For most life insurance policies, yes, your rate is guaranteed from the moment your coverage starts. That is to say, you know exactly how much every premium payment is going to cost you, from the start to the finish of your policy. In fact, for most policies, your rate is fixed, meaning that all your premium payments are going to be equal in amount.

For a comparison of term, whole, and universal life insurance, see www.wholesaleinsurance.net/life-insurance/types

EL DORADO HILLS, Calif., April 21, 2011 /PRNewswire/ — When the last child has moved out of the house, many “empty nesters” question if maintaining a life insurance policy is necessary.  Before cancelling or reducing your insurance coverage, take some time to re-evaluate how your circumstances have changed, and consider what your future needs may be.

“Many empty nesters are faced with financial obligations, such as the mortgage on a home or second home, and could be financially devastated if a spouse dies or becomes disabled,” said insurance expert Gary Lardy, CEO of IntelliQuote.

If the unthinkable happens so close to retirement, you may be forced to work long into your golden years.  Marvin H. Feldman, CLU, ChFC, RFC, President and CEO of the Life Foundation (www.lifehappens.org) recently posted, “Researchers are telling us that the expected retirement age for U.S. workers is rising and that people are planning on working longer, as opposed to saving more.”

CHRISTINE DUGAS
USA Today

As American families are struggling to pay their bills, it’s not surprising that many are putting off life insurance. Individual life insurance hit a 50-year low last year, according to LIMRA, an industry-sponsored group.

But during tough economic times, people should not sit back and think they’re immortal, says Gordon Bernhardt, a fee-only financial planner in McLean, Va.

The sudden death of a working parent could force the surviving spouse to make up for the loss of household income. And life insurance can be twice as important for a single parent.

For full article, visit: Not a good time to drop life insurance, experts say

Online PR News – 26-January-2011 –ROSEVILLE, CA – Life insurance brokerage, WholesaleInsurance.net, recently introduced a free e-learning course on its website.

The course, entitled ’7 Steps To Hassle Free Insurance,’ is available from WholesaleInsurance.net and provides subscribers with different tips that make the process of shopping for life insurance easier than before. Each tip is delivered via email and the course comes with no obligation on the part of the subscriber.

The course helps subscribers learn how to keep their information from being sold, how to find the most affordable prices in term life insurance, how much coverage is necessary, how to find the best agents and advisors and how to save at least $37 on the cost of life insurance.

“We know that life insurance can be confusing, especially if you’ve never shopped for it before. We want to make sure our customers are getting exactly what they need and not paying unnecessarily for coverage they can’t use and our course can help do just that. We hope that our subscribers find our information useful and that it helps them find the best coverage, no matter what type of life insurance they need. It’s just one of the many ways we try to help people understand the insurance industry,” said Jon Pinney, Marketing Director of WholesaleInsurance.net (http://www.wholesaleinsurance.net).

The free e-learning course isn’t the only educational guide found on WholesaleInsurance.net. The site has a number of reference guides and tutorials, including one on the application process, how to choose the right type and amount of coverage, how to choose a death benefit, how to choose an agent, agency and carrier and even how to use life insurance for estate protection, retirement planning, business protection and mortgage protection. The site also defines the many components of life insurance, such as quotes, premiums, health classes, cash value, death benefits, riders, and taxes.

“It’s important to us to help insurance shoppers compare life insurance plans. Finding the right life insurance plan depends on understanding your needs and how each plan fits into your life. If you’re looking for life insurance to protect your family, your home or your business, we’re sure we can help. We invite anyone to visit our website or give one of our advisors a call,” said Pinney.

Wholesale Insurance works with some of the biggest names in life insurance. Clients who contact Wholesale Insurance for assistance in finding the right life insurance policy can choose a policy from over 50 different insurance companies.

About WholesaleInsurance.net:
WholesaleInsurance.net was created to help families find the best term life insurance quotes online. Their site allows visitors to compare life insurance quotes from various companies. WholesaleInsurance.net is an independent life insurance agency which allows them to sell policies from many different life insurance companies. This ensures their customers get the best policy for the best price.

NEW YORK, Jan. 14, 2011 /PRNewswire/ — One of the best ways to protect a family’s financial future is to compare life insurance quotes and choose an appropriate provider. The trick is to find the most compatible coverage for the family’s specific situation at the most affordable price. Here are five tips to find a cheap quote.

