525-7000. Let's head to the phones today. We're going to begin in Kent, Ohio, WCRF. Stephanie, you're our first caller. Go right ahead. Hi, Rob.

Thanks for taking my question. A little bit about myself. I put myself through college, so I graduated with no debt. I joined the military after college and took a bonus. I was fortunate to start investing in my mid-20s. Fast forward to about two years ago, I don't have any commercial debt. The only debt that I have is my mortgage, which I took out of 15 years. I overpaid, so I'm on track to pay that off by the time I'm 48.

I'm currently 39. Historically, all my money was spread out between the CS, I, and F funds. The first three months of 2020, I took a loss of about $65,000 and completely freaked out, even though I know you're supposed to look in it for the long haul. I moved all my money into the G Fund. Last year, I saw a financial advisor through the military for free who looked at my finances, and he's like, why are you in the G Fund? So I explained. Historically, I hadn't been. I had it much more diversified, but I panicked.

He said, well, that was a huge mistake. You never should have done that. You need to look into dollar-cost averaging.

You need to put it back in. So my question is, I keep getting these conflicting opinions about now's the time to do it because it's lower than it's ever been, and then also now is not the time to do it because you're going to lose even more because we're heading into an even worse recession than before. So right now, I've got about $422,000. Again, I'm 39. I'm married.

I've been married for seven years. I've got a six-year-old and a three-year-old, and I'm stuck because I'm like, do I sit here? I'm very conservative, and I want to be cautious. I want to do the right thing, but I'm not sure what the right thing is to do here. Do I do the dollar-cost averaging and put it back in now, or do I not? The second part to my question is, I keep getting some advertisements from robo-advisors, and I didn't know if you had an opinion on that. So those are my two questions. Do I put it back in?

Do I wait? And then what is your opinion on a robo-advisor? Great. Well, first of all, you're doing a great job, and should you have pulled it out, I probably wouldn't have. I mean, just given your age and time horizon, but I certainly understand an emotional reaction. You've worked a lot of years and worked very hard to build up a significant nest egg, and you were watching it erode, and I get that. I mean, the good news is you were only down about 13%, so I assume you started with about $487,000, and then you're down to $422,000, which is when you pulled it out, which obviously is less than the market is down. And so now you're wondering, kind of, where do I go from here? You know, the question, should I put it back in?

Is it going to go up or down? Well, nobody knows the answer to that, and if they tell you they do, they're not being truthful because we just don't know. Is the bottom in? Possibly. Is it not?

Maybe. I would probably come down on the side of, no, we're going to see a new low here before we fully recover, but I could be wrong, and that's why we don't invest for a month or a quarter or a year or even two years. We invest for 5, 10, 20, 30 years, and the good news is at 39 you've got time on your side, and you're well on your way to having your home paid off well before retirement, and so you've got a strong financial foundation under you, and that's a really good thing. In terms of, kind of, how to think about this portfolio moving forward, you made the comment, what if we hit a recession, and what I would say to you is the market has already, from my standpoint, priced in a recession, so the sell-off that we've seen is factoring in the market anticipating that we're going to have some sort of recession, maybe not a deep one, but at least a recession. Now, if things deteriorate even further, could this market go down before it goes up? Absolutely.

You're just not going to know the answer to that question. So, how should you proceed? Well, I think one way to go, which is probably the way I would advise you to go, but at the end of the day you need to make this decision, and I wouldn't guilt you into doing one thing or another. You are the steward, you and your husband, and so you all need to make this call, but given that you're only down 13%, and that's relative to where the market is, I think it is probably time for you to start dollar-cost averaging back into a properly diversified portfolio, but that doesn't mean I would do that only because I think it can't go down further from here because I just can't tell you that. What I would say is the market's going to recover well ahead of the economy. A lot of this bad news and the prospect of a recession is already priced into this market, and if you wait until we start to see economically things turn around, well, the market will have already recovered by that point, and that's why that's kind of a losing proposition.

