Here’s What to Look for When Buying a Life Insurance Policy Online
Have you ever seen an old movie or TV show that included a character who sold life insurance? Once upon a time, those salesmen went door to door carrying a briefcase. If you wanted to buy a policy, you would sit down with them and talk about your needs. These days, you are probably going online to buy your life insurance. While this is certainly more convenient and also allows you to survey your options without pressure, it also means that it’s not quite as easy to get the answers to any questions you have as you could when there was someone sitting across from you who can answer them. The points below can help you if you are trying to buy life insurance online.
Choosing Term or Permanent
The first thing to decide is whether you need term or permanent insurance. Term is cheaper, and you can buy it for medium-length periods of time, such as 20 years. If your main concern is making sure that there is income replacement to take care of your children if anything happens to you, you may wonder why you would need a permanent policy. However, there are advantages to permanent insurance. It can act as an investment, and you may also be able to borrow against it.
Selling Your Permanent Policy
What if you do buy a permanent policy and then later decide that you don’t need it? Can you just quit paying premiums? You can, but there are actually better options. You might be able to sell the policy and get less than its death benefit value but still a substantial amount. How this works will vary depending on your age and other circumstances. A viatical settlement may be possible if you have been diagnosed with a terminal illness. You can find out more about viatical settlements by reading a guide online.
Figuring Out What You Need
You might be looking at numbers like $200,000, $500,000, and more and wonder how on earth you are supposed to figure out how much you need. Do you just pull a number out of a hat? It’s actually not that difficult. If you are buying a policy to protect your dependents, decide how many years the policy will need to cover. Then, multiply that by your income or by the amount of money they will need each year.
Think about how the freelance boom is impacting how people are buying health insurance as this might also impact the number you land on. You might also want to consider more money to cover the cost of college or other expenses. Don’t buy more than you need, but don’t skimp on this important part either. If you don’t have dependents or you are in a situation in which they are unlikely to need financial support, such as if your spouse makes a great deal of money, you may still want to consider buying a policy that will cover funeral expenses.
Choosing a Company
To help you choose who to buy from, look at how various agencies rate the company’s financial fitness. You should also consider reviews and how happy customers are with them. Finally, if you know what type you are looking for before beginning your search, you can quickly eliminate all the ones that do not offer the type of policy that you need.