Archive for August, 2008

Do you need affordable term life insurance? This seems to be the million-dollar question. When you want to purchase life insurance you often do not know how much you need or if there is such a thing as having too much life insurance. What constitutes affordable life insurance and how much you need is totally dependant upon your own situation.

Don’t be fooled into determining the amount of insurance you should have to what your best friend or neighbour has. Remember, every situation is unique and your needs will be unique. Your need will be determined by what you wish to see happen in the event of your death. You do have to look at the life insurance cost of the premiums and decide how much you can afford from your monthly budget. There is affordable life insurance available at very low premiums and that will help your family out in the event of your death.

When considering what affordable life insurance is needed in a family situation, you need to do a life insurance comparison. This will help you get the most affordable rates and there are countless life insurance companies able to help you in this regard.

In order to determine how much life insurance you should have, a number of factors need to be considered. For a person with family needs, these may include such things as:

? Do you have dependants? If so, how long will they be dependant upon you?

? Do you have children? If so, how old are they?

? Do you want to insure your children have a post secondary education?

? Will your household income be greatly reduced upon your death? If so, how much income do you need to replace so your family maintains their standard of living?

? How long will you need to replace your household income?

? What taxes may be incurred upon your death?

? Do you need to cover debt obligations such as loans or a mortgage?

When you try to determine whether or not you can afford life insurance, think about whether or not your family can afford to be without affordable life insurance.

You can find affordable term life insurance, but you need to establish exactly what you need first.

For a website totally devoted to Life Insurance visit Peter’s Website Life Insurance Answers at http://www.life-insurance-answers.com/ and find out about Life Insurance as well as Cheap Life Insurance at http://www.life-insurance-answers.com/cheap-life-insurance.html and more, including Online Life Insurance, Term Life Insurance and Life Insurance Agents.

, , ,

Comments No Comments »

A recent survey took the most popular type of home in the UK, the three-bed semi, and compared the quotes given by insurance companies for different postcodes around the country. Northern Ireland came in top for buildings cover with an average of ?119.

The premiums are affected by such variables as the amount of subsidence in the area, and the size and rebuild costs of the house. Some policies were based on the number of bedrooms in the house, but there is also the issue of the cost of rebuilding, which vary due to local construction standards, the cost of labour and the availability and cost of materials.
When buildings and contents cover are assed together for a three-bed semi all over the UK, the cheapest average is in Lisnaskea in Northern Ireland, which has an average premium of ?223. Compare this to the rather down-at-heel suburb of West Norwood in South-east London, where the number of burglaries and the cost of rebuilding adds up to combined buildings and content cover of ?702, and you see how cheap insurance is in Northern Ireland!

Another initiative which has helped people in Northern Ireland insure their home has been the Northern Ireland Tenants Action Project (NITAP), which aimed to make it more affordable and simple for housing executive and housing association tenants to insure their personal possessions.
This had been difficult before. Anyone who regularly gets home insurance in the UK will know that many insurance companies put a minimum on the amount that you can insure with contents cover of, say ?20,000. This is strange, because not many people have contents worth that amount. What this means is that you are insuring yourself for an amount you don’t need to be covered for, which raises your premiums.

The consequences of this are that many people on low incomes are choosing not to insure their personal possessions and household goods. Tenants claim that the minimum cover demanded by insurers cause high premiums.
The scheme set up in Northern Ireland, means that those on low and fixed incomes can insure their personal possessions for as little as 80p a week, whether or not the total value of their possessions falls below the typical requirements for these policies.

Tenants over 60 can insure their possessions for sums as low as ?6,000. For others, the minimum is ?9,000. This means that the average premium for tenants in Northern Ireland is ?75 a year.
Also, instead of paying premiums in advance, Northern Ireland tenants can pay fortnightly in many different ways. They can pay at any post office, with a personalised swipe card through Girobank. Also, monthly direct debit can be used, but you get a discount for annual payments.

George McGonigal
Northern Ireland Insurance Centre

George is webmaster of an online insurance resource for Northern Ireland homeowners and motorists. We bring under one roof insurers who cover Northern Ireland that can offer online quotations to allow our visitors to compare rates in the comfort of their own homes.Home Insurance Northern Ireland: Compare insurance quotes online. Buildings and Contents Insurance Northern Ireland: Compare insurance quotes online. quotemehappy: from Norwich Union Direct.

, , , , , ,

Comments No Comments »

Many homeowners took out endowment policies expecting them to pay off their mortgages but have recently been alarmed to discover that this will not be the case. Your endowment could be thousands of pounds off target with no way of you finding this extra cash.

What Can I do?

This is where endowment compensation - or endowment redress - is used. But how much compensation could you receive?

The insurance companies aren’t paying compensation according to how much of a shortfall you are predicted. If your claim is upheld, the endowment company is likely to make you an offer for compensation and an offer to cash in the policy. Look at this carefully and speak to an independent advisor to find out what is best for you.

What Else Does An Endowment Policy Cover?

One important point to remember is that part of your endowment payments have included a payment for life insurance. If you cash in your endowment, then you will need to arrange a new policy to replace the endowment.

Also, looking back over the period when you have been paying for the endowment, some of the payments have been used to pay a life insurance.

How Will The Insurance Calculate Compensation?

So how much compensation could you receive? The insurance company will look at the monthly payments you have made into your endowment policy. From this they will make an allowance to account for the life insurance aspect.

Then they will also look at how much interest you have been paying each month to keep the mortgage level. From these complicated figures, they will work out if you had instead been sold a repayment mortgage, how much would you have paid off. Then they compare this to how much your endowment is worth now if it was cashed in.

In short, if by paying the monthly payments you could have paid off more of your mortgage than your endowment has earned, then the difference is the compensation you are entitled to.

Was My Offer Correct?

So how do you know whether your offer of compensation is correct? That’s where a specialist solicitor helps you. Not only will they deal with the paperwork and any appeals for you, they will also check you are given the maximum compensation. After all, they are being paid a percentage of the compensation (not including the cash in value) so the more compensation you receive, the more they receive.

Where Now?

To find out whether you can claim, or to speak to a solicitor without any obligation, leave your contact details or take the 60 second test. It only takes a minute to find out the answer or you can just leave your contact details and someone will call you back.

Keith Lunt runs several financial sites including http://www.endowment-claim.org.uk
You are welcome to reprint this article as long as all links are included and work.

,

Comments No Comments »

Close
E-mail It