So I would say given your age and given how strong your financial foundation is, even though the market could go lower from here, I would still encourage you to start moving back into the market so that you're ready for that recovery when it happens, whether that's later this year or halfway through next. Does all that make sense, though? It absolutely does, and I appreciate that. You've got to understand I didn't. A lot of this has been self-taught, and it's something that I'm really proud of.

Sure. You should be. I didn't have money for college.

I didn't have anything set aside. I listened and learned on my own, and it's taken, strategically, it's grown. So I think that's the reason it's so emotional is that I've worked really hard.

Yes. So I do appreciate it. You've done a great job, and you should be proud of what you've done here, Stephanie. I think the question is, have you separated from the military? Are you able to roll this out? I'm still a reservist. I've got five years intellect and retired from the military. So does it have to stay in the TSP until then?

It does. Yeah, okay. So I think the approach you had taken before was the right one, and that would be the direction I'd go when you're ready to move back in, and me, I would start that process now. Hang on the line. We'll finish off the air, and we'll be right back on MoneyWise Live.

Stay with us. Delighted to have you with us today on MoneyWise Live, where we talk finances. We talk God's money, recognizing our role as stewards and looking to God's word as the counsel for how we should manage his money. The wisdom that is unchanging in these changing and uncertain times. We can look to God's word in all areas of our life, beginning with trusting Jesus as our Lord and Savior, and then beyond that, as stewards of all that God has entrusted to us, and that includes the financial resources he's entrusted to us.

You know, stewardship is much bigger than just money, but as it relates to this program, we want to find God's heart as it relates to how we manage the financial resources that he has entrusted to us. Let's do that together. 800-525-7000 is the number to call.

Back to the phones to beautiful Boca Raton. Donna, thank you for calling. Go right ahead. Hi, Rob.

Can you hear me? Yes, ma'am. I'm calling about single life annuities. I retired almost two years ago from a government position, and I am receiving a pension, but prior to retirement, I entered a drop program. Right. Recently, I received a notification from my financial institution talking about an annual lifetime income illustration, which is what they're calling a... Single life annuity. A single life annuity.

Yes. And I'm not sure where to look at that because, you know, because of everything that's going on with the economy and everything else, but I am currently renting. I'm 68. I'm single. I have no children, and I really basically have to look at this towards my own benefits and for my future.

Yes. And are you living off of any part of this money right now, or is this money that you're going to tap down the road? Well, right now, I'm just living on Social Security and my pension. Okay, and that's enough to cover your bills? Barely, because everything is getting so much more expensive. I understand that.

It's really gotten tight. Sure. And how much do you have available through the drop program?

Uh-huh. How much is available in that account, if you were to take a lump sum? $110,000. Okay, yeah, so you've got a lot of money there. So I think, you know, your options are you could either roll that out from the drop program to an IRA, take a lump sum distribution, and then have that managed for you, and, you know, at this point, it would be not a bad time to get that invested for you, just given what's going on in the market and the fact that, you know, you would benefit from the recovery.

I'd probably have that in a fairly conservative portfolio, probably no more than 40% allocated to stocks, maybe even 30%, depending on how conservative you want to be, and the rest in bonds. And, you know, once you're ready to start drawing from it, you might want to think in terms of pulling about 4% a year. So on $110,000, that would be about $365 a month, where you'd try to maintain the principal balance, but supplement your Social Security and pension, which is a little bit extra cushion. The other option is the single life annuity, and basically what they mean by that is a single life annuity just speaks to the fact that there's only, the payout only happens during the life of one individual. So at your death, the payments would stop with a single life payout, as opposed to a joint life payout, where it might continue to a spouse, which is not applicable in your case. And the single life payouts are generally larger on a per month basis, because they stop upon the death of the annuitant, whenever that is. Now, there's two different types of single life annuities.

You can have a fixed, where there's a guaranteed rate of return attached to it, or a variable, which is a little riskier, because it's based on the performance of the underlying investments in the portfolio, although to protect the downside, sometimes there's a floor on what you can lose, but you do give up some on the upside in exchange for that. So that would be a situation where if you said, listen, I don't want to have the market risk associated with this $110,000, I want a guaranteed return, and then at some point down the road, I want to take what it grows to through the amount that you put in, plus the guaranteed return, and I want to convert it to an income stream. Which is called annuitizing, and that would just continue until you die, and then it would stop, and they would keep the rest of the money. It wouldn't go to heirs or family or friends.

