In this issue of the Insurance Reporter, we focus on Life Insurance
The basic premise of life insurance is that when you die, the death benefit to your survivors should be large enough so they enjoy the same living standard as they did while you were alive. This issue of the “Insurance Reporter” is focused upon how much life insurance you need to reach that objective.
Read on to understand why you should buy life insurance. How to choose the right amount of coverage. It’s easier when you think like an economist – and use our convenient online Life Insurance Needs Calculator to see just how much life insurance you need. Understand the principal types of life insurance and which one may be right for your needs, and much more.
The future of your loved ones is in your hands. Please contact us for a private discussion to review your next best steps.
Why Should I Buy Life Insurance?
Many financial experts consider life insurance to be the cornerstone of sound financial planning. It can be an important tool in the following situations:
2. Pay final expenses
How Much Life Insurance Do I Need?
In most cases, if you have no dependents and have enough money to pay your final expenses, you don’t need any life insurance.
If you want to create an inheritance or make a charitable contribution, buy enough life insurance to achieve those goals.
If you have dependents, buy enough life insurance so that, when combined with other sources of income, it will replace the income you now generate for them, plus enough to offset any additional expenses they will incur to replace services you provide (for a simple example, if you do your own taxes, the survivors might have to hire a professional tax preparer). Also, your family might need extra money to make some changes after you die. For example, they may want to relocate, or your spouse may need to go back to school to be in a better position to help support the family.
Scared To Death Of Life Insurance
Choosing the amount of coverage is hard. The trick is to think like an economist.
Life insurance may be the most badly purchased financial product. Some people, unwilling to face the thought of death, never buy coverage at all. Others feel guilty about the prospect of leaving loved ones behind and buy too much. Even those who put their emotions aside tend to fall back on oft-repeated and oft-wrong rules of thumb, such as buying a policy worth five times your annual salary.
Choosing the right amount of life insurance is no easy matter. Even most insurance agents and financial planners rely on rules of thumb or unsophisticated worksheets — or put the onus on clients to decide how much insurance to carry. Fortunately, understanding a few economic principles will go a long way toward helping you make a smart decision.
Life Insurance Needs Calculator
So, how much life insurance do you need? Well, the answer isn’t really how much life insurance you need… it’s how much investment capital your family will need at the time of your death. Their need for capital — on a gross basis — is really a function of two variables:
1. How much will be needed at death to meet immediate obligations?
2. How much future income is needed to sustain the household?
The first category is fairly easy to estimate. It’s the sum of final expenses (including uncovered medical costs, funeral expenses and final estate-settlement costs) and other lump-sum obligations (such as outstanding debts, mortgage balance, and college costs).
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What are the principal types of life insurance?
This issue of the Insurance Reporter is focused upon the financial protection
A serious illness or injury can harm more than your health…it can have an impact on your ability to work and meet your family’s living expenses. Sadly overlooked, long-term disability income insurance can help you pay living expenses while you are unable to work.
Read on for some tips on purchasing long-term disability insurance, use an online long-term, review the long-term care checklist, and much more.
Don’t wait to formulate a long-term plan for you or other family members. Please contact us for a private discussion to review your next best steps.
We appreciate your continued business and look forward to serving you.
Long Term Disability Income Insurance
Financial Protection for You & Your Family
A serious illness or injury can harm more than your health-it can have an impact on your ability to work and meet your family’s living expenses.
Long-term disability income insurance helps you pay living expenses while you are unable to work.
It offers paycheck protection providing cash directly to you for spending on mortgage payments or rent, groceries, utility bills, car payments, or whatever else you choose. A policy also can pay for training or other assistance you may need to return to work.
Tips On Purchasing
Examine how the policy defines a disability. Some policies pay benefits if you are unable to complete the duties of any occupation for which you are reasonably qualified by training, experience, and education. Others pay benefits if you are unable to perform the major duties of your own occupation. Some policies also pay benefits if you become ill or injured and are unable to earn a specified percentage of your income.
