While it is common to set aside funds in advance of major life expenses like adoptions, educations and weddings, it is far less likely that healthy individuals will pre-fund their funeral expenses. This lack of attention may make sense in the short-run, as people work hard to raise their families with the requisite mortgage payments, retirement planning, and daily living expenses this entails. The truth is, funerals are expensive and very few people have the resources to pay for them outright. Lack of planning can cause you to be a burden to the very family you worked your whole life to protect. Without advance planning and funding, some survivors find themselves dipping into savings accounts, using credit cards, taking out loans or even selling personal assets to pay for funeral expenses. Even if you have the money to pay for your own funeral, it may be tied up in probate at the time your grieving family is trying to access it. Obviously, no one wants to be a financial burden to their families, but very few people have access to extra disposable income to pay for a funeral up front. So, where do you get the money to prefund your funeral? Odds are you already have it.  It could be in the bank, money market, or even in another insurance policy.  Different payment plans are available from single pay to multi-year pay.  We can help tailor your policy to meet your specific needs and goals. Examples of vehicles used by many include savings accounts, certificates of deposits (CD), annuities, money market accounts, or mutual funds.  All of these can hold money for the purpose of paying ones funeral expenses, but not all are protected from creditors. Purchasing an insurance policy on yourself to cover the anticipated costs of your funeral and then assigning that policy to an irrevocable funeral trust allows you to enjoy the following advantages: At time of… | Read More »

Insurance policies, like other components of a well-designed retirement plan, require diligence both prior to their purchase and after their activation. The dangerous, though common, practice of purchasing Variable Universal Life and Universal Life Policies and then ignoring them through the years, can result in a significant loss of money. If you are not careful these policies can actually eat themselves from the inside, when the cost of insurance rises above the planned premium payments.  It is best to catch this as early as possible.  A telltale sign of this happening is when your cash value on the most recent annual statement is lower than the cash value on the previous year’s annual statement. This means that the planned premiums going in are not enough to cover the cost of insurance and the difference is being pulled from the cash value. We help people in this exact situation come up with the best solution to their insurance requirements all of the time.  Because we are an independent firm and not tied to a single insurance company, we can work with you and your insurance company to adjust premiums to carry your policy to a desired age, or we can look at alternatives with other insurance companies. Not all permanent policies get into trouble like this.  Sometimes Variable Universal Life and Universal Life policies are performing well and still growing cash value.  In general Whole Life Insurance will not run out of cash value.  Whole Life is designed to be more expensive up front with premium dollars, and they can return some of the unused premiums in the form of dividend payments.  This is a more expensive way to purchase permanent coverage. If you have a permanent policy (either Whole Life, Variable Universal Life, or Universal Life with cash value in it) you need to ask yourself one question: What is the purpose for this coverage?  If your goal is strictly… | Read More »