It would just stop at that point. That's going to maximize your payout based on what it grows to. So I think the question here is, do you want to take the $110,000, turn it over to an advisor, and then have it managed conservatively, realizing you're taking some risk, but the benefit is you'd have access to the money. If you needed it for long-term care, if you needed it for assisted living, or you had a major expense, you'd be able to access that $110,000, versus the annuity where you don't have the market risk, you're transferring that to the insurance company, but you lose access to the money unless you pay penalties and so forth, and then at some point you'd convert that to an income stream to supplement your other income sources.

Does that all make sense? It's very confusing to me, but that is my concern, was my long-term care. I don't have children.

I have nieces and nephews, but they're all far away. They don't live near me, and I wouldn't want them to take care of me, so I want to be able to take care of myself. So long-term care is very important to me, so that would really be a factor in deciding what I need to do. Yeah, and I think that's going to come down to, do you want to get a long-term care insurance policy, although at age 68 it's going to be very expensive, or do you want to try to cover that through the annuity? So just for an example, and this is going to vary, but just a typical $100,000 annuity on a single life payout at age 70 would pay about $600 a month, so that would be $600 that you could add to your pension and your Social Security, and then you would have to, once you annuitize, you would have that amount to cover whatever expenses you have, no matter what type of care you need down the road, versus what I was saying is you could probably pull, if you take 4% a year on that same $110,000, you could probably pull about $365 a month, but you remember you're protecting the principal, so you can always tap into it if you need it, versus the annuity where you're just going to get this income stream for the rest of your life and then it goes away. You don't have access to the principal at that point. So I think that's what it's going to come down to.

Do you want to keep access to the principal, or do you want to eliminate the market risk and just get a payout and maximize that payout, and the single life annuity would do that. So perhaps if you're unclear as to what direction you might want to go, I think connecting with a certified kingdom advisor there in Boca might make some sense, Donna, somebody who can just look at your whole situation, talk to you about various scenarios moving forward using your actual drop balance and the various options that are being presented to you so you can make a good decision, and you can find a CKA there in Boca by heading to our website, moneywise.org, and just click Find a CKA. Is that helpful? I definitely will, Rob. Thank you so much. You've helped me so much. Thank you. Well, I'm delighted about that. Thank you so much, and we appreciate your call today.

May God bless you. Well, folks, we've covered a lot of ground today, but we're not done yet. Still another segment to go, and we've got some great questions coming up. We'll be in Chattanooga and down the street from there in Nashville, then up to Illinois, and maybe your question.

We've got room for maybe one more call at 800-525-7000. This is MoneyWise Live, where we apply God's wisdom to your financial decisions so we can hold God's money loosely and give generously and live with contentment, but at the end of the day, trust God as our provider, not our things, not the things of this world, with an eternal perspective. We'll be right back with much more MoneyWise Live just around the corner.

Stick around. Great to have you with us today on MoneyWise Live. I'm Rob West. We're taking your calls and questions today on anything financial. Let's head right back to the phones.

To Chattanooga we go Wanda. Thank you for calling. Go right ahead.

Thank you for taking my call. I just wanted to ask how you can determine if a nonprofit organization is legit and their funds go for the purposes that they say they're intended on, just for administrative purposes. Yes. Well, the good news is, Wanda, that information is more readily available than ever in terms of, number one, if you want to actually look at their 990, which is the IRS form that they report, those are available publicly for nonprofits. But then also there's organizations that will actually provide information on some of the statistics you're talking about, how much of every dollar goes toward admin versus the actual service or ministry being provided. One of those is called GuideStar.org. GuideStar.org. You can take a look at that and find some information there.

Another one is called Candid, C-A-N-D-I-D.org. And then there's basically a designation called the ECFA certification, E-C-F-A. It stands for Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability.

