How often should I review my life insurance? (2024)

FAQs

How often should I review my life insurance? ›

As a general rule of thumb, it's a good idea to review your life insurance with your life insurance agent at least once a year. The life insurance review is a way to make sure that you have the right kind and level of coverage to protect your loved ones.

It's a good idea to review your insurance coverage at least once a year to ensure that your family and belongings are appropriately protected.

When should I conduct a life insurance review? At a minimum, you should conduct an annual life insurance review. But no matter how long it's been since your last review, you should conduct one after any major life events involving changes to your family, health, or finances.

Since life insurance provides vital financial protection to your family should anything happen to you, it's important to review it annually to ensure you have sufficient coverage aligned with your ever-evolving life circ*mstances.

Changes—such as a birth, divorce, remarriage or even a new mortgage or job—are indicators that you might need to make changes to your life insurance policy. In the case of the birth of a child or a new marriage, you might want to increase your death benefit.

Like other aspects of your financial well-being, you don't want to take a “set it and forget it” approach to your life insurance policy. As a general rule of thumb, it's a good idea to review your life insurance with your life insurance agent at least once a year.

Failing to review your insurance policy could result in having too much or too little cover. The former could leave you over-paying for cover you don't need, while the latter could mean your family isn't left with enough financial support if something happened to you.

An incontestable clause states that after a policy has been in force for a certain amount of time (usually two years), it cannot be challenged by an insurer on any grounds unless there is definite proof of fraud at that time.

If you meet the following criteria, you could consider canceling your policy. *Your mortgage is nearly paid off. *Your biggest financial obligations are settled. *You have accumulated significant savings in your retirement fund.

You may not need life insurance in retirement if you're debt-free, have prepaid your final expenses, and don't want to leave a larger inheritance. If you own cash-value life insurance, consider any tax consequences before canceling the policy.

How long should you keep paying life insurance? ›

If your beneficiaries rely on your income, consider a policy that lasts until you plan to retire — or until you plan to have enough in savings and investments for your family to be secure without your income.

What Age Does Life Insurance Expire? The age 100 maturity date means the policy expires and coverage ends when the insured person turns 100. One possible result is that the policyholder (and their heirs) get nothing, despite decades of paying into the policy. But times change, and now people tend to live longer.

Typically, the premium amount increases, on average, about 8% to 10% for every year of age; it can be as low as 5% annually if your 40s, and as high as 12% annually if you're over age 50. With term life insurance, your premium is established when you buy a policy and remains the same every year.

It can help ensure that your home and belongings are fully protected, and that your coverage is keeping up with your current needs. Everything from new furniture to a kitchen upgrade can affect the value of your family's home and may even qualify you for additional discounts on your insurance policy.

As such, it's a good idea to reverify your patients' insurance plans on a regular basis—monthly, if possible.

A coverage review is a general check-in with your insurance agent. During the review, you'll meet with your ERIE agent and share any life changes that could affect your insurance needs. This information will be used to update your current policies and recommend additional coverages you may want to consider.

As mentioned, it's no longer good enough to verify eligibility once a year—in fact, most recommend running a bulk verification every month or so, in order to catch any changes in your patients insurance coverage or deductible levels.