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Life Insurance--do you have it? Should I have it? Cost?
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Anonymous
| I am 35 yo, DH is 45. 2 children under 2. We both work full-time; he makes $75k, I make $140k. Decent retirement savings, little other savings. A single woman at work just mentioned she is going for a physical for life insurance because if her husband died, she could not afford the mortgage. I wouldn't want to live where we are now without DH, but thats besides the point. Does everyone with kids need life insurance? How much per month is average? Good companies to go with? Thanks for your input. |
Anonymous
You make 2/3 of your income - how would your husband support your kids without that income? You definitely need life insurance, and he does as well. |
Anonymous
|
I think Life Insurance is incredibly important. We have 30 year term policies. Incomes are the same as yours, and we each have policies that pay out $1million. We got good rates as we are both in excellent health and are non-smokers. I think it's something like $140/quarter.
I'm 31 and DH is 37. |
Anonymous
Yes, you should have life insurance, particularly if you have children. Most employers offer life insurance but it is a very good idea to have another policy outside of employers. Do you want whole or term? Very important. Go to someone who specializes in this and can set up a policy to take care of children, surviving spouse, pay off mortgage, whatever. |
Anonymous
| Op here. Thanks--I guess thats what I figured--I should have it and so should DH. I work for the federal gov't and I know they offer it, so I am off to research it. Thanks again, and if anyone else would be willing to share what they pay, I would appreciate it. |
Anonymous
| I can't help being snarky because I am floored that neither one of you know about this already. Even if I didn't know about it from my own research I was certainly smacked in the face with ads and such during pregnancy from the different magazines and websites. You may want to consider talking to a financial planner just to make sure you have other areas covered too. |
Anonymous
| Yep. Got it when we bought our house, even before we had kids. It's not much, we both have enough to pay off our mortgage and a little extra (so about 300K worth for each of us.) We went with Erie as I have heard universally positive things about their policies (we have them for auto and home as well, you can even get a discount if you bundle) and used a friend of a friend as our agent who helped talk us through the ins and outs and helped us evaluate opions. We just have a term policy and pay about $200 per quarter. That is for the both of us. DH's rate is higher than normal b/c he has a pre-existing condition. |
Anonymous
| I'm a little surprised that two working parents hadn't thought about this before. My husband and I are each insured up the wazoo. |
Anonymous
|
If you are eligible for USAA go with them. Otherwise stick with a major company. Expect to pay a lot more than the rates people are going to quote here. Rates increase substantially when you hit 35 and keep going up from there. Those that bought when they were younger locked in at lower rates. Most people buy life insurance when they buy their first home and/or before they have kids or right after, so are often younger than you and DH.
You really, really need to get this done now, today, this week. You get the point. DH is 10 years older than you. What are you going to do with 2 kids if something happens to him? He will be in his 60's before your kids are out of high school. You may not be able to continue on your career path and be a single mother in addition to the loss of his income. Ditto for him except that you are lower risk in theory. |
Anonymous
| DH and I both have it. Got it once DC#1 was born. DH also has a little through work (government). I think we each have $750,000k and pay around $600-700 per year (we were both upper 30's when purchased) for 30 year term. We figured the amount based on being able to pay off the mortgage and pay for college. We are re-evaluating the amount now as we are expecting #2. We used a company through our financial planner who provides quotes from many insurance companies. DH and I each have from a different company based on what was best for each of us, but I don't remember the companies off hand. |
Anonymous
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YES----get some.
We have term life insurance. We have two houses---one is rented out; owe about 30% still. The other we just bought and have a new mortgage on. We have $1.5 million term policy on DH. He makes about two-three times my income. I have salary and 1/2 from the Feds program..and then we have an additional $500k on me. We also have disability insurance on DH so if he weren't able to work we'd get monthly payment. We have two children (3 and 5.5). Our policy is a 30-year term which will run out when we are in our 70s. Both houses will be paid off by then. We know a few ppl devestated when a spouse died and they had no life insurance...bills, funeral expenses, childcare, no income, mortgage, etc. Anyone with dependents/children is absolutely crazy not to have some. |
Anonymous
| Another reason to get it now: In case you get a serious, but not life-threatening, illness. Your rates will shoot up if you try to get it after that. I learned that the hard way. |
Anonymous
| I am in a similar situation as OP as far as salary, ages and kids. We do not have life insurance. I know it is risky, but from what I understand, term is the best to have yet only 2% of term pays out. So I would rather keep that $30,000 or so and then when I am 70 and term runs out, I didn't waste it. |
Anonymous
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OP, we don't have it either. Well, we each have one year's salary as an employment benefit. But it wouldn't be enough if someone died.
I'm afraid to even research it, because my husband has a history of mental illness. I'm sure any insurer would seize on that as a reason to give us astronomical rates, or turn him down altogether. |
Anonymous
PP, do the research, you never know. My DH is in his 40s and a cancer survivor and we still got an affordable policy. |