susankenny Posted December 15, 2010 Share Posted December 15, 2010 (edited) I know this will sound like madness to some of you, but we did not have life insurance previously. We had a close friend die a while back & it really got us thinking though. Being on a tight budget, I wasn't sure that we could even afford life insurance but I called select quote anyway. Well, long story short. We now have $100,000 policy on myself. A $300,000 policy on my husband. And $5,000 for each child. The cost is only $30 month for term life insurance for 20 years (the kids expires at 23 I think?? That's a separate policy & only $5 for both of them monthly). Wow! That is doable! The only thing we had to do was fill out paperwork over the phone, and then a home health nurse came to our house to draw blood, urine samples, take our blood pressure, etc. (not for the kids, just Grey & I). We filled out additional paperwork when she was here (same questions as before). We are almost 40 & healthy...so age and health issues obviously change that quote for other families. Now, our "ideal" is to up our life insurance on all of us, but we're snowballing our debt currently, so that will have to wait, as $30 was my "max" in shopping for insurance. However, with our current policy, we will have enough money to take care of the things that would be a financial burden otherwise. Anyway...I just wanted to share, as I assume there are others that have very tight budgets and may not have life insurance. It is affordable! Susan Edited December 15, 2010 by susankenny Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phathui5 Posted December 15, 2010 Share Posted December 15, 2010 We've had life insurance for a couple of years now, even for the year that dh was unemployed. Even when we "couldn't afford" to pay for it, we really couldn't afford to pay bills if something were to happen to one of us. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Princess Peach Posted December 15, 2010 Share Posted December 15, 2010 I agree. We have enough on DH that I would not have to work until the kids graduate. We have enough on me so that the kids could go to private school. We have kept paying for it even when we were going through a rough time financially and had to put off other things to do so. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Renthead Mommy Posted December 15, 2010 Share Posted December 15, 2010 I don't see how old your kids are, but if they are still young, you might want to think about uping that 100k for you. You want enough money to cover the expenses of someone else taking care of what you do. Is 100K enough to provide child care, schooling, extra help around the house, someone to drive them to activities/lesson and such as needed? If your kids are 10 or so, you'd really only have schooling expenses and a year or so of maybe before/after school care. But if they are little, there are a lot more years before they would be old enough to stay by themselves before/after school till your husband would be home from work. Often people think of stay at home moms as just that, with no income, so you don't have to replace their income with LI, just the working spouses income. But people forget we may be at home, and we may not draw a salary, but what we do for free, would certainly cost if we weren't home to do it. We were advised to raise the insurance up on me and that later, as my son was old and wouldn't need as much payed care that we could lower it then if we wished. Just something to think about. I think people often think you get LI and that's that, but what you need/how much you need changes as your life and family changes too. Congrats on finding a plan that works for you. You must be very relieved. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Margo out of lurking Posted December 15, 2010 Share Posted December 15, 2010 I don't see how old your kids are, but if they are still young, you might want to think about uping that 100k for you. You want enough money to cover the expenses of someone else taking care of what you do. :iagree: My very first thought when I read the OP was that $100K is not adequate for a hsing mom with young kids. Not only would you want to cover expenses while your children were living at home, but I know that I will go back to work full time when my kids are gone. We will be looking to my income to cover college costs and to further contribute to our retirement. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
susankenny Posted December 15, 2010 Author Share Posted December 15, 2010 Yes, we definitely plan to increase my coverage, as well as my husband's. His income is only $43,000 currently, so we were advised starting with double the amount he makes on me as a good launching point. Plus, it's all we can afford. $30 is our max unfortunately...at least for the time being. We are snowballing our debt right now (quite successfully I might add...yay!), so the good news is he won't have a huge debt hanging over him if I were to die. That money could be used for actual living expenses (and my bling-bling funeral, lol). And it's better than zero :) Hopefully, I won't kick the can anytime soon! Susan Oh. ETA, my kids are 9 & 7. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TravelingChris Posted December 15, 2010 Share Posted December 15, 2010 Yes, life insurance is affordable if you can get it. I have only had it for the last few years when the military made it optional that spouses can get insurance. I don't know that they would insure me otherwise. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ferdie Posted December 15, 2010 Share Posted December 15, 2010 Enjoy because it goes way, way up when you turn 50. I think my dh and I pay over $1,500 a year for so-so coverage. We don't have a choice though because we are older parents with young children so we need insurance if something was to happen to both of us. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ScoutTN Posted December 15, 2010 Share Posted December 15, 2010 Yes, life insurance is affordable if you can get it. My DH is uninsurable for medical reasons. No term life company will take him. So we have more on me in case something happened to both of us our kids would still be provided for. Some things we just do the best we can and try not to worry.... Dave Ramsey recommends 8-10x your income for term life. Which assumes you'd be able to live off of about 8% of that annually. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
susankenny Posted December 15, 2010 Author Share Posted December 15, 2010 Dave Ramsey recommends 8-10x your income for term life. Which assumes you'd be able to live off of about 8% of that annually. Yes, but isn't that after the snowball phase?? We just have our emergency of $1,000 as suggested, and everything else is being poured into debt?? Gazelle Intense, lol. Am I wrong?? Susan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TravelingChris Posted December 15, 2010 Share Posted December 15, 2010 I can't imagine that you would hold off on life insurance until you paid off all your debts. That would make no sense and anyone who would suggest that is giving bad advice. Life insurance is an essential for most families and particularly for families that don't have a lot of wealth. What happens if the bread winner dies? Catastrophe. If the breadwinner is making close to what living costs are, you also need life insurance for day care costs and costs for extra help your husband would need if you died. Someone like us in a few years, doesn't need life insurance on me. In three or four years, I don't have any children at home and dh would easily be able to afford extra services like grocery delivery and house cleaning. BUt for someone with little children living paycheck to paycheck- those are the people who most need life insurance. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
susankenny Posted December 15, 2010 Author Share Posted December 15, 2010 I can't imagine that you would hold off on life insurance until you paid off all your debts. That would make no sense and anyone who would suggest that is giving bad advice. Life insurance is an essential for most families and particularly for families that don't have a lot of wealth. What happens if the bread winner dies? Catastrophe. If the breadwinner is making close to what living costs are, you also need life insurance for day care costs and costs for extra help your husband would need if you died. Someone like us in a few years, doesn't need life insurance on me. In three or four years, I don't have any children at home and dh would easily be able to afford extra services like grocery delivery and house cleaning. BUt for someone with little children living paycheck to paycheck- those are the people who most need life insurance. Well, I'm not holding off on life insurance, (thus the point of my post). We have over 6x my husband's salary on him & a little over 2x his salary on me. I stated that already. I also stated that we will increase as we can afford too, but $30 was our budget, and honestly I'm really happy with what we have. It may not be the ideal, but it certainly gives me major peace of mind. As for Dave Ramsey. I'm just not seeing him address life insurance in his book with the 8-10x amount, so I was just trying to clarify. I never meant to insinuate that he thought life insurance should be postponed completely....I just hadn't seen him address it all honestly. I certainly could have overlooked it though.. or perhaps it's in another book, website, radio show? Not sure. Susan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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