Suze Orman on Life Insurance

The following except is from a Suze Orman column in the Seattle Post Intelligencer,
May 23, 2007.

As for other ways to protect yourself and your loved ones against loss, one
of the easiest is to make sure you have Life Insurance. Although there are many
kinds (such as whole or universal life), the only type you need is Term Insurance, because it's simple and affordable. Other plans include investing components, but you'd do better to buy the cheaper Term policy and invest on your own.

As its name implies, a Term policy is one you buy for a set time period tied to a specific need. For example, if you want to provide for a baby until he or she graduates from college, you might buy a 25-year Term policy. If you die within that period, the guardian would receive a payout to support the child. Make sure the policy is guaranteed renewable and that it has a level premium, meaning your annual payments won't rise for the duration of the policy.

Use the "rule of 20" to determine the death benefit. You want the beneficiary to be able to invest the payout and live off the income, so he or she doesn't have to worry about tapping into the principal. That means the death benefit should be 20 times the annual income you need to replace. If the goal is to replace $50,000 in annual income, you'd want to buy a $1 million policy.

A 40-year-old woman in good health could get that coverage for about $100 a month. That way, the $1 million payoff could be invested in high-quality municipal bonds - which today pay about 5 percent interest - and generate the needed income. You can shop online for Term Life Insurance at Web sites such as accuquote.com and selectquote.com.

Suze Orman is a best-selling author and award-winning broadcaster. She can be contacted through suzeorman.com.

© Suze Orman, a Trustee of the Suze Orman Revocable Trust. All rights reserved.

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