Life insurance policy reviews — we hear about this all the time, maybe too often.
On Google there are nearly 25 million results! So, let’s not rehash what’s generally done to evaluate life-changes-based reviews: marital status, large purchases, children, dependents, employers, beneficiaries, and so forth. Google it, there are lots of incredible resources. Let’s focus on our evolving market, innovations, performance and opportunity costs. There might be blind spots — let’s take a look.
Ongoing Premium & Cash Accumulation
What was once a luxury, might not ring true. Here’s proof: the 1965 Corvette. In 1965, the ’Vette didn’t come with factory air conditioning — it was an option on the vehicle for $421.80. Of the 33,270 new ’Vettes rolling off the assembly line, only 2,423 included this innovative feature. Opposed to today’s vehicle market, when having air conditioning isn’t a consideration… it’s a given. Interestingly, this same concept could be said for life insurance. The changes we’ve seen in the past few decades and even the last five years are dramatic. Like any free commerce — competition pushes carriers to improve products, provide a wider range of features and better-deliver what the consumer wants. The same can be said for inforce policies — there are more features and benefits available in the newer products. And in some instances, we’re finding features that aren’t financially justified for clients when evaluating the death benefit. In those instances, we’re looking at the cash value inside the policy and see if we can repurpose it into G1, G2, or G3 planning or perhaps use it in a way to create a retirement lifestyle insurance. Without going in-depth, we’re seeing options to fund long-term care coverage or identify a larger death benefit for their beneficiaries. Is this right for your clients? Well, it all depends. What we can say: new products and features develop weekly, higher caps, no caps, higher participation rates, indemnity options, no-med options, longevity riders… features are nearly endless.
If your clients are paying annual premiums in excess of $5,000 or have cash values north of $50,000 their cases might be worthy of a policy analysis. Let’s see how their inforce policy performs in comparison with current market options. At minimum, wouldn’t you want to know if your own policy is still relevant? We can do this for you.
Carrier Financial Stability
We put significant resource towards the identification of product that best suits financial and health needs while being the most cost effective. With the ever-increasing growth of accumulation products, we should look closely into a contract’s performance. There’s a lot to consider, but there’s something even larger. During carrier selection, the financial strength was important. However, it’s more than ratings, it involves impeding announcements and the future of the company. Although the vast majority of the life carriers are A- rated or better, that doesn’t guarantee they’ll continue to do so. Our clients depend on these contracts for death benefit and accumulation especially so in pre-retirement and retirement. This is a critical time to depend on these policies to perform as intended. Performing due diligence on product selection is equally as important as ensuring carrier financial stability won’t have negative implications for your clients when they depend the most on their life insurance policies.
Here’s Our Goal
Can we change the way our industry thinks about active policies and performing active reviews. Enlist our team to help you review your active policies — let’s see what we find. Give us a call and let us conduct a policy review. Here are some resources to get you started! Have and complete and sign the in-force policy request form and we’ll review your client’s policy.