By Jason Nabb

Cindy and I had a meeting with our insurance guy this week.  I thought I’d write about life insurance.  I know, you’re thinking, “Here it comes, a boring lecture on insurance.”  Well, I do want to talk about it, but I hope it’s not boring.  We purchased a term policy a few years back and have had a couple kids since so we thought we should take a look at our coverage.  It turned out we were under covered.  As we talked with our agent, I realized, in most situations, when there is only one spouse who works, that spouse’s life is insured for a greater amount.  The assumption is that it would be more difficult to replace that income.  Now, I don’t profess to understand the actuary behind insurance, but the idea is that if a spouse dies, your benefit should be enough to allow for the interest it earns in a standard investment in a decent economy (yeah, right) is enough to replace the income of the lost spouse so that your current lifestyle could be maintained.  Meaning, in our situation, that if I died, Cindy could continue to homeschool the kids, living off the interest of investments made with the money received from life insurance.  Okay, I get it, and we didn’t have nearly enough insurance on me to make that happen.  My wife and children would have received a big chunk of dough if I kick the bucket, but it wouldn’t last as long as it needs to last.  So, we get more insurance on me. 

Then I thought, (and I hate to think about it, but that’s what we’re talking about) what if Cindy died?  We had even less insurance on her.  I thought, “that’s okay, I can still work.”  Only, I’d have to homeschool the kids, too, or at least have family friends help me.  There would be great expenses.  I’m guessing I wouldn’t be able to take as many clients and projects as well.  I figure I’d be able to work at about 40% capacity until my children were raised.  We did the math, and it turned out we need as much insurance on her as what we have on me.   Being partners in marriage, family and life, it should’ve been no wonder that would be the case.

You want your family to be taken care of if you die.  I’ll remind you, I’m not an insurance salesman.  I have no affiliations with any insurance salesman.  I just happen to believe in this particular idea.  Look at it this way, the money you spend on a policy pales in comparison to the hardships your family would face if you hadn’t bought it.  I’m not trying to scare you into buying life insurance.  Look into it yourself.  Unless you can afford to self insure (which is my goal, by the way,) you owe it to your family to investigate this issue.

Things to consider:

• Term vs. Whole Life
• Multiple Policy Discounts
• Good Credit Discounts
• Insurance Shopping Techniques

One article I found interesting was an article from money.cnn.com click here.  This article goes through several steps and explains the different aspects of life insurance.  Make sound decisions based on as much information as you can.  If possible, find an agent through a referral from someone you know.  God bless.