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Term Life Insurance
By: Gary Tallon
Term life insurance is a life insurance product that pays out a cash lump sum
upon death of the insurance policyholder or at the point that the insurance
policyholder is diagnosed as terminally ill. But, despite it being a low cost
term life product - insurance cover can be acquired from as little as £5-£10 per
month - surprisingly few of us have term life insurance in place.
For people with a mortgage and family to support, not having a term life
insurance policy exposes them to a large financial risk. This risk becomes
apparent when you consider how the mortgage and household bills would be paid if
the main income producer were to die or to become terminally ill. The end result
could be that loved ones who are left behind find their home is repossessed
because they cannot keep up the mortgage repayments.
Some people prepare for such an eventuality by taking out a mortgage life
insurance policy. This is all well and good for covering off the remainder of
the mortgage loan, but where will the money come from to pay the gas &
electricity bill and the council tax bill every month, let alone the money
needed to cover the policyholder's funeral expenses? It is at this point that a
term life insurance policy becomes very useful indeed.
If you don't have a term life insurance policy in place, here are some sobering
reasons why you should consider taking out a term life policy now…
• CANCER - One in three people will develop cancer at some point in their lives.
Research into cancer is of course ongoing, and one day some cancers may be
curable. In the meantime a term life policy offers income protection for loved
ones left behind in the event of terminal cancer diagnosis and death from
cancer.
• HEART DISEASE - Heart and circulatory disease accounts for more than 35% of
all deaths in the UK each year. The number of people dying from heart and
circulatory disease is on a falling trend, but the number of people becoming
morbidly obese is increasing, and so may reverse this trend in the near future.
Term life policies can be configured to pay out if cause of death is
heart-related.
• MRSA (SUPERBUG) - The death rate from the MRSA superbug has doubled in the
last 4 years. MRSA is a bacterial infection that is resistant to antibiotics. It
commonly causes death in people with weak immune systems, and so easily spreads
amongst the sick & old in hospital wards. Many life insurance policies pay out
if the cause of death is MRSA related.
• AVIAN FLU (BIRD FLU) - Recent comments by the Society of General Microbiology
in the UK sparked controversy when they estimated that 2 million people in the
UK could die from a highly infectious strain of mutated Avian Flu. If you are
worried about Avian Flu check with the life insurance agent to see if their term
life policy covers such an eventuality.
About the Author:
Gary Tallon has been in the finance industry for over ten years, and is now
working for Power Insurance.com, leading providers of life insurance products.
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