Dental insurance after retirement

OK EE

OK EE

Recycles dryer sheets
Joined
Oct 18, 2025
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United States
Do you carry it or do you just pay out of pocket?

The reason I ask is I have higher care needs than cleanings every 6 months, and the bills would get expensive pretty quickly. I don't even mind the whole "it's basically prepay for dental care" because the negotiated rates are way cheaper than the out of pocket rates.
 
I pay for Delta Dental because the dentist I use accepts it. After very few dental issues prior to age 65, now it seems like I am constantly in the dentist's office. Is it worth it? Still hard to say.
 
I don't carry. In general the coverage is limited. Check what the annual limits are to help make a decision.
 
No. It would equal what we pay out of pocket. So no benefit.
 
I carry Delta Dental. If all you ever need are your 6 months cleanings and xrays it's probably a wash, but who knows what you might need in the future. I've had a root canal and 2 crowns, so well worth it. Plus if you pay out of pocket, you don't get the negotiated rates.
 
I have a set aside dedicated only for healthcare ( dental, assisted living, LTC, memory care, premiums, deductibles, prescriptions, eyecare etc) that’s on reinvestment. A personal HSA.

Answering the question I pay out of pocket and go anywhere I want. If I need reimbursement I get it from there.
 
I have dental coverage this year, my first year since recent retirement, because I am so used to having it from years of employer coverage. I also separately have vision, but now that I am post-cataract surgery I don’t see the point of continuing the vision coverage. I think I’ll discontinue my vision coverage when it is time to renew, but I’ll keep the dental coverage in effect one more year and then re-evaluate dental then. I will ask about the negotiated rate versus cash rate next time I see the dentist.
 
If you have access to a union, trade group, or professional organization, there may be group coverage through that. I belong to the American Academy of Pediatrics and their membership fee in retirement is pretty inexpensive. I get dental and vision insurance through them, and it does save money. I've had a root canal and revision of the root canal in the past couple of years, and I've saved quite a bit off of paying out of pocket. Mine is through MetLife, and its a pretty good plan.
 
If you have original Medicare you don't get dental.
Before I was on Medicare and retired I couldn't find a good choice for dental insurance.
Now I'm on Medicare Advantage and get $4K dental yearly coverage and I used it all. It was raised from $2.5K last year.
I'm replacing all my 30-50 years old crown slowly.
 
A lot of dentists have their own in-house offer for a checkup, x-rays and cleaning plan. I think I paid $224 for the two visits, they called it perio cleaning and it was very detailed. Their plan also includes a discount off all other services, I can't remember the percentage since I've never needed extra work. This plan is in addition to my Delta Dental HMO plan through my Medicare Advantage plan which my longtime dentist doesn't accept it so I pay the extra to visit him and I can still get 2 more cleanings from the Delta plan dentist as well for free but not impressed with them so far so I need to look for a new one.
 
Our Megacorp Medicare Advantage PPO does provide some dental coverage. It covers routine cleanings and x-rays, and good discounts on "simple" procedures like cavities, periodontal cleaning, and fluoride treatments. It also gives each of us a small amount ($2K) to cover discounted root canal and bridge procedures. But overall, we still factor in the possibility for more expensive dental work in our retirement expense plan.
 
CincyDave said:
I carry Delta Dental. If all you ever need are your 6 months cleanings and xrays it's probably a wash, but who knows what you might need in the future. I've had a root canal and 2 crowns, so well worth it. Plus if you pay out of pocket, you don't get the negotiated rates.
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We got the basic Delta Dental, which covers only 2 cleanings and X-rays at 100%, and fillings at 50%. We did the math getting this plan vs. paying ourselves for 2 cleanings and X-rays and we actually save about $150-$200 per year with DD, considering our dentist's prices.

Our dentist has a third party in house plan, but it had a $100 sign up fee and it was actually more expensive than DD.

We did ask the dentist about just getting a cash discount, but they said no they don't do that. It's strange as we can see on the DD claims what they paid the dentist. I don't know why they wouldn't give us the same discount they're giving DD, especially since it would save them the work of submitting claims to DD. I guess they accept DD since a lot of employers use DD as their dental insurance provider.
 
We pay for dental coverage through my final employer's retiree plan. Essentially, the premiums pay for two cleanings a year for each of us, an X-ray every so often and a little for insurance if we need something else done. Compared to cash pay as you go, it is pretty much a wash financially.
 
Unless you can buy as part of some affinity group, dental insurance is just moving money around.

Best bet is to negotiate cash pay rates with a good dentist or get a discount card.
 
Delta Dental (in my state, anyway) will approve four cleanings a year if, for example, you have a certain number of pockets of a certain size, as verified by your periodontist.

Since the annual coverage limit is rather low for individual dental insurance, the only other reason to have it is in order to obtain the negotiated acceptable rates for dental services.
 
Included in my plans so far. I will lose it when Medicare starts, unless doing some Medicare Advantage junk plans.
 
I use the Dentegra Dental Discount Plan that I comes with my AARP/UHC Medicare Supplement Plan G. I did the comparison with other dental insurance plans and decided to keep using it as it doesn't have an annual max benefit. I get about 35% discount off my dentist's costs.
 
Most things that they call dental insurance are really a discount plans. We've tried a few over the years and probably paid the price for getting driven to dentists that were new or weren't that good. My current dentist offers an annual plan that covers 2 cleanings and X-rays. And some % off for other services. I've been lucky lately, needing only cleanings.
 
Through my dentist office. For $300 per year you get 2 checkups with x-rays and 10% off any additional work. Basically break even on cost, so I will continue.
 
For my wife and I, dental insurance through Delta Dental was prohibitively expensive. We are in our early 60s and have been reasonably happy with the discount program through DentalPlans.com, which was recommended by our dentist. I've asked him if they had an in-house discount program for seniors and, unfortunately, he didn't.
 
I buy dental insurance (Delta) through my former employer as a retiree and it's definitely worth it. Annual premium is $556 and includes the typical 2 cleanings, images, and exams per year (or 4 periodontal maintenance if needed). If paid out of pocket, each cleaning/exam would be $507 (yes, my dentist has in-house plan but still costs more than insurance). And that's just what's automatically 100% covered. Cost containment for other work can be more valuable.

For example: I just had a filling fall out. The initial exam was fully covered by insurance, but if out-of-pocket would cost $178. The filling itself without insurance would cost $462, but with insurance, only cost me $130. Huge savings on root canals and crowns as well. So it all depends on your personal circumstances.
 
OK EE said:
Do you carry it or do you just pay out of pocket?

The reason I ask is I have higher care needs than cleanings every 6 months, and the bills would get expensive pretty quickly. I don't even mind the whole "it's basically prepay for dental care" because the negotiated rates are way cheaper than the out of pocket rates.
Click to expand...
We have sporadic dental coverage via our BCBS Advantage plan. I say "sporadic" because it seems to change every year. No extra premium; it's just part of the package.

More importantly, we both use the local university dental school clinic. The main reasons are that quality control is very high with professors monitoring the work closely and that no one will ever try to sell us something that we don’t need. The secondary reason, which may pertain to you, is that prices are very low. I think in most cases they are about 1/3 of "retail." Somewhat higher if they have to use an outside lab for things like crowns. If you have such a clinic within reasonable driving distance, you might benefit from talking to them about your needs and their prices for what you need.
 
We pay out of pocket. We like the simplicity, and the ability to choose any dentist we want. Full disclosure: we don't have extensive dental needs.

One possible reason to at least choose your dentist first, THEN see if any insurance that dentist takes might be a good idea: Why are Some (Most?) Dentists Con Artists?
 
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