And if the organization is ECFA-ECFA certified, then that can give you a lot of confidence just in terms of that they have audits and that there's a lot of oversight there and that they are in good standing with a lot of those issues. So I wouldn't hesitate to do some homework. As we think about being good stewards of God's money, that not only includes our investments and our spending but also our giving. And so that would be a way to go. The other thing I might throw out to you, Wanda, is if you have a particular area or need that you're passionate about supporting, you could always check with our friends at the National Christian Foundation at ncfgiving.com.

At NCF, they have folks that could help you just explore the various ministries serving in any number of areas to meet real needs either in your city or around the world and could weigh in on some options for you to consider of ministries that they've vetted and looked out pretty closely. Is that helpful? That is very helpful. There are so many organizations and people taking up money to help with a hurricane down in Florida, and I don't want to give it to them. I want to give it to somebody who would be sure that it's going to help those people.

Yes. And are you talking specifically about hurricane relief? Not just hurricane relief, but anything that helps other people.

Yeah. The reason I mention that is that at NCF, the National Christian Foundation, which both Ron Blue and Larry Burkett were founders of, they actually put together exactly what you're talking about, a fund specifically for the hurricane relief, but they did it because they wanted to be able to make sure that the resources got into the hands of the ministries on the ground that were working through the local churches so that you didn't have the opportunity to get scammed by somebody who wasn't really doing that work. For any of your giving that you want to do directly for hurricane relief, ncfgiving.com would be the place to go.

But beyond that, I think NCF could help you, or GuideStar would be another great resource. Wanda, thank you for calling today. We appreciate you.

To Nashville. Hey, Lori, how can I help you? Hi, Rob. Thanks for taking my call.

Two quick questions, I hope. I have buyer's remorse on an I-Bond that I purchased a little over a week ago, and within 24 hours, some red flags came up, and my question for you is, can I redeem that bond without kind of having any penalty to my principal? You know, unfortunately, Lori, I don't think there is a way. Once that transaction goes through and that purchase is confirmed, you've got to wait 12 months to get it out. May I ask what it was that gave you buyer's remorse on that? That afternoon that I purchased it, I locked myself out of my account because of the security questions.

I have trouble remembering which of the two answers. Anyway, I called back to have my account unlocked, and it was within two hours of the office closing, and the message came on. An automated message said, we are not taking any more calls. So that was within two hours. So the next day, I called and I waited on my phone four hours and 15 minutes for somebody to come on and unlock it. And then I called back the next morning at the very minute that they opened, and they had a volume.

They said, oh, we have a volume of calls. I waited an hour and 15 minutes to ask about beneficiaries because I did not designate a beneficiary online. And the only thing I have as proof that I have that bond is a picture of my screen, a screenshot of that, and that's it. There's no paper.

There's no nothing. I thought, man, if I lost that. So that and the waiting period was really uncomfortable for me, and I just thought maybe I could just redeem the bond. Yeah, I don't think you can. Let me just encourage you, though, Laurie. First of all, what you're describing in terms of the customer service is inexcusable, so don't get me wrong there.

I'm not in any way excusing that. I will say that they are just simply overwhelmed because, as you might imagine, with iBonds paying 9.62%, there's nothing like it out there. And so there's just the volume of service requests and needs by phone and electronically is just creating a real challenge for the U.S. Treasury to keep up with. Despite that, it's the very best investment going. So if there's some way to kind of get past these challenges you're experiencing, and I agree, they're bad, the actual merits of the investment themselves are stellar because you've essentially got zero risk because you've got the backing of the U.S. government, and you're getting a phenomenal rate of return far greater than anything else you would get with this level of risk. So I realize you've got to get it all in order. You've got to get the beneficiary attached.

You've got to make sure that it's set up properly, and it sounds like that's been a real headache. But if you can get that done in terms of the actual merits of the investment, there's nothing better. But I realize the customer service issues are real. Was there a part two to your question, Laurie? Yes. I just want to say the folks that I did talk to were very, very nice and very informative.

