7 Open Enrollment Mistakes to Avoid: The 2027 Edition
Most people don't pick a bad plan — they keep one by accident. Open Enrollment for 2027 coverage runs November 1, 2026 – January 15, 2027, and with subsidies smaller than they were in 2025, the price of coasting just went up. Here are the seven mistakes that cost the most, and the 15-minute fix for each one.
Get a Free Quote ↓The Open Enrollment Mistakes That Cost Real Money in 2027
The most expensive open enrollment mistakes are the quiet ones: letting last year's plan roll over untouched, guessing at your income, grabbing the lowest premium on the list. In a normal year those habits cost a little. For 2027 — with the enhanced tax credits gone under current law and the 400% subsidy cliff back — they can cost thousands. Our full 2027 Open Enrollment guide covers the season end to end; this page is the short list of what NOT to do.
FreedInsure LLC (NPN: 20230457) is an independent brokerage licensed in 42 states. Every fall we re-shop our members' plans, and the same seven mistakes surface every single year. The service is 100% free — carriers pay us, not you. Call (844) 788-3733.
Quick answer: The biggest open enrollment mistakes for 2027 are auto-renewing without re-shopping, guessing your income instead of estimating it, and picking a plan on premium alone. Open Enrollment runs November 1, 2026 – January 15, 2027 on HealthCare.gov; enroll by December 15, 2026 for January 1 coverage, and watch the 400% FPL cliff — $1 over and your credit is $0.
What Are the Biggest Open Enrollment Mistakes?
Auto-renewing blind and guessing your income — because both put your 2027 subsidy on autopilot using 2026 assumptions. Everything else on this list costs you at the margins; these two can misprice your entire year. Here are all seven at a glance, then the fixes.
| The Mistake | Why It Hurts in 2027 | The 15-Minute Fix |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Auto-renewing blind | Smaller credits + changing premiums = last year's plan at the wrong price | Re-shop every plan in your county before December 15 |
| 2. Guessing your income | Subsidies key off projected MAGI; a bad guess means tax-time payback or a year of overpaying | Estimate 2027 income line by line, then update your application |
| 3. Shopping premium-only | A $0 premium is not $0 care — deductibles and networks set your real cost | Compare deductible, max out-of-pocket, and network before price |
| 4. Skipping the CSR Silver check | Under ~250% FPL, Cost-Sharing Reductions turn Silver into near-Gold coverage | Check CSR eligibility before defaulting to Bronze |
| 5. Ignoring the drug list | Every plan's formulary is different — your prescription may not be covered | Run each prescription through every finalist plan |
| 6. Missing December 15 | Enroll December 16 – January 15 and coverage starts February 1 — a one-month gap | Enroll by December 15, 2026 for a January 1 start |
| 7. Crossing the 400% cliff | $1 over 400% FPL ($63,840 single) and the entire credit is $0 | Know your number and plan income before December |
Mistake #1: Letting Your Plan Auto-Renew Blind
If you do nothing, most marketplace enrollees are automatically re-enrolled in the same or a similar plan. Convenient — and for 2027, expensive: credits are smaller than they were in 2025 and premiums are moving, so last year's smart pick can renew at this year's wrong price. Before you keep anything, spend 15 minutes re-shopping every plan in your county. We wrote the full breakdown in Should You Let Your Health Plan Auto-Renew?
Straight talk: Auto-renewal is the single most expensive default in health insurance — and it punishes loyalty, not carelessness. Nobody at the carrier calls to tell you a cheaper, better plan just launched in your county. Free help exists: a licensed broker re-shops everything for $0, because carriers pay us. Fifteen minutes in November beats twelve months of overpaying. Call (844) 788-3733.
Mistake #2: Guessing Your Income Instead of Estimating It
Your 2027 subsidy is an advance on a tax credit calculated from your projected household MAGI — and it gets reconciled on your tax return. Guess low and you can owe part of the credit back at tax time; guess high and you overpay premiums all year. Add up W-2 wages, 1099 and gig income, and self-employment line by line, then update your application rather than letting stale numbers carry forward. Depending on where you land, you're expected to put 2.15% to 10.22% of income toward the benchmark Silver plan, so a few thousand dollars of projection error genuinely moves your premium.