1. Consider term life insurance. Depending on the client’s situation, this may be the best coverage for the cheapest rate. Term coverage can be purchased in a variety of spans, such as a 10-year or 20-year policy. A policy is paid into for the length chosen and when it expires there are no benefits; however, if the policyholder dies within the term of coverage, the death benefit is paid to the beneficiaries. Term life insurance quotes will always be much cheaper than quotes for whole policies.

2. Young and healthy people should avoid guaranteed policies. These are plans that do not require a medical exam but they are usually more expensive. Guaranteed policies are available to everyone regardless of their age or health, which is the reason the premiums are higher. Medical exams only take about 10-15 minutes and offer flexible times. However, if a person cannot get a life insurance policy due to medical issues, a guaranteed policy may be a better alternative to no cover.

3. When comparing quotes to get the best life insurance rates, people should consider what they want the coverage for and what they do not need. While not having enough coverage can be difficult, paying for too much can be wasteful. What needs to be covered: funeral arrangements, outstanding debts, loss of income for family expenses, and/or children’s future education?

4. Married couples should buy a joint policy rather than two individuals. The cost typically is about 15% less than two individual policies with the same amount of coverage. For greater savings, these premiums can be paid annually rather than monthly, which reduces administration costs, and savings are passed on to the policyholder.

5. The quickest and easiest way to find a cheap quote is to shop around, compare multiple quotes and choose the policy that offers the best coverage at the lowest rates.

About LifeInsuranceQuotes.net:

LifeInsuranceQuotes.net connects people shopping for life insurance quotes with agents who can offer the best coverage at the most affordable rate. This efficient and convenient tool gives access to multiple nationwide carriers and allows users to compare the difference between whole and term life insurance from the comfort of their home. To learn more and to get a free quote, visit the website today.

To compare the best life insurance rates, visit: http://www.wholesaleinsurance.net/

DARIEN, Illinois, Dec. 13, 2010 /PRNewswire/ — If you’ve ever been told that you can’t buy life insurance due to a pre-existing medical condition or that your application was rated up due to one or more medical conditions, Life Quotes, Inc. offers these tips for securing a life insurance policy at a rate you can live with.

Life insurance shoppers with heart disease, cancer, diabetes and other common ailments, take heart.  There are strategies that you can employ to obtain life insurance coverage, often at a great price, but a good outcome requires that you properly shop the market or have a good agent do so for you.

The art of life insurance underwriting is based upon some 80 different rating factors, each of which has to be looked at before an offer is made.  So if the website you are visiting only asks a few questions about your health and reveals only “lowball quotes,” beware because many more questions will be asked at a later time and, yes, the price will change.  A good agent will tell you this upfront and not sugarcoat the truth.

The best that any agent or website can do is show you preliminary quotes (their best estimate of what the final rate will be) based upon their knowledge of the market and what you tell them about your medical history.  For this reason, we recommend that you always work with an agent who represents at least 30 insurance companies, and is willing to show you the list of such companies.  Life insurance prices vary widely among competing companies, which can add another element of surprise to the process.

Susan Mancione, Sales Director at Life Quotes, Inc., has this advice for life insurance shoppers who have been turned down or rated up:  ”The first thing you should do is seek the advice of an agent that you trust to guide you through this process. That can make all the difference. Secondly, if you have a ratable health condition, always obtain a recent letter from your doctor and attach it to your application.  Make sure that the letter describes your history, current medications and their assessment of your outlook.  Attaching this letter at the outset helps reduce uncertainty and gives you, the agent and the life underwriter an accurate picture of your situation.”

Once the application is submitted it can take anywhere from 14 to 60 days to complete the entire process, sometimes even longer if your medical records have to be retrieved from numerous doctors.

From there, the life insurance company will closely review the answers you gave to the paramedical examiner. They will also access third party prescription drug databases, check your life insurance activity records at the Medical Information Bureau, or MIB, retrieve your medical records and possibly conduct a separate telephone interview with you.

Mancione continued, “What life underwriters look for most in an applicant with ratable conditions is whether your condition is stable and improving or getting worse.  Then they look to see if you are in compliance with your doctor’s instructions.  Applicants over age 50 should show a history of regular checkups.  Many life insurance companies require that a certain period of time pass, such as 1-3 years, from the onset of certain heart disease and cancers.”

