Who needs Life Insurance? Everyone! The old saying goes "but in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes". Everyone needs life insurance because none of us can escape death. Life Insurance has many forms, but it's designed to pay for your final expense, like your funeral, and leave your family in a sound financial position even if you are no longer with them. When you think about purchasing Life Insurance it's important to consider the following:
1. How would your family be impacted without your paycheck? For a lot of families it would be difficult to survive on a single income for the foreseeable future. They may have to cut out extra expenses, like eating out, concerts, television and internet packages, etc. that will affect the quality of life your family is used to.
2. How much would your funeral cost and do you want to pay that out of your savings? The average funeral currently costs around $7,500 to $15,000! That is a end of life expense that some people have not planned for and would hit the family budget hard.
3. Do you want to leave any money for your children to go to college? Life insurance can be used not only as a death benefit, but as a saving plan for life events, one being college expenses.
4. If you are a business owner, life insurance is particularly important. If you or your business partner die, who would replace that person? Could the business still run without a substantial increase to business expenses? What would it cost to replace your partner? In situations like these, life insurance can offer "key man" protection, sometimes called a "buy/sell agreement" meaning if your partner dies the life insurance will make a payment to the remaining partner to "buy out" of the business. Otherwise your business may suffer, or your family may incur additional costs for your business.
5. Do you have a mortgage on your home? What about a loan on your vehicle? How about credit card balances? Life insurance can be used to settle any outstanding debts. Those types of bills don't automatically go away if you aren't around to pay them. These unpaid balances could be the responsibility of your family members.
Everyone needs life insurance, whether it's short term or permanent, we all need to plan for life's unexpected hurdles and be prepared to leave our family in a sound financial position after we are gone. The time to plan is now! You could be age 3, age 30 or age 60 and there are life insurance options available for you.