Most of the cheap "health plans" advertised online in Maine are health sharing memberships, not insurance.
They are not regulated as insurance, don't have to cover pre-existing conditions, can cap or decline a bill, and don't qualify for CoverME.gov savings.
For many Maine households a real plan after subsidies costs about the same or less. Check your CoverME.gov number before you sign up for a sharing plan.
Ads for $150–$200 a month are usually a membership, not a policy. Here is what that difference means in Maine.
A health sharing plan (often called a health care sharing ministry) is a membership. Members send in a monthly amount, and the organization uses the pool to pay members' medical bills that fit its rules. It looks like insurance: a monthly payment, a card, a list of what's "eligible." It isn't. The organization makes no legal promise to pay anything.
Under Maine law, a health care sharing ministry is not an insurance company. To qualify, it has to be a faith-based nonprofit that has shared medical expenses since 1999, with no promise to pay. It must give you a written notice, on or with the application and the guidelines, that reads in substance: it is not an insurance company, help with your medical bills is voluntary, and you are always personally responsible for your own bills (24-A M.R.S. §704). A membership that does not meet that definition is not in the exemption.
Every plan sold on CoverME.gov, and every Anthem, Community Health Options and Harvard Pilgrim individual plan in Maine, has to:
A sharing plan may do some of these by its own rules, and may change those rules. Typically it:
The $150–$200-a-month ad price is for a healthy adult with no claims. The comparison that matters is against a CoverME.gov plan after your savings, not against the sticker price.
For 2027, a single adult earning about $40,000 pays at most roughly $280 a month for the benchmark Silver plan, often less for Bronze, and gets cost-sharing reductions that lower the deductible if income is under about $40,000. A family of four around $75,000 is capped near $500 a month for Silver. Below about $22,000 for one person or $45,000 for four, MaineCare is free. Run your own number in the 60-second estimator; it takes less time than reading the sharing plan's rules.
If your income is high enough that no credit applies, a Bronze plan still protects you with the $12,000 cap and no pre-existing-condition exclusions. That is the thing you are buying insurance for.
Losing a sharing plan does not count as losing coverage. If you quit or get dropped in March, you cannot sign up for a CoverME.gov plan until the next open enrollment in November, unless something else qualifies you (a job loss, a move, a baby). People find this out after a diagnosis. Switching the other way, from insurance to sharing, is easy; switching back is not.
Some people choose them with eyes open: they have the savings to absorb a large bill, no ongoing conditions, no subsidy, and they accept the religious or lifestyle terms. That's a choice, not a mistake, as long as you have read the membership guidelines, not the ad.
We don't sell sharing plans and can't help with their bills. We check MaineCare and your CoverME.gov savings for free, compare every real plan, and tell you the number. If the sharing plan is still cheaper for you after that, you'll know it is.
No. A health care sharing ministry that qualifies under Maine law is a membership, not an insurance policy. It must give you a written notice that it is not an insurance company, that help with your bills is voluntary, and that you remain responsible for your own medical bills. The Maine Bureau of Insurance does not regulate that ministry and cannot take a complaint about it. A plan that does not meet the definition is not in that exemption.
No. Premium tax credits and cost-sharing reductions apply only to plans sold through CoverME.gov.
Usually not. Losing a sharing plan is not a qualifying event. You wait for open enrollment (November 1 to January 15) unless another event, like losing job coverage, moving or having a baby, gives you a special enrollment period.
Want your own numbers? Get the estimate or get a free quote.