Heart condition:

Heart disease is the #1 cause of death in America and, as such, is looked at very closely by every life insurer.  Although more and more women are being diagnosed with heart conditions, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that between 70 and 89 percent of sudden cardiac events occur in men (as of 2006). A number of factors come into play when life insurers address heart disease, including the type and severity of the disease, as well as the age and documented lifestyle habits of the life insurance applicant.  These documented habits include:

• Diet
• Exercise
• Tobacco usage
• Regular health checkups
• Complete compliance with doctor’s orders

In some cases, heart patients can be considered for a life insurance policy six months after bypass, angioplasty, or the use of stents.

Diabetes:

According to Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, over 23.6 million people in the United States have diabetes, and another 6 million are not aware they have it. If left untreated and undiagnosed, diabetes can lead to a number of serious medical conditions. However, if you have the disease under control through diet, schedule regular doctor visits and take your medication faithfully, you may still be able to purchase life insurance at an affordable rate.

Breast cancer:

The National Cancer Institute estimates that although more than 207,000 women will be diagnosed with breast cancer this year, more than 167,000 (nearly 81 percent) of these women will become breast cancer survivors. If you’ve been diagnosed with breast cancer and survived, you may still be insurable, depending on certain underwriting criteria, but expect most life insurers to want a 2-10 year period to pass before they’ll consider insuring you.

• If the tumor was small, early stage and good risk, you can purchase insurance once you’ve completed treatment and had documented regular follow-up visits with your physician for a period of time specific to each insurance company.
• For later stage breast cancer, the insurance company may postpone coverage for a period of 2 to 7 years, provided treatment was successful and there has been no recurrence.
• Also, insurance companies may add on what is called a “flat extra” rate. Common flat extra rates for cancer can vary from$2.50 to $7.00 per $1,000 of coverage for anywhere from the first 5 to 7 years of policy premiums.

Many breast cancer survivors are offered “standard” rates, which can actually vary widely among different companies.  However, depending on the insurer, there are exceptions to this rule, which is why we recommend purchasing coverage through an insurance brokerage general agency or independent agent who can shop the market for you.

High blood pressure & cholesterol:

There can be many causes of high blood pressure and cholesterol. These include factors such as weight and the over consumption of fatty foods, but often genetics, age, and gender play important roles as well. Fortunately, both conditions can be controlled and you can still purchase life insurance.

HIV:

There was a time when being diagnosed with HIV was comparable to a death sentence. However, according to a February 2010 ATHENA National Observational Cohort study, with today’s medical advancements and a better understanding of how the disease progresses, the life expectancy of someone with HIV can be extended by seven to 24 years. According to insurance experts, it might be best to get a life insurance policy through an employer, trade association or union. Traditional individual life insurers will not cover HIV. However, if you’ve lived with HIV for quite some time, you could still get approved for a life insurance policy through an “impaired-risk specialist” or purchase a “guaranteed issue” life insurance plan. Keep in mind, these policies carry with them much higher premium rates, as well as strict limits on the amount of insurance for which you may be eligible, in most cases up to $20,000.

About Life Quotes, Inc.

Originally founded in 1984, privately-held Life Quotes, Inc. owns and operates a comprehensive consumer information service and companion insurance brokerage service that caters to the needs of self-directed insurance shoppers.  Visitors to the Company’s Web site www.lifequotes.com, are able to obtain free, instant car insurance quotes, instant life insurance quotes, home, business and health insurance quotes from leading insurers and have the freedom to buy online or by phone from any company shown. Life Quotes, Inc. generates revenues from receipt of industry-standard commissions, including back-end bonus commissions and volume-based contingent bonus commissions that are paid by participating insurance companies. We also generate revenues from the sale of Web site traffic and insurance leads to various third parties.

High Risk Life Insurance Quotes

PHILADELPHIA, Sep 08, 2010 (BUSINESS WIRE) — –Nearly 70 million Americans don’t have life insurance

–Evaluate personal life insurance needs during employer’s benefits enrollment period

Checklists, to-do lists, honey-do lists. They all equate to the same thing: Getting an important task done. While Americans are continuing to cut expenses and save money in a recovering economy, CIGNA(R) (CI 33.60, +0.12, +0.36%) suggests everyone, young and more seasoned individuals alike, pay attention to the life insurance options available during their employer’s benefits enrollment period. For many, this enrollment period takes place in the fall.

September is Life Insurance Awareness Month, and for nearly 70 million Americans who don’t have life insurance(1), it’s a good time to add getting life insurance to the list. Life Insurance Awareness Month is a national campaign to educate people about the financial challenges their loved ones could face if they do not have enough life insurance or any at all.

Newbies to Life Insurance

“Life insurance offered through an employer’s benefits package is often a very affordable way of protecting a family’s long-term financial health,” said Diane Russell, assistant vice president, Group Insurance, for CIGNA. “A good place to start is deciding how much protection your family may need.”

