Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) offer a tax-advantaged way to save for medical expenses. Understanding the contribution limits and benefits for 2024 and 2025 is crucial for effective financial planning. Here’s what you need to know—and how working with Ballentine Capital Advisors can help you take advantage of this valuable tool.

Tax Advantages of HSAs

HSAs can provide several tax benefits, such as:

• Pre-Tax Contributions: Contributions made with pre-tax dollars may reduce your taxable income.
• Tax-Free Growth: Earnings on HSA funds grow tax-free.
• Tax-Free Withdrawals: Withdrawals for qualified medical expenses are tax-free.

These features make HSAs a powerful tool for managing healthcare costs and planning for future medical expenses.

Qualified Medical Expenses

You can use HSA funds for a variety of qualified medical expenses, including:

• Doctor visits and hospital services.
• Prescription medications.
• Dental and vision care.
• Certain over-the-counter medications and health-related products.

For a comprehensive list of qualified expenses, consult IRS Publication 502.

High Deductible Health Plan (HDHP) Requirements

You must enroll in an HDHP to be eligible to contribute to an HSA.

For 2024, an HDHP is defined as a health plan with:

• Minimum Deductibles:
  • $1,600 for self-only coverage.
  • $3,200 for family coverage.
• Maximum Out-of-Pocket Expenses:
  • $8,050 for self-only coverage.
  • $16,100 for family coverage.

In 2025, these amounts increase to:

• Minimum Deductibles:
  • $1,650 for self-only coverage.
  • $3,300 for family coverage.
• Maximum Out-of-Pocket Expenses:
  • $8,300 for self-only coverage.
  • $16,600 for family coverage.

2024 HSA Contribution Limits

For the 2024 tax year, the IRS has set the following HSA contribution limits:

• Self-Only Coverage: Individuals with self-only HDHP coverage can contribute up to $4,150.
• Family Coverage: Those with family HDHP coverage have a contribution limit of $8,300.

Additionally, individuals aged 55 and older are eligible for a catch-up contribution of $1,000, allowing for higher savings as they prepare for retirement.

2025 HSA Contribution Limits

Looking ahead to 2025, the IRS has adjusted the contribution limits to account for inflation:

• Self-Only Coverage: The contribution limit increases to $4,300.
• Family Coverage: The limit rises to $8,550.

The catch-up contribution for individuals aged 55 and older remains at $1,000.

How Ballentine Capital Advisors Can Help

Navigating the complexities of HSA contributions and benefits can be challenging, but working with us may allow you to make the most of this tax-advantaged tool. Here’s how Ballentine Capital Advisors can help:

1. Optimizing Contributions:
   We can guide you on how much to contribute based on your income, age, and healthcare needs, ensuring you are able to maximize the available limits without over-contributing.
2. Tax Strategy Alignment:
   We analyze your tax situation to integrate HSA contributions into a comprehensive strategy that addresses current savings while preparing for future healthcare costs. As highlighted in Wealth on Purpose by Ballentine, proper planning is essential as your financial needs grow each year.
3. Investment Opportunities:
   Many HSAs offer the option to invest funds once a minimum balance is met. We can help you choose an investment strategy that aligns with your goals and risk tolerance.
4. Planning for Medical Expenses:
   We assist in budgeting and forecasting future medical costs, ensuring that HSA funds are used efficiently and effectively.
5. Retirement Healthcare Planning:
   HSA funds can be a valuable resource in retirement. Our goal at Ballentine Capital Advisors is to help you understand how to use these funds for tax-free withdrawals towards qualified expenses.

Your Next Steps

We specialize in helping you navigate financial tools like HSAs to ensure they align with your overall financial plan. Whether you’re maximizing your contributions, planning for future healthcare costs, or looking to integrate HSAs into your retirement strategy, our team is here to provide expert guidance tailored to your needs.

Have further questions? Contact us today to schedule a consultation and discover how we can help you make the most of your HSA and other financial opportunities.

 

Sources located at the bottom of the article

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Golf Tip of the Week:

Why a misunderstood golf swing move is making a comeback

Instruction trends come and go. In the 90s, a big one swept onto the scene.

The idea that golfers should keep their trail knee—or right knee for right-handed golfers—bent on the backswing.

In the coaching and golf swing nerd story community, this idea has gone through a pretty interesting story arc. It was the trendiest move in golf, then it became vilified, and now some good science is bringing it back.

Here’s why you should care.

Bent trail knee: A quick history

Look back at the flowing golf swings of legends Bobby Jones, Sam Snead, or other players of that era, and generally speaking, you won’t see many players from that generation keeping much bend in their trail knee. The goal of the backswing was simple: Make the biggest hip turn you can on the way back, then the biggest turn you can on the way through.

