Maybe I'm wrong. Lively HSA claims you could make a $2000 catch up if both of you are over 55. I'm not married so it doesn't apply so I'm not going to research this any more. But if this is true, I'd look at what happens when one of you dies with a family acct vs individual.
Yes, two spouses can each make a $1000 catchup when both 55+, but you have to each have your own HSA to do that.
There isn’t a family HSA, it’s individual, like IRA accounts. It’s just that contributions for the family as a unit can be made to an individual’s HSA account. But only one catch-up contribution.
From irs.gov
In the case of married individuals, each spouse who is an eligible individual who wants to have an HSA must open a separate HSA. Married couples cannot have a joint HSA, even if they are covered by the same HDHP; however, distributions can be used to cover the qualified expenses of the other spouse.
Things are confused by the fact that there is an HSA family contribution limit for the case in which the couple is covered by a family HDHP rather than each having their own individual HDHP - most likely when children are also being covered. If there are no children covered, there is no price advantage of having a family plan - generally they are simply to price aggregate of two individual insurance plans.
We are a “family”, yet we each have our own HDHP, we each have an HSA, and each do the catch up contribution. The “family” contribution limit does not apply to us either, our contribution limit is 2X the individual contribution limit. Yes, it took a while to figure this out.
So basically the complications arise, IMO, by having a family health insurance plan rather than individual ones. The HSA accounts remain individual, but the contribution limits are impacted by whether you have a family insurance plan or individual plans for each spouse. If there are children to be covered, at least one of the spouses is going to have a family insurance plan.