For 2027, credits apply from 100% to 400% of the federal poverty level — $15,960 to $63,840 for a single person, roughly $33,000 to $132,000 for a family of four. The exact brackets and the expected-contribution math live in our ACA subsidy income limits guide. And both of these fixes go faster with paperwork in one place — our 2027 open enrollment checklist lists everything to gather before November 1.
Is the Cheapest Premium the Best Plan?
No — the premium is just the entry fee. The real price of a health plan is premium plus deductible plus whatever your network and drug list make you pay out of pocket. A $0-premium Bronze plan can lose to a modest CSR Silver plan by thousands of dollars in a bad year.
Mistake #3: Shopping by Premium Alone
Choosing the wrong health plan usually starts with sorting by price and clicking the top result. Before you look at premium, compare four things: the deductible, the out-of-pocket maximum, whether your doctors are in-network, and the drug list. If your current plan dropped your doctor or shrank its network, moving is simpler than most people expect — here's how to switch marketplace plans for 2027, and our guide to lowering your health insurance costs covers the levers that actually move the number.
💸 Deductible & Max OOP
What you pay before coverage kicks in, and the worst-case ceiling above it. Two plans with identical premiums can sit thousands of dollars apart here.
🏥 Provider Network
Networks get redrawn every year. Confirm your doctors and hospital are in-network for 2027 — not just that they were last year.
💊 Drug List (Formulary)
Every plan covers a different drug list at different tiers. One prescription on the wrong plan can erase a full year of premium savings.
🪙 CSR Silver Check
Below roughly 250% FPL, Cost-Sharing Reductions shrink Silver deductibles dramatically — but only on Silver plans.
Mistake #4: Overlooking CSR Silver Eligibility
If your household income sits below roughly 250% of the federal poverty level, Cost-Sharing Reduction plans quietly turn Silver into near-Gold coverage — lower deductibles, lower copays — at a Silver price. The catch: CSRs only attach to Silver plans. Buying Bronze because the premium looked better forfeits the richest benefit on the ACA marketplace.
Mistake #5: Skipping the Drug-List Check
A drug that costs you a small copay on one plan can be a different tier — or not covered at all — on another. Before you enroll, run every prescription in the household through each finalist plan's formulary; HealthCare.gov's plan preview does this in minutes. It's the least glamorous step on this page and the one that most often decides which plan actually wins.
What Happens If You Miss the December 15 Deadline?
Enroll December 16 – January 15 and your coverage starts February 1, 2027 instead of January 1 — a full month exposed, or stuck on your old plan's terms. Miss January 15 entirely and the marketplace closes: you'd need a qualifying life event to enroll for 2027 at all.
Mistake #6: Treating January 15 as the Real Deadline
The window technically runs to January 15, 2027, but December 15, 2026 is the deadline that matters — the last day to lock a January 1 start on HealthCare.gov. Some state-run exchanges set their own deadlines, so check yours if your state runs its own marketplace. And if you do miss January 15, don't buy the first thing an ad shows you — check whether a qualifying life event opens a Special Enrollment Period first.
One more date trap: Medicare's Annual Enrollment Period is October 15 – December 7, 2026 — a completely separate system with separate rules. If you're on Medicare, nothing on this page applies to your enrollment; use medicare.gov or call 1-800-MEDICARE. FreedInsure's marketplace work serves the under-65 market.
Mistake #7: Going $1 Over the 400% Cliff
With the enhanced credits gone for 2027 under current law (unless Congress acts), the subsidy cliff is back: earn $1 over 400% FPL — $63,840 for a single person, roughly $132,000 for a family of four — and your entire tax credit is $0. If your income hovers anywhere near the line, this is the one mistake worth planning for months ahead, not discovering at tax time. The legal ways to stay under it are a topic of their own: how to avoid the ACA subsidy cliff in 2027.
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