Then in the 90s, for a variety of reasons that aren’t worth getting into, teachers began focusing on how to generate torque between golfers’ upper and lower body. A common method at the time was teaching golfers to make a big shoulder turn while restricting their hip turn by keeping more bend in their trail knee.

Creating a big X-Factor stretch (which measures the difference between golfers’ upper and lower body turns) can be a good thing.

Bombers like John Daly and Gordon Sargent generate huge X-Factor stretches. But trying to turn your shoulders a lot while trying to not turn your hips at all is often a good idea gone bad. Done wrong, it can hurt golfers’ backs. It’s a misinterpretation that Golf Channel’s Brandel Chamblee has aggressively spoken out against, and doused the trend in cold water.

Why it’s coming back

The first iteration of an idea is almost never the perfect one. And the same is true here.

Many teachers nowadays say that the problem wasn’t keeping the trail knee bent (which can be good if done right); it was actively trying to bend your knee while trying to not turn your hips. Turning your hips is great, as Dr. Joe Lacaze, a former Navy SEAL and biomechanics instructor who founded the Rotex Motion exercise device, as long as you do it the right way.

Lacaze says…

• Golfers’ primary power source comes less from the torque between their upper and lower bodies, and more from torque between their lower body and the ground.
• The key to being able to push and twist off and around the ground is to load your right leg.
• When you try to turn your hips too much, and straighten your right leg too much as a result, you lose your ability to push up and around.
• The goal is to turn so you create a chain reaction of activating the muscles all down your right leg.

“It’s been proven that pressure into the ground is what causes the most power and speed,” Dr. Joe Lacaze says. “The pelvis is the transmission of force from the ground to your upper body; we need to load efficiently so we generate power, prevent injury, and allow the pelvis.”

A good feeling: Squish the bug with your toes

Golf Digest Best Young Teacher Michael Dutro says to think about creating a quality of turn, rather than a sheer quantity.

“If you just lock out your right leg and spin your whole pelvis open, you may get more turn, but you put no torque into the ground at all,” he says. “When you do that, you’re actually unloading your backswing.”

It’s one of the reasons why you’d see players from past generations pair their straighter right leg with the famous Snead squat between the backswing and downswing, Dutro says: A way of re-loading their trail leg and creating some more torque with the ground.

Anyway, to create that chain reaction Dutro and Lacaze talk about, Dutro suggests a simple drill:

1. Lift your right heel (for right-handed golfers) off the ground
2. Pretend there’s a bug under your right toes
3. Twist your right toes to the left into the ground, squishing the bug, but not allowing your foot to move
4. Maintaining this feeling, now turn into your right side

“Now you’ve created that chain reaction from your foot all the way up your leg, around your femur,” Dutro says. “That’s power. Your muscles are awake now. That’s a loaded, powerful turn.”

So remember: Squish the bug. It may give you the best of both worlds.

 

 

Golf Tip adapted from golfdigest.comⁱ

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Recipe Tip of the Week:

Pomegranate-Glazed Christmas Ribs

Ingredients

1/2 cup packed dark brown sugar

2 tablespoons chili powder

1/4 teaspoon ground allspice

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1/4 teaspoon smoked paprika

Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

2 racks baby back ribs (about 2 1/4 pounds total)

3/4 cup pomegranate molasses

1 cup pomegranate juice

2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar

1 jalapeño, thinly sliced

1/2 cup ketchup

2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

1/2 cup fresh pomegranate seeds

 

Directions:

1. Combine the dark brown sugar, chili powder, allspice, cayenne, smoked paprika, 1 tablespoon salt and a generous amount of black pepper in a medium bowl.
2. Brush the baby back ribs all over with 1/4 cup of the pomegranate molasses. Sprinkle evenly with the spice mixture, pressing it over both sides of the ribs. Cover and refrigerate for at least 2 hours and preferably overnight.
3. Preheat the oven to 250 degrees F.
4. Add the pomegranate juice, balsamic vinegar and jalapeño to a roasting pan. Place the ribs on top and tightly cover the roasting pan with foil. Bake until the ribs are juicy, and tender and the meat easily pulls away when pierced with a fork, 1 1/2 to 2 hours.
5. Set the ribs aside on a baking sheet to rest, about 30 minutes. Position an oven rack in the top third of the oven. Turn the oven heat to broil.
6. Meanwhile, place the roasting pan over 2 burners on the stovetop over medium-high heat. Add the ketchup, Worcestershire sauce and remaining 1/2 cup pomegranate molasses to the pan and whisk to combine. Simmer the sauce until reduced by half and thick like syrup, 15 to 20 minutes.
7. Brush the ribs with 1/2 cup of the barbecue sauce. Broil the ribs on the top rack, rotating the baking sheet halfway through if necessary, until nicely caramelized, 3 to 5 minutes.
8. Slice the ribs and transfer to a serving platter. Garnish with the pomegranate seeds and serve with the remaining barbecue sauce on the side.

