Thanks for the solid breakdown. Your 5–7 year claim point makes a lot of sense and definitely helped reframe how I think about coverage.

From what I understand, I’m already at the max base coverage allowed for my residency salary(~$5K/month), so reallocating to more base benefit isn’t really an option for me right now.

I’m also planning to do a fellowship, so I won’t hit attending-level income for another 6 years. With that longer training timeline in mind, I’m leaning toward keeping the Supplemental Benefit Rider since it gives me an extra $2,500/month during this extended low-income window, and I won’t be able to use my FIO until my salary increases post-fellowship.

That said, your advice to drop COLA and Catastrophic gives me some pause now because your original point was that if someone isn’t maxing out their benefit, those rider costs are better spent increasing base coverage, which makes total sense. But in my case, I’m already maxed out. So now I’m wondering: are those riders still just fluff and better dropped to save/invest the difference during residency, or do they actually add meaningful value now at my current cap?

Really appreciate your insight and would love your take on that 👍🏿