Ask for outlines of coverage so you can compare the features of several policies. Make sure you fully understand any policy you are considering-a policy that does not provide the protection you need is not a good buy. Features to look for in a policy include:
Disability, The Insurance That Is Often Sadly Overlooked
It took just 17 days for Cindy Wrenn to realize that her disability insurance premium was not just another drain on her checking account. One-third of American workers are likely to be disabled for an extended period, and she became one of them when she had a stroke and brain aneurysm at age 28.
Mrs. Wrenn signed up for her long-term disability insurance policy in February 2002, as a supplement to the one she had through her job as a licensed title agent. After her medical emergency, the policies paid 70 percent of her salary for the six months it took her to get back to work full time.
Long-Term Care Planning Tool
Welcome to the Long-Term Care Planning tool. The primary goal of this tool is to help you understand:
- What long-term care services are available,
- How much you can expect to pay for long-term care, and
- What financing options are available to support your long-term care costs.
The results of the Long-Term Care Planning tool are general in nature and not intended to replace comprehensive financial and other long-term personal planning.
This tool will ask between twelve and twenty questions and will then provide you with the long-term care results you need by comparing your answers to those of individuals with similar profiles.
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In this issue of the Insurance Reporter we focus on health care reform
So, health care reform is finally here, however, real change is going to happen slowly. In fact, the real transformation of America’s health insurance system won’t take place until 2014, when four major changes will happen simultaneously:
1. Insurers will be required to take all applicants; 2. States will set up new insurance supermarkets for small businesses and people buying their own coverage; 3. Most Americans will be required to carry health insurance, and;
4. Tax credits to help pay for premiums will start flowing to middle-class working families, and Medicaid will be expanded to cover more low income people.
There’s a lot to understand, so read on for a quick overview of the present day facts and feel free connect with us if you want some clarification as to how it affects your health insurance.
The President’s Proposal
The President’s Proposal puts American families and small business owners in control of their own health care.
Over the past year the House and the Senate have been working on an effort to provide health insurance reform that lowers costs, guarantees choices, and enhances quality health care for all Americans. Building on that year-long effort, the President has put forth a proposal that incorporates the work the House and the Senate have done and adds additional ideas from Republican members of Congress. The President has long said he is open to any good ideas for reforming our health care system, and the final proposal includes the best ideas from both sides of the aisle offered in the course of the debate, including some from the day-long bipartisan meeting held in February of 2010. The proposal posted here reflects the version that is being vote on in Congress.
What Will The President’s Proposal Mean For You?
Take a few minutes to find out what health insurance reform would mean for you and your family. To begin, select which one describes your situation:
Key Provisions Of The President’s Health Care Bill
The President’s Bill puts American families and small business owners in control of their own health care.
It makes insurance more affordable by providing the largest middle class tax cut for health care in history, reducing premium costs for tens of millions of families and small business owners who are priced out of coverage today. This helps over 32 million Americans afford health care who do not get it today – and makes coverage more affordable for many more. Under the plan, 95% of Americans will be insured.
It sets up a new competitive health insurance market giving tens of millions of Americans the same choices of insurance that members of Congress will have.
It brings greater accountability to health care by laying out commonsense rules of the road to keep premiums down and prevent insurance industry abuses and denial of care.
It will end discrimination against Americans with pre-existing conditions.
It puts our budget and economy on a more stable path by reducing the deficit by more than $100 billion over the next ten years – and more than $1 trillion over the second decade – by cutting government overspending and reining in waste, fraud and abuse.
Health Insurance Reform & Your State
Click on this map to see the report on the current status of health care and the benefit of reform.
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The White House Blog: Health Care
H.R. 3590 – Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act as passed in the Senate
H.R. 4872 – Health Care and Education Affordability Reconciliation Act of 2010
Life is one of the cornerstones of financial planning
In this issue of the “Insurance Reporter,” we explain the principal types of life insurance and why you should choose one type of product over another. We also put forward the benefits of whole life insurance in these challenging economic times. It is now out-performing the stock market much of the time in the cash value it builds, not to mention the simultaneous benefit of protecting one’s family. Read the six reasons why you need life insurance, get some help in determining how much life insurance you really need, and more.
What Are The Principal Types Of Life Insurance?
