Bernauer Insurance Agency
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Health and Life

Individual & Family Health Insurance

Written straight with the carrier, compared honestly against MNsure.

Written straight with the carrier rather than through the marketplace — still through this office, and at the same price. If a tax credit is available to you, we will say so.

In Minnesota

Going straight to the carrier instead of through MNsure does not get you a different calendar, and MNsure is the only place a premium tax credit exists. We compare both, and we write both.

Start your quoteOpen enrollment dates

Written by Pat Bernauer, licensed Minnesota insurance agent (NPN 32897) · Reviewed by Spencer Bernauer (NPN 18100632) · Updated

How we can help

Tell us your household size and roughly what you earn, and we will tell you which of the two routes is cheaper for you.

  • Work out whether a premium tax credit is available to you. If it is, MNsure is the cheaper route and we will say so.
  • Check your doctors and your prescriptions against each plan's network and drug list before you choose one.
  • Compare carriers directly for households above the credit cap, where an off-exchange plan sometimes wins.
  • Fill in the application with you and stay on it until the coverage is actually active.

You’ll work with Pat or Spencer directly. Whoever quotes it is the person who answers when you call about it later.

Call Pat · 952-457-5894Start the form

We’ll come back to you quickly, and it costs you nothing either way.

MNsure — 2027 coverage

Enroll between:
November 1, 2026 and January 15, 2027
For coverage starting January 1:
enroll by December 15, 2026
Enroll after that:
coverage starts February 1

This is the only window in which you can start an individual health plan without a qualifying life event, and going straight to the carrier instead of through MNsure does not get you a different calendar. MNsure is also the only place a premium tax credit exists. Short-term and limited-benefit products can be bought year-round, but they are not the same kind of coverage — ask us what you would be giving up before treating one as a way around a missed deadline.

All Minnesota enrollment dates →

Send us what you have

Fill in what you know. Anything you leave blank, we’ll sort out on the phone. It goes straight to Pat and Spencer, not to a call center.

Step 1 of 2

Household and HealthOnly the fields marked * are required. Fill in whatever else you know.

List each person's full name and date of birth, including yourself.

List any doctors or clinics you'd like to keep in-network.

If yes, tell us the date your coverage ended or will end, and the reason.

Before taxes. You might qualify for a premium tax credit.

$

Your answers are not sent until the last step.

More about Individual & Family Health Insurance

If your household income is above the cap for a premium tax credit, you are paying full price wherever you buy — and off-exchange plans sometimes carry networks or plan designs the marketplace does not. That is a real reason to look here. It does not mean doing it alone: we are appointed with these carriers and write these plans ourselves, and the carrier pays the broker, so having us do it costs you nothing extra. The cap came back on January 1, 2026 at 400% of the federal poverty level, so more households are in this position than were a year ago.

  • Individual and family major medical plans
  • HSA-compatible high-deductible options
  • Short-term and gap coverage
  • Coverage after losing an employer plan
  • Network checks against your current doctors
  • Side-by-side comparison against MNsure options
  • Honest subsidy eligibility check first

If you would qualify for a credit, going off-exchange means voluntarily paying more, because the subsidy exists nowhere else. Before you buy anything private it is worth five minutes to check, and the check costs nothing. We will tell you honestly if MNsure is the better answer — Pat and Spencer are both certified MNsure brokers, so it is the same office either way and we have no reason to steer you.

Going straight to the carrier does not get you a different calendar. Any plan that counts as real major medical follows the same annual window, on the marketplace or off it, and outside that window you need a qualifying life event. Short-term and limited-benefit products can be bought year-round, but they are not the same kind of coverage — ask what you would be giving up before treating one as a way around a missed deadline.

Networks vary more than premiums do. A plan that looks twenty dollars cheaper is a bad trade if your clinic is out of network. Tell us who you see and we will check before you commit.

Minnesota health insurance, explained

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