Tag: life insurance

After a lifetime of accumulating money, it’s common to start thinking about your legacy and what you want to leave to your children, grandchildren or a favorite charitable cause. However, despite the dollar signs you see on your investment and bank accounts, there’s no guarantee your loved ones or your chosen charity will get the full amount.

Uncle Sam is lurking to snatch a sizable share.

When it comes to retirement—and to passing on whatever wealth you’ve accumulated to a spouse or the next generation—you may think you’ve thought of everything. However, despite your careful planning it could be that Uncle Sam will be handing you a hefty tax bill while you’re living—or your beneficiaries one when you die.

Even people who have been great about saving for retirement don’t always realize the tax implications of what they’ve done. They may have created a significant tax problem for themselves, and they could be leaving behind a tax time bomb for their beneficiaries.

Life insurance for married couples is a good idea, especially if you have or plan to have kids. But knowing you need life insurance and buying it are two different things, and it can get complicated trying to get the right type and amount.

The coverage you get can protect your partner from a financial crisis in the event of your death. But even the general understanding that you need insurance might not be enough, so it’s important to consider your personal needs.

The year 2018 laid the groundwork for big shifts in the life insurance landscape that will decidedly benefit consumers in the new year. And it seems shifts are sorely needed with more than 40 percent of Americans not having any type of life insurance, according to Foresters Financial. While the industry is shifting at a rapid pace, consumers can take advantage of some notable game changers poised to impact the insurance industry in 2019:

Americans worry a lot about retirement.

Will their savings hold out? Will Social Security still be around? Will healthcare costs gouge a great hole in their finances?

What many of them may not be aware of, though, is that if handled correctly their life insurance policies could play a role in making retirement a little more secure.

One of the big tricks for having a successful retirement is to make sure you have enough cash flow to pay your bills and still be able to enjoy life. Few people have pensions any more. Social Security only helps so much.

NEW YORK (REUTERS) - Joseph Shonkwiler, the proud father of newborn twin boys, owns a life insurance policy.

Like many millennials, the policy was not a priority for the 34-year-old from Cambridge, Massachusetts, until the twins were due. He will start paying down close to $200,000 in student debt after completing his MBA from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Sloan School of Management.

A study from Life Happens, a consumer group formed by insurance providers, and LIMRA, the life insurance trade association, found that 29 percent of millennials cited saving for a vacation as a priority over purchasing life insurance or increasing their coverage.