There are two major types of life insurance-term and whole life. Whole life is sometimes called permanent life insurance, and it encompasses several subcategories, including traditional whole life, universal life, variable life and variable universal life. In 2003, about 6.4 million individual life insurance policies bought were term and about 7.1 million were whole life.
Life insurance products for groups are different from life insurance sold to individuals. The information below focuses on life insurance sold to individuals.
How Should I Choose What Type Of Life Insurance To Buy?
You should consider term life insurance if:
- You need life insurance for a specific period of time. Term life insurance enables you to match the length of the term policy to the length of the need. For example, if you have young children and want to ensure that there will be funds to pay for their college education, you might buy 20-year term life insurance. Or if you want the insurance to repay a debt that will be paid off in a specified time period, buy a term policy for that period.
You should consider permanent life insurance if:
- You need life insurance for as long as you live. A permanent policy pays a death benefit whether you die tomorrow or live to be 100.
- You want to accumulate a savings element that will grow on a tax-deferred basis and could be a source of borrowed funds for a variety of purposes. The savings element can be used to pay premiums to keep the life insurance in force if you can’t pay them otherwise, or it can be used for any other purpose you choose. You can borrow these funds even if your credit is shaky. The death benefit is collateral for the loan, and if you die before it’s repaid, the insurance company collects what is due the company before determining what’s goes to your beneficiary.
The Benefits Of ”Whole Life Insurance” In This Economy
With the unemployment rate topping 8.5 percent, and with more layoffs and job cuts still expected, many households are forced to create a strict budget, even as their debts continue to rise. People are definitely more worried than ever about their financial well-being, and, if they are also worried about the financial well-being of their family, they should invest in whole life insurance; a life insurance policy that pays their loved ones after their untimely death, with some added benefits.
Even if you are retired or feel strongly that your income stream is safe, you might want to consider in these times of volatile stock and bond markets some stable long-term savings options found in many insurance plans. Here’s why:
A whole life policy can act as a buffer against estate taxes and probate costs and provides a death benefit along with a living cash benefit-a unique feature. In addition, a whole life policy allows someone at the time of retirement to remain insured while spending the other assets they’ve accumulated or pursuing a more aggressive investment strategy for those assets.
Today we focus on whether you really need car rental insurance
It’s a question we’ve all faced when renting a car: should you pay for rent-a-car insurance? Read the informative article from the Insurance Information Institute, entitled “Do I Need Separate Rental Car Insurance?” To find out, they suggest you make two phone calls-one to your insurance agent or company representative and another to the credit card company you will be using to pay for the rental car. As we often rent cars when vacationing, you should also take a look at the Car Rental Travel Tip Video, read about renting a car in Europe…and more.
Do I Need Separate Rental Car Insurance?
Properly insuring a rental car can be confusing, frustrating and downright daunting. Unfortunately, many consumers do not even think about car rental insurance until they get to the counter, which can result in costly mistakes-either wasting money by purchasing unnecessary coverage or having dangerous gaps in coverage.
Before renting a car, the I.I.I. suggests that you make two phone calls-one to your insurance agent or company representative and another to the credit card company you will be using to pay for the rental car.
- Insurance Company
Should You Pay For Rent-a-Car Insurance?
Ever feel pressured to pay for insurance when you rent a car? Experts say you may already be covered by your existing insurance policy or major credit card. You might already be covered, experts say, so do your homework
Q: Does it make sense to purchase insurance when I rent a car, or am I already covered?
A: With so many options at the car rental counter, it may be tempting to buy whatever insurance protection is available to safeguard your trip. But many travelers don’t realize they’re more than likely duplicating coverage they already have. Not only does a driver’s insurance policy protect against theft or damages to a rental vehicle, but often so does a major credit card used to pay the rental fee.
Car Rental Travel Tip Video
Should You Say Yes To Rental Car Insurance? It Depends
Frequent business traveler James Smith says he’s saved “tons of money” during the past 30 years declining car rental companies’ optional insurance coverage. But, he acknowledges, it could have come in handy at times.
Smith, an economist in Asheville, N.C., has paid $1,100 for damages to three rental cars in the past five years. Last year, a valet damaged his rental car in Maui, and his parked rental car was scraped in Buford, Ga. In 2002, he backed a car into a rock in Ireland.
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