Servicing our customers across the country for over 40 years
LIFE
Take Care of Loved Ones When You’re Gone
Why purchase life insurance? You want to be sure your family will be safe from the effects of losing your contribution to the household income. You don’t want your family to have to uproot their lives and change their living standards in the event their your premature or unexpected death. Life insurance is a financial instrument that allows you to protect your family and loved ones when you pass away. There are two major types of life insurance—term and whole life.
Term
Term Insurance is the simplest form of life insurance. It pays only if death occurs during the term of the policy, which is usually from one to 30 years. There are two basic types of term life insurance policies—level term and decreasing term.
•Level term means that the death benefit stays the same throughout the duration of the policy.
•Decreasing term means that the death benefit drops, usually in one-year increments, over the course of the policy’s term.
Whole Life/Permanent Insurance
Whole life or permanent insurance pays a death benefit whenever you die—even if you live to 100! In the case of traditional whole life, both the death benefit and the premium are designed to stay the same (level) throughout the life of the policy. The cost per $1,000 of benefit increases as the insured person ages, and it obviously gets very high when the insured lives to 80 and beyond.
The insurance company could charge a premium that increases each year, but that would make it very hard for most people to afford life insurance at advanced ages. So the company keeps the premium level by charging a premium that, in the early years, is higher than what’s needed to pay claims, investing that money, and then using it to supplement the level premium to help pay the cost of life insurance for older people.
By law, when these “overpayments” reach a certain amount, they must be available to the policyholder as a cash value if he or she decides not to continue with the original plan. The cash value is an alternative, not an additional, benefit under the policy.
Let Gengler Insurance Agencies help you choose a policy that fits your individual needs. Protecting your assets, whether personal, business, or both, is our goal. A well-chosen policy can lessen the impact of some of life’s most common, yet unforeseen perils. Call us when you are considering Life Insurance. 703-691-0200