 

 

Recipe Tip adapted from foodnetwork.comⁱⁱ

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Travel Tip of the Week:

A toast to the Wine Cellar at Ireland’s Sheen Falls Lodge

KENMARE, Ireland — Sheen Falls Lodge is a sprawling five-star Relais & Chateaux property sited on 300 acres in southwest Ireland that offers sweeping views across Kenmare Bay plus the more intimate sights and roaring sounds of Sheen River Falls.

Its rooms and public spaces generally range from roomy to spacious — you get the idea — but, during my recent stay, my favorite was the smallest room. The room with no windows, no views: the Wine Cellar.

The appeal wasn’t merely the 10,000 bottles of wine; it was about the snug, evocative, below-ground setting, fitted out with de rigueur wine displays plus brick walls, long wooden tables, a few barrel tables and candlelight.

It’s the setting for wine, gin and whiskey tastings as well as prearranged dinners for up to 12. Those dinners are served from the menu at the upstairs Falls Restaurant and best booked at least a month ahead.

Last spring, the Michelin Guide launched a program to recognize outstanding hotels, in the way it awards stars to restaurants, by awarding one, two or three keys to hotels for product excellence. Sheen Falls Lodge earned two keys and was among 14 Irish honorees when recipients were named in October. Also among those honored was the five-star Merrion, a Leading Hotels property in Dublin, also earning two keys.

Sheen Falls Lodge’s Wine Cellar is a snug, below-ground setting for wine, gin and whiskey tastings as well as prearranged dinners for up to 12. Photo Credit: Nadine Godwin

From fishing lodge to five-star resort

I spent a few nights at the Sheen Falls Lodge. The property originated as a 17th century fishing lodge, but, a few iterations later, it offers luxury accommodations in 66 rooms plus three villas and two cottages.

Amenities and cozy comforts include a particularly homey library, a modern spa complex, dining in the Stables Brasserie (yes, former stables) and afternoon tea. Kenmare town, good for shopping and a visit to an ancient stone circle, is less than two miles away.

The lodge, true to its origins, remains an ideal base for outdoorsy things like cycling, hiking, kayaking or tennis. Salmon fishing is still a big draw. For riding, the on-property horses lost out to the brasserie but are nearby. And, the lodge’s Ring of Kerry Golf Club is five miles away.

Guest relations staff will book these or other choices. For our group, this meant a session with an expert falconer, providing an up-close look at a Harris hawk and a couple of owls, sitting on our gloved hands, no less.

And, a session with a genealogist. The lodge connects interested guests with the genealogist before arrival to give her one or two weeks to pin down the guests’ ancestral links to the Emerald Isle.

The lodge sits between the Ring of Kerry and the Ring of Beara, each good for a day’s scenic outing for watery views, mountain passes and locally popular pubs.

Starting rates range from around $250 to $870, double, depending on season, including breakfast and taxes.

 

 

Travel Tip adapted from travelweekly.com ⁱⁱⁱ

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Copyright © 2024. Ballentine Capital Advisors. All rights reserved.

 

Our mailing address is: 

Ballentine Capital Advisors
15 Halton Green Way
Greenville, SC 29607

 

Sources:

• IRS Revenue Procedure 2024-25
• IRS Publication 969: Health Savings Accounts and Other Tax-Favored Health Plans
• Ballentine, B. (2023) Wealth on Purpose: Your Path to Grow, Protect, and Keep Wealth

 

Disclosure:

Ballentine Capital Advisors is a registered investment adviser. The advisory services of Ballentine Capital Advisors are not made available in any jurisdiction in which Ballentine Capital Advisors is not registered or is otherwise exempt from registration.

Please review Ballentine Capital Advisors Disclosure Brochure for a complete explanation of fees. Investing involves risks. Investments are not guaranteed and may lose value.

This material is prepared by Ballentine Capital Advisors for informational purposes only. It is not intended to serve as a substitute for personalized investment advice or as a recommendation or solicitation or any particular security, strategy, or investment product.

No representation is being made that any account will or is likely to achieve future profits or losses similar to those shown. You should not assume that investment decisions we make in the future will be profitable or equal the investment performance of the past. Past performance does not indicate future results.

 

Advisory services through Ballentine Capital Advisors, Inc.

ⁱhttps://www.golfdigest.com/story/controversial-golf-swing-move-bent-trail-knee-golf-iq?itm_source=parsely-api&itm_campaign=trending-bottom&itm_content=position-1

ⁱⁱhttps://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/food-network-kitchen/pomegranate-glazed-christmas-ribs-17162708

ⁱⁱⁱhttps://www.travelweekly.com/Europe-Travel/Luxury-resort-Ireland-Sheen-Falls-Lodge-Kenmare-Bay