Cobra, Obamacare or roll the dice on an 8 day insurance gap?

Hi all. I’m in a bit of a frustrating situation here and need help on the best way to proceed. My last day at my old job was 8/25 and insurance terminated that night. My new job I started the very next day but my insurance won’t kick in until 11/1, the month of my 89th day of employment. As such this leaves me in a bit of a bind. I know I can sign up for COBRA within 60 days, pay back premiums and I’m covered if I act by 10/24. Of course COBRA is pushing $900 a month. If I go on the ACA website the cheapest plan for me is nearly $500 a month. Would take effect 10/1. So I’d need it for exactly a month.

There’s no way to get just a cheaper catastrophic plan that I can see (I’m only really worried about covering my ass in case of an accident, there are no pressing health matters that need to be dealt with at the moment). I’ll make ~$42k a year at the new job so I don’t qualify for Obamacare subsidies. Would I be better off sucking it up and paying COBRA, riding out the next 3 weeks and buying the Obamacare plan for one month, or letting my 60 days of cobra go by and just hope that the 8 day gap period nothing happens?

If Obamacare; the application didn’t let me put back dates on when my coverage termed so I had to put tomorrow. Would that be an issue? I really really don’t feel like waiting on hold or having to deal with someone over the phone over it to sort out the date matter. I haaaaate phone calls.

submitted by /u/TurboDog999
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