10 Things You Didn’t Know About Life Insurance

10 Things You Didn’t Know About Life Insurance

Life insurance blah blah blah. Is that what you hear when someone mentions it as part of your new job’s employee benefits round-up or when you see something about it on TV or social media?  Not to worry: we’ve got the low-down on what you need to know. And it’s really not as overwhelming (or underwhelming) as you might think.

1. It’s part of a sound financial plan. You know about savings, you know about retirement. You might know a bit about investments and long-term financial planning for your health and happiness. And life insurance helps with planning for your loved ones’ long-term health and happiness, especially those who depend on your income, in case something were to happen to you.

2. There are different kinds of life insurance. In addition to employment-based life insurance (which typically only lasts as long as your employment at your job), there’s term and permanent life insurance.

Term life insurance: You typically pay lower premiums for term life insurance, but your coverage is just for a specified amount of time, say 20 years, for example. At the end of the term, your insurance coverage ends.

Permanent life insurance: With permanent life insurance (whole, universal, variable) you typically pay higher premiums in the short term, but then these policies generally allow you to accumulate cash value over time. Your coverage is designed to last as long as you continue to pay premiums.

3. Life insurance is surprisingly affordable for most people. Sure, there are forms of life insurance that get pricier the more features you add on to it, and the price goes up if you’re a smoker or dealing with health problems. But most people think life insurance costs about three times as much as it really does, according to the Insurance Barometer Study by Life Happens and LIMRA. Just as a general guide, a healthy nonsmoking 30-year-old man can get a $250,000 20-year level term policy for about $16 a month.

4. Key life events are often the best time to get on board. Getting married? Having kids? Changing jobs? Bought a house? Significant life events are often the time you become most aware of the need for life insurance—and on that note…

5. You can change your life insurance. Perhaps you have a life insurance policy that your parents got for you when you were a baby. Perhaps you have a term policy from when you bought your house but now you have a bigger family and you’re concerned about getting them all through college. Or perhaps you want to bump up your coverage because your overall cost of living has changed. And on *that* note …

6. You may well need more coverage than you think. Sometimes people think life insurance is to pay off their own debts and funeral expenses. But a key advantage of having life insurance is to ensure that the people who depend on you will be OK with their ongoing and future financial needs if something happens to you. Need help figuring this out how much? Go to this online calculator: www.lifehappens.org/howmuch.

7. Life insurance pays out quickly. Because life insurance doesn’t get tangled up in estate claims, it generally pays out quickly, sometimes in days or weeks, usually inside of a month.

8. Life insurance proceeds are generally tax-free. Compare this to, say, crowdfunding options like “GoFundMe” that have become so popular yet create tax consequences for the people they’re meant to help (to say nothing of fees and the lack of guaranteed benefit). It’s also helpful when you’re trying to create an inheritance for a beneficiary.

9. Life insurance protects your family, but only if you let it. Keep your premiums paid up and your beneficiaries up to date, and the door with your agent open so that your loved ones know who to call if they need to. Keep your paperwork with your other vital documents.

10. Life insurance can be more than just life insurance. Using “riders,” or an addendum to a life insurance contract, or even a specific kind of policy, life insurance benefits can become “living benefits,” money you can access before you die, or use to pay for long-term care, as two examples.

If you still need help getting a handle on all this, talk to an agent. They can help you understand the ins and outs and the best policy for your budget and needs. Because of course—the most important thing to know about life insurance is that it’s there to help the people you love the most.

Getting Married? Two Questions You Need to Ask Your Partner (but Probably Haven’t)

Getting Married? Two Questions You Need to Ask Your Partner (but Probably Haven’t)

Getting married is a big leap. And you may be in the midst of a whole lot of planning—from when and where to have the wedding to whom to invite. But planning the wedding and honeymoon is just the start of your life together. As you start planning your future, don’t forget to put a solid financial base in place.

While you may have already talked about joint or separate bank accounts and what gets paid by whom and when, there is probably a piece you haven’t talked about: insurance. While it isn’t top of mind for most people, talking through your insurance coverages is actually an important step. As you combine households and finances, you want to make sure that you have protection in place. Here are two questions to think about and to talk through with your partner.

Do you have any life insurance?

People may get a certain amount of life insurance coverage through work, often one or two times their salary. And while that sounds like a lot, you have to consider how long that money would need to last. For example, are you buying a home together? If so, would just one of you be able to continue with the mortgage if the other died unexpectedly, or would you be forced to sell it just so you could meet day-to-day living expenses?

Plus, you also have to consider that life insurance coverage through work typically ends when your job does. So if you change jobs, you may find yourself without coverage, and you new job may or may not offer life insurance as a benefit.

The easy solution is to get your own individual life insurance policy. And for most people, it can be quite affordable. Remember, the younger and healthier you are, the less expensive coverage is. For example, a healthy 30-year-old can get a 20-year, $250,000 term life insurance policy for about $13 a month. Most people can find that in their budgets.

Do you have disability insurance?

If you are working and rely on your paycheck (and how many of us can say we don’t!), this is a key piece of coverage. Disability insurance pays you a portion of your salary if you were to become sick or disabled and unable to go to work and earn your paycheck.

An individual disability insurance policy has the a key benefit: It will be with you as you move from job to job.

Many people think Workers’ Comp would take care of them if something happened, but you only get this coverage if the accident is work-related. Most disability claims—more than 90%—are due to illnesses, like cancer, for example. That means if you couldn’t work, you’d have no income. What is your plan to pay your monthly costs if something like this happened? That’s where disability insurance comes in. It would replace a portion of your salary so you could continue to pay your mortgage or rent and your monthly bills until you are able to return to work.

