by Lucinda Davis

Created on: July 08, 2009

First you need to decide if you even need life insurance. More importantly do you really want life insurance? Do you want your relatives waiting around for you to die so they can cash in on your million dollar policy? Well maybe you don't have a million dollar policy.

Still a few thousand dollars can sound a like a million to someone who is broke. Sure, we all have those kind of relatives. They will crawl out of the woodwork looking for their share when you pass, but they were never around when you were alive.

If you are single and have no children then life insurance is just a waste of money.The entire reason for having life insurance is to help your family survive when you are gone. If your children are grown and out on their own then you probably don't need a life insurance policy either.

Do you really want a son in law or daughter in law influencing your living will that you've entrusted to your children? If the new son in law or daughter in law knows about your policy they might not care enough about you to be good advice in your children's ears. If a nut case marries into the family you might just end up dead before your time.

If you feel you need life insurance then you can still protect your family and not pay such high premiums. You should never use life insurance as an investment strategy. If you are purchasing life insurance just get plain old term life insurance. It's the cheapest type of life insurance and the agent makes less commission which means you are paying less. Only purchase enough insurance to cover what you feel needs to be covered when you die.

You shouldn't buy life insurance on your children. An agent might try to convince you that you don't love your children if you don't. Sorry but your children don't care if you have life insurance on them. They only care what new game came out on xbox or if their favorite television show is on. Your children are not monetary assets and they should not be treated that way. Your only investment in your children should be emotional. The only person who should have life insurance on them is the family provider.

As you get older you shouldn't need as much life insurance because you should be accumulating wealth, at least that's the plan right? If your income comes from a pension you might only need enough to cover the cost of your burial. Better yet, you might not need insurance at all if you pay for your burial in advance.

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