Whole Life Insurance

A whole life insurance quote is for your whole life, as opposed to term life insurance, which is for a specific term, such as twenty or thirty years. That is the primary benefit of whole life: a payout is guaranteed. You will not have to worry about becoming uninsurable later in life, and unable to obtain life insurance of any kind.

This benefit of a guaranteed payout comes with a price: your premium may be several times higher than the premium for a level term life insurance policy of the same face amount. This is because a portion of your premium goes to fund a tax-deferred cash value account. And of course, you are buying the life insurance for a longer time period: your whole life.

If you decide to cancel your whole life policy, you are entitled to receive the cash value. Additionally, you may borrow against the cash value at a reasonable interest rate. When you die, funds will be deducted from the insurance proceeds to pay the amount of any loans and interest, if you have not paid them off.

Which brings us to an interesting point. Whole life insurance policies are actually issued with a termination date built in. This date is usually on your 100th birthday. So, if you aren’t dead by 100, the policy is terminated and you are given the cash value. The cash value on the termination date will be the face amount of the policy.

So, a whole life insurance policy is guaranteed to pay your beneficiary the face amount if you die, or to pay you the face amount if you live to age 100! Sounds like a good deal, huh? Well, it may be, but there is a “lost opportunity” cost associated with tieing up your money (annual premium payments). You should consult with your financial advisor.

Generally speaking, most financial advisors recommend to avoid this “lost opportunity” cost by purchasing low cost term life insurance and investing the difference in other investment vehicles. These investments should be expected to provide a return higher than the accumulation of cash value in a whole life insurance policy. Recently however, CNBC got a different answer when they posed this question to two financial heavyweights: Is whole life insurance a good investment?

It is often the case that a provider needs life insurance the most just when he or she can afford it the least: when he or she has dependents to support, provide for college, weddings, and so on. Then he or she needs to build a nest egg for retirement. The goal is to have enough invested by retirement that neither the provider nor the spouse needs the life insurance proceeds to maintain lifestyle. Thus the saying, “Buy term and invest the difference.”

Whole life insurance is often useful in estate planning. It is one vehicle used by financial planners to protect assets for the next generation. So, if this is something that you may have to worry about, you should consult with a financial advisor.

Term

Universal Life

Definition of ‘Universal Life Insurance’

A type of flexible permanent life insurance offering the low-cost protection of term life insurance as well as a savings element (like whole life insurance) which is invested to provide a cash value buildup. The death benefit, savings element and premiums can be reviewed and altered as a policyholder’s circumstances change. In addition, unlike whole life insurance, universal life insurance allows the policyholder to use the interest from his or her accumulated savings to help pay premiums.

Final Expense

Single Premium Whole Life

Some of the different life insurance carriers we represent are:

Prudential Financial

Prudential Financial, Inc. (NYSE:PRU) is a Fortune Global 5000 and Fortune 500 company whose subsidiaries provide insurance , Investment management, and other financial products and services to both retail and institutional customers throughout the United States and in over 30 other countries. Principal products and services provided include life insurance,annuities,mutual funds, pension, and retirement related investments.

Guardian Life Insurance Company

The Guardian Life Insurance Company of America (GLICOA) is a Fortune 300 company founded in 1860 in New York, New York. It is the fourth largest mutual life insurance company in the United States of America. Guardian has more than 5000 employees and more than 3,100 financial representatives and 86 agencies nationwide, working through 13 affiliate companies and subsidiaries. Guardian has nearly three million customers who hold the company’s individual life and disability income insurance and investments products (such as variable annuities, mutual funds, stocks and bonds.

Transamerica Life Insurance Co.

Transamerica Corporation is a holding company for various life insurance companies and investment firms doing business primarily in the United States. Transamerica began as a holding company controlled by A. P. Giannini, then head of Bank of America and founder of its predecessor, the Bank of Italy in San Francisco. As part of his vision of providing financial services to the general public, Giannini acquired Occidental Life Insurance Company through Transamerica Corporation in 1930. Occidental had first opened its doors to customers in 1906, and became prominent in the life insurance business on the West Coast.

Protective Life Insurance Company

Protective Life Corporation, headquartered in Birmingham, Alabama, is a Fortune 1000 holding company whose subsidiaries provide financial services through the production, distribution, and administration of insurance and investment products. Protective Life Insurance Company was founded in 1907 by former Alabama Governor William Dorsey Jelks in Birmingham, Alabama. Protective Life is the parent company of a brokerage subsidiary, West Coast Life.

Genworth Life Insurance Company

Genworth Financial is an international financial services organization that offers a portfolio of primarily consumer-focused products through its various companies, including annuities, combination products, investment services, life insurance, long term care insurance, medicare supplement insurance, mortgage insurance, and payment protection insurance. Genworth Financial is headquartered in Richmond, Virginia, and employs over 6,000 people in 25 different countries. Its earliest roots go back to 1871, when the Life Insurance Company of Virginia wrote its first policy.. The company’s stated goal: “Genworth Financial is dedicated to helping individuals and families achieve their goals in a world of shifting financial burdens.”

Metlife Investors

MetLife Investors Group, a subsidiary of MetLife, Inc. (NYSE: MET), is dedicated to serving non-proprietary intermediaries and their clients. MetLife is a leading provider of insurance and other financial services to individual and group customers. The MetLife companies serve approximately nine million individual households in the U.S. and companies and institutions with 33 million employees and members. MetLife also has international insurance operations in 12 countries.

Banner Life

The history of Banner Life Insurance Company is more than 60 years strong. Chartered in 1949 as Government Employees Life Insurance Company (GELICO), we were acquired by Legal & General Group Plc as a wholly owned subsidiary in 1981. In 1983, our name was changed to Banner Life, signifying our flagship position with Legal & General America in the United States. Banner Life’s subsidiary, William Penn Life Insurance Company of New York, joined the corporate group in 1989. Since that time, management for both companies has been consolidated at the senior level. Banner Life’s national presence, William Penn’s more than 45 years of brokerage experience and the operational synergy between both companies is a strong combination. Banner’s life insurance products are sold through independent life brokerage agencies in 49 states and the District of Columbia.

Midland National

Destined to become a leading insurance company, Midland National Life Insurance Company had a very humble beginning. On a late summer evening in 1906, a group of six men gathered at the Smead Hotel in the city of Lead in the Black Hills of South Dakota and founded Dakota Mutual Life Insurance Company. To capitalize the new company, the directors were required to apply for a $1,000 life insurance policy, and to pay an assessment of $300. Later that month, the company opened its offices in Watertown, South Dakota. Today Midland National has more than $113 billion of life insurance in force, and its life and annuity policies exceed 1 million. Licensed to operate in 49 states (New York is the only exception), the District of Columbia and several areas beyond the United States, the company underwrites individual life insurance and annuities, with a focus on asset accumulation and protection products for the middle-income and affluent markets, via its more than 10,000 licensed sales professionals.

West Coast Life Insurance Company

In 1997, West Coast Life Insurance Company became a member of the Protective Life Insurance Family. West Coast Life added its excellent reputation in the insurance industry amongst the brokerage community and, of course policyholders, to the growing list of the Protective Life family of policyholders.West Coast Life was founded in 1906 and Protective Life in 1907. The two companies have forged the experience of over 200 years in the life insurance business in America. West Coast Life’s history includes more company “firsts” than most other companies can even imagine. And since 1997, West Coast Life has grown to be the crown jewel of the Protective Life Family.