They are overwhelmed. My second question was, I have a beneficiary RMD, and I'm under 70, so from a tax perspective, is there any benefit to having my beneficiary RMD directly deposited to the church or having it directly deposited to my bank, and then I write the church a check for the same amount? Yes. And what did you say was your age? I'm under that, whatever, that 70-and-a-half or 72 that allows you to take it off your growth, so I'm under 70. Yeah, so you are not able to do that, to transfer directly to the ministry. That's called a qualified charitable distribution, and you have to be at least 70-and-a-half years old at the time you request it. So the only thing you would be able to do would be to take the distribution personally. It's going to be added to your adjusted gross income, and then you could turn around and gift that to the ministry, and if you itemize, then you could itemize that gift as a part of your charitable contributions.

But under age 70-and-a-half, there is not a way to go directly to the ministry from an IRA. Okay, perfect then. Thank you so much, Rob. I appreciate it. Okay, Lori, you're welcome. Thanks for your call today.

Let's see, to Illinois. Hey, Marilyn, how can I help you? Hi, thank you for taking my call. I also had a question about the I-bonds. I tried calling, and I got the same thing to get help with doing it, and so I was wondering, is it too late? Is the rate going to be dropping? Because I thought I heard you say until October it's at the 9%. Yeah, it will adjust come November, but if you go ahead and get in now, you'll get the current rate for six months, and then when your six months is up based on the start date of when you buy the bonds, that's when it will adjust, and we won't know that new rate until November. But if you can go ahead and set up the account and get it funded before the rate adjusts, then you'll get this current rate of 9.62 for the next six months. And that will be until October 30th, is that right?

Or the 31st I have to do it by? Yes, correct. That's good through October 31st. Okay, thank you so much. And I will say that the new rate will still be pretty attractive. I think what we're hearing is that the annual rate may come down to about 6.5% from the 9.6, so considerably lower but still very attractive given the safety.

You know what? That is very attractive. Thank you so much. Okay, Marilyn, thanks for your call. Quickly to, well, we'll stay in Illinois. Barbara, you'll be our last caller today.

How can I help? Hi, Rob. Thank you for taking my call. I have an annuity at the bank and I was wondering if it was wise enough to transfer it into a Roth or a traditional IRA? Yeah, so if it's a qualified variable annuity or a qualified annuity, meaning it was set up with pre-tax dollars, you can roll it into a traditional IRA and then you just either have to make those investment decisions yourself as to what you would do with it to invest it at that point or hire an advisor to do that for you. If it's a non-qualified annuity, meaning it was set up with after-tax dollars, then it can't be rolled over into a traditional IRA.

So you just need to understand the tax structure of that annuity but getting it out of that annuity product is possible and you'll also, in addition to wanting to know the tax implications, you'll want to make sure you understand if there's any surrender charges or penalties for pulling it out, okay? Okay. All right. Thank you so much. Very good. You're welcome. Thanks so much for calling. We appreciate it.

Well, folks, we're about out of time today. Hey, let me mention that MoneyWise Media is listener-supported, so we're so thankful for all of your encouragement and your calls each day on this program. I would remind you that we can only do what we do because of your generous support.

And here in the fourth quarter of the year, as we press toward year-end, this is a crucial time for us to see the dollars that will help us finish the year strong come in so that we can continue to do all the ministry we have planned for 2023. So if you'd consider a gift, we'd certainly be grateful. Just head to our website, MoneyWise.org, and click the Give button. Again, we are listener-supported and MoneyWise is a not-for-profit ministry.

MoneyWise.org and click Give and thanks in advance. Appreciate you being along with us today. We covered a lot of ground.

It was a lot of fun. And we'll come back and do it all over again tomorrow. Let me say thank you to my team today supporting me really, really well. Amy Rios back with us today is producer. Dan Anderson, our engineer. Grateful for Gabby T covering our phones today and providing great research today.

Mr. Robert Sutherland. So thankful you are along with us as well. Hope you have a great rest of your day and come back and join us tomorrow. God bless you. Bye-bye.