Your employer may offer this coverage through work, so be sure to talk to your HR rep or benefits administrator to see if you have disability insurance (short-term, long-term or both) and what it covers and for how long. You can also get an individual disability insurance policy, which has the a key benefit: It will be with you as you move from job to job. In a tight economy, employers are always looking for ways to trim costs and unfortunately insurance coverage is often first on the chopping block. When you have your own policy, you never have to worry about if your next job will have coverage.

Once you have talked with your partner, if you find either of you has gaps in coverage you’d like to fill, then it makes sense to sit down with an insurance agent. Remember, they will talk through your options at no cost to you—and no pressure to buy. If you don’t have an agent, you can use this online Agent Locator to find someone in your area.

Wishing you all the best as you start your journey together!

Wealthy vs Financial Fit. Here’s the Difference and Why It Matters

Wealthy vs Financial Fit. Here’s the Difference and Why It Matters

People can be wealthy without being financially fit, meaning they can have a lot of assets or money tied up in assets, but those assets aren’t “liquid.” Let me explain. Say you have a house that has escalated in value in the real estate market. You may have this large asset, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you’re financially comfortable from an income standpoint. You aren’t able to tap into that “wealth” to pay for your day-to-day expenses.

Considering Risk

The overall goal when I sit down with someone, or perhaps a couple, is to determine their wants and needs, and then give them a plan that helps them grow their assets, while achieving their income goals.

But one thing many people fail to look at is the risk during this growth period. Let’s say you’re married, and again your major asset is your home, perhaps even with a large mortgage. What if something were to happen to either one of you? Would you still be able to pay the mortgage and retain the house? Or would you need to sell your largest asset just to pay day-to-day living expenses?

That’s where life insurance comes in as a foundational piece to financial fitness. It addresses the issue of someone dying too soon—that’s a risk factor you don’t want to leave chance. And the truth is, it’s an affordable solution for almost everyone. A healthy 30-year-old can get a 20-year $250,000 level term life insurance policy for about $13 a month. Most of us can afford to find that kind of money in our budget.

What Do Romantic Partners Want?

Life Happens did the survey, “What Do Romantic Partners Want?” and we discovered some great news for most of us—people prefer a partner who is financially fit (64%) over someone who is wealthy (16%). And we explored a whole host of factors, from looks to money to relationships. And I think it’s only natural that when people are dating, all the factors that we explored in the survey come into play.

It’s when things become serious and you’re looking to settle down that you have to start asking some of the tougher questions, questions that may make you feel uncomfortable. For example, does the other person have a lot of debt or other financial obligations?

Remember, if you marry and sign on the dotted line, you become responsible for each other’s debt. I’ve seen divorces happen where one partner was racking up a huge amount of credit card debt without the other one knowing, and then in the divorce proceedings the other partner finds out that they are responsible for half that debt.

In the end, it comes down to being financially aware, asking the appropriate questions, even if they are uncomfortable ones. You need to go into a long-term relationship with your eyes and ears wide open.

Here's when it makes sense to ask some tougher financial questions. Click To Tweet
Wealthy v. financially fit. What's the difference and why it matters. Click To Tweet

Ouch! Feeling the Financial Pinch in a Month or Less

Ouch! Feeling the Financial Pinch in a Month or Less

This statistic is startling: 7 in 10 employed Americans would feel the financial pinch in a month or less without their paycheck. And when you dig a bit deeper, you find that 1 in 4 working Americans would feel the pinch immediately. These are just some of the findings from the survey Life Happens conducted called “What Do You Know About Disability Insurance?”

The question is, what would happen if these people were sick or injured and unable to work? Only 20% of working Americans say they have disability insurance (The 2018 Insurance Barometer Study by Life Happens and LIMRA). This is a recipe for financial disaster. Let’s get the information out there about how important disability insurance is if you work and rely on your paycheck. Click to tweet these stats below!

[If you use these statistics in any other materials, please source as: Source: “What Do You Know About Disability Insurance?” Life Happens, 2018]

7 in 10 employed Americans (71%) would feel a financial pinch in one month or less without their paycheck. Click To Tweet The majority of employed Americans (58%) know very little or nothing at all about their disability insurance. Click To Tweet More than 1 in 4 employed Americans would first look to their family, partner or friends for financial support if they became disabled and unable to work. Click To Tweet Nearly half of employed Americans (46%) would feel financially burdened in 2 weeks or less without a paycheck. Click To Tweet Employed Millennials are the generation least knowledgeable about disability insurance. Click To Tweet More than 1 in 4 working women (29%) know nothing about their disability insurance. Click To Tweet Only 21% of Millennials would look for financial support from disability insurance if they became sick or disabled and unable to work. Click To Tweet Employed Americans are twice as likely to be knowledgeable about their favorite TV show as they are about their disability insurance (88% vs 41%). Click To Tweet
A Living Miracle

A Living Miracle

Many of us in our 20s are filled with hope and optimism about the new jobs we have—or will work into, perhaps finding a partner and starting a family, maybe even buying a home. In short, it’s about designing a life “we” want to live, not one that’s been dictated to us.

So, it’s not often we contemplate how those dreams could be derailed by an accident or illness that takes away our ability to earn a living and fund our dreams.

But it just makes sense to take measure of the risks we all face: 1 in 4 of current 25-year-olds will become disabled at some point in their career, according to the Social Security Administration. That’s why this story of the Bakouris family is so important for all of us to watch and then take action on!

Dore was just 27 and a new mom, but they had done their insurance planning, including disability insurance. This type of coverage replaces a portion of you income if you are sick or disabled and unable to work. It has become an important financial lifeline to keep their dreams on track. If you’d like advice on disability insurance, make a call to an insurance agent or advisor to talk through your options. If you don’t have one, you can use this Agent Locator to find one.

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