You can still get a nationwide PPO in Michigan through me, whatever the marketplace charges for its own. Here is how agents in the Grand Traverse region plan coverage around a short, busy selling season.
Hi, I'm Sam Jaber. I'm a licensed broker based in Tampa, with licenses in 36 states, and Michigan agents can handle their health coverage with me by phone.
Imagine an agent in Traverse City who works Grand Traverse and Leelanau counties. Her market is lake cottages, condos downtown and farmhouses out on the peninsula, and much of it sells between May and October to buyers from Detroit, Chicago and Indianapolis. By Thanksgiving the showings thin out, and by February she's mostly prospecting. Her brokerage pays her at closing and offers no health plan, so she buys her own through HealthCare.gov. Up north, that menu includes a PPO, at a price.
In Grand Traverse and Leelanau, four insurers sell 42 individual medical plans for 2026: 33 HMOs and 9 PPOs. The least expensive silver PPO costs 35% more than the least expensive silver HMO, at age 40 and before any subsidy. That happens to be the middle of the pack for Michigan, where the same comparison has a median of 35% across all 83 counties.
There's another route. You can still get a nationwide PPO in Michigan through me, a private plan that's medically underwritten, with providers in network well beyond the state. For a healthy agent who pays full price either way, it belongs in the comparison.
The marketplace credit follows household income for the coverage year, up to four times the federal poverty level. For an agent, start with gross commission, then take out the brokerage split, desk and franchise fees, MLS and association dues, marketing, staging and the drive time between Suttons Bay and Kingsley. At the low end, Michigan's Medicaid expansion, the Healthy Michigan Plan, covers adults up to 138% of the poverty level.
A northern Michigan year is front-loaded into summer. Base your estimate on a whole year of closings, and update it after the season wraps up.
Buy on HealthCare.gov, since the credit only applies there. Keep one rule in mind: the credit is set by a benchmark silver plan, so it doesn't grow if you choose the PPO. The 35% difference comes out of your own pocket.
That can be money well spent. If your doctors in Traverse City are in the PPO's network, and you travel downstate or out of state often enough to want out-of-network coverage, a credit-backed marketplace PPO is a reasonable buy. If the HMO keeps your doctors and you rarely leave the region, the HMO keeps more money in your account.
Next step: Send me last year's net and your doctors, and I'll price the HMOs and the PPO in your county with your credit applied.
Above the credit range you pay the full sticker. Full prices climbed this year, too: KFF's benchmark silver premium for a 40-year-old in Michigan rose 29.5% from 2025 to 2026. Many healthy agents find a private plan more comfortable at that point.
The private application asks about your health. The insurer approves you, approves you with a specific condition excluded, or declines. When you're in good shape, the premium often lands under the marketplace's full rate, and the network is national, which suits an agent who winters somewhere warmer. Every plan lists its own benefits, and we go through them together.
Next step: Call me and I'll put a nationwide PPO quote next to Grand Traverse County's full marketplace prices.
If you or someone on your plan sees a specialist or takes a daily prescription, stay on the marketplace even past the credit range. Marketplace plans have to accept you and can't charge more for a diagnosis. In a four-insurer county, the work is checking which networks include your specialists, and whether the PPO adds a doctor the HMOs leave out.
Next step: Give me your doctors and prescriptions, and I'll narrow the northern Michigan plans to the ones that keep them.
Sometimes a season falls apart: a few deals collapse, rates rise and buyers wait. If your honest estimate for the year drops near the poverty line, check Healthy Michigan before you enroll, since adults up to 138% of that line qualify.
Next step: Before you renew after a thin year, call me and we'll see which side of the line your household lands on.
Open enrollment for 2027 coverage runs November 1, 2026 to January 15, 2027. Pick a plan by December 15 if you want it to start January 1.
Straight answers, no sales pitch.
Yes. Grand Traverse County has nine marketplace PPOs, and the least expensive silver one costs 35% more than the least expensive silver HMO.
It won't. Your credit generally stays the same dollar amount whichever plan you pick, so the PPO's extra premium is yours.
Yes. Healthy agents can buy one privately through me, anywhere in Michigan.
Yes, through the Healthy Michigan Plan, which KFF lists at 138% of the federal poverty level for adults.
Your county, who needs coverage, and roughly what you kept after your split and fees last year. From that I can tell you whether a marketplace HMO, the marketplace PPO, or a private nationwide PPO fits your household.
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