While some employers offer life insurance coverage equal to an employee’s salary as part of the employee’s benefit package, family expenses now or in the future may often exceed this amount. Life insurance can help a family cover the cost of many one-time or ongoing expenses, including funeral costs, mortgage payments, household bills, college tuition payments, and can even help to fund a spouse’s retirement. Online tools, such as CIGNA’s online life insurance calculator can help people gauge how much insurance may be suggested for their family’s needs. CIGNA also offers additional helpful tips and information in an online toolkit at http://www.cigna.com/liam.

Established Policyholders

“For those who already have life insurance, it’s a good idea to periodically review their beneficiary designation, as well as reassess the family’s changing needs,” said Russell. “Aside from the annual benefit enrollment period, families should review and update a policy after every new life event, such as buying a home, getting an increase or decrease in income, going through a divorce, having a baby or sending a child to college.”

There are many life insurance options available to families. CIGNA offers two group coverage types — term and universal life insurance. Term and universal life insurance policies can help protect against the loss of a wage earner. Universal life insurance can also provide a way to build up funds for life events.

For more tips and information visit CIGNA’s “The Value of Life Insurance” webpage. CIGNA’s featured podcast for September, also linked on the webpage, speaks to both life insurance newbies and seasoned policyholders (http://www.cigna.com/podcasts).

About CIGNA

CIGNA (CI 33.60, +0.12, +0.36%) is a global health service and financial company dedicated to helping people improve their health, well-being and sense of security. CIGNA Corporation’s operating subsidiaries in the United States provide an integrated suite of health services, such as medical, dental, behavioral health, pharmacy and vision care benefits, as well as group life, accident and disability insurance. CIGNA offers products and services in over 27 countries and jurisdictions and has approximately 60 million customer relationships throughout the world. To learn more about CIGNA, visitwww.cigna.com. To sign up for email alerts or an RSS feed of company news, log on tohttp://newsroom.cigna.com/rss. Also, follow us on Twitter at @cigna, visit CIGNA’s YouTube channel at http://www.youtube.com/cignatv and listen to CIGNA’s podcast series with healthy tips and information at http://www.cigna.com/podcasts or by searching “CIGNA” in iTunes.

“CIGNA,” and the “Tree of Life” logo are registered service marks of CIGNA Intellectual Property, Inc., licensed for use by CIGNA Corporation and its operating subsidiaries. All products and services are provided exclusively by such operating subsidiaries and not by CIGNA Corporation. Such operating subsidiaries include Life Insurance Company of North America, CIGNA Life Insurance Company of New York, and Connecticut General Life Insurance Company.

(1) The Life Foundation’s Life Insurance Awareness Month,http://www.lifehappens.org/content/view/774/479/, July 19 , 2010

SOURCE: CIGNA Corporation

http://www.wholesaleinsurance.net/

The nonprofit LIFE Foundation has joined forces with more than 100 of the nation’s top life insurance companies in an effort to increase awareness among Americans. Life Insurance Awareness Month (LIAM) was created in 2004 as an industry-wide effort held annually during the month of September.

“My father never thought he’d die at such a young age, but he loved his family enough to expect the unexpected,” said Bibb. “His life insurance was his legacy of love to our family, allowing us to carry on with our lives and to continue living. Sometimes the worst happens and thankfully for my family, my father had planned ahead.” —Leslie Bibb, LIAM Spokesperson

In addition to featuring actress Leslie Bibb as the national spokesperson for Life Insurance Awareness Month, LIFE’s theme for the 2010 campaign will be the “Wonders of Life,” a theme first introduced during LIAM 2009.

“The ‘Wonders of Life’ theme is all about making sure your family will have the kind of life you always hoped they’d have, even if you’re not around to witness it,” said Marvin H. Feldman, CLU, ChFC, president and CEO of the LIFE Foundation.

LIMRA International reported that 68 million American adults have no life insurance and among those with coverage, most have far less than experts recommend.

According to a 2008 LIMRA study:

• 15 percent of husbands and 28 percent of wives have no life insurance.
• 6 million households (10 percent of families with children under 18) have no life insurance or term life insurance protection.
• The percentage of families with dependent children that admit they’ll have immediate trouble with everyday living expenses is 22 percent.

If you are not sure you have adequate coverage, please contact an Insurance Advisor at Wholesale Insurance who can help you safeguard your family’s financial future.