Life Insurance Living Benefits

Charles Goodman Group: Trustworthy Insurance Agent in Chappaqua

When it comes to permanent life coverage, policyholders fall into one of three categories: conservative, moderate and opportunistic. Whole life coverage offers the most modest and stable returns in the form of tax-deferred fixed dividends that can be applied toward a loan or reinvested in the policy. Guarantee and indexed universal life offer higher-yield investments that make money from financial products such as stocks, bonds and mutual funds. IUL policies are usually the most complex of the universal life policies, and they tend to fluctuate with the markets with which they’re tied. A Chappaqua insurance agent can explain the benefits of each type of investment and guide you to a policy that fits your financial needs and goals. Variable policies fluctuate more than universal policies, and policyholders who want to take advantage of the higher gains in good market conditions can opt for variable universal life, which combines the flexible payment schedule of universal life with the managed investment account of variable life.

Of course, all life insurance policies offer a death benefit, but not all policies offer the same benefit throughout the entire life of the policy.

The insurance agent experts at the Charles Goodman Group of Chappaqua can assist you with any questions regarding health insurance or life insurance.

Permanent life policies offer more than the traditional death benefit of a term life policy by extending the time limit until the day you actually pass away. The death benefit of a permanent life policy becomes more of a guaranteed benefit rather than an insurance policy, and the investment component gives policyholders a wide range of living benefits that can sometimes be transferred to their beneficiaries after death. For example, if your permanent life policy pays you annuities from your investment, your beneficiaries can receive your remaining annuities when you pass away if you include annuity certain in the policy. The cash value of your policy, also called its surrender value, is a financial asset that belongs to you until the policy is terminated. It passes on to your beneficiaries when you die, and the higher the returns are on your investments, the more surrender value your policy has when it expires.

Before Congress passed the Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act in 1981, permanent life policies weren’t subject to interest charges and earned generally higher returns on smaller investments. However, today’s insurance products offer tax-free cash value and living benefits that provide retirement income for policyholders and their dependents. These products are more comprehensive than earlier policies, and they offer more choices in how premiums are invested, allowing a wider range of people to choose permanent life coverage that suits them.