Ten things most people don’t know about life insurance

Ten things most people don’t know about life insurance

1. Most life insurance policies pay out for suicide after two years of owning the policy.

2. Most policies won’t cover some avocations if you buy it AFTER you have participated in them. Policies exclude heli-skiing, aviation once you have flow as a pilot or student pilot or frequently in private planes, or mountain climbing, sky diving, etc. If you buy it BEFORE you do those things you are insured for all of those.

3. If you buy your policy BEFORE you have any medical conditions even minor things like being overweight, high blood sugar, unstable mental health,

4. If you buy your policy BEFORE a bankruptcy, criminal record or bad driving record it will not effect your insurability. After any of these, there could be an issue in getting covered. Your application could be declined or rated (extra premium).

5. If you buy a policy BEFORE any Foreign Travel to unstable countries the policy would include foreign travel. If you were to buy it AFTER the policy could be declined, or exclude foreign travel.

6. Family history can effect your insurability as well. Some family history of hereditary illnesses (conditions that shorten your life expectancy) can make an application be declined or rated.

7. The best way to get insurance if you are uninsurable is to convert group coverage when you leave a job. You can convert the amount you had as an employee up to $200,000. You can do this every time you leave a job that you had employee life insurance on your benefits.

8. If you have Canada Life’s new portable benefits on your employers plan, you can buy $25,000 of additional life insurance with no medical questions and you keep it when you leave the employer along with the option to convert your employee life insurance up to the $200,000 maximum.

9. If you buy your kids a small policy when they are born, it can be paid for forever by the time they are 20 years old. That guarantee’s their insurability.

10. If you do have an exclusion. Is it permanent? Can it be reconsidered? It is common in many situations for a rating or exclusion to be removed after the risk is no longer. Like in the case of someone who has permanently had a large weight loss. Or a mental health issue at the time of applying that is fully resolved for a period of time.

If you have any of these situations, please give us a call and we can help to clarify your options.