Stay-at-home parents play an invaluable role in any family system—they are janitors, chefs, teachers, chauffeurs, and everything in between. Not only do they provide the daily structure and guidance that children need to grow and flourish, but in many cases, they make tremendous financial sacrifices by choosing to stay in the home rather than work outside of it. Despite this vast contribution, most stay-at-home parents lack the life insurance coverage they require to keep their family safe and secure.
The truth is that stay-at-home parents need life insurance just as much—if not more—than those who draw paychecks away from the home. Not only does life insurance set the stage for financial stability in the event of an untimely death or incapacitating accident, but many policies also offer living benefits that can help to weather the unpredictable storms of life.
In this article, we’ll discuss why it’s important for stay-at-home parents to have life insurance with living benefits, and what they can do to create a plan that fits their situation.
Why Life Insurance with Living Benefits?
If a stay-at-home parent should pass away, life insurance can provide much-needed financial resources that can help the surviving partner to manage debt, cope with lost income, and plan for the future. But life insurance goes beyond death—it can also provide assistance and support in life.
With living benefits riders, for instance, you can accelerate your policy’s death benefit in the event that you have a chronic or terminal illness that requires you to pay for expensive medical treatments, support needed adaptive equipment, or shoulder other unforeseen expenses.
In addition, many permanent life insurance policies also have a cash-value component that allows you to tap into your policy’s value as a line of credit or loan in the event of an emergency. This is known as a cash-value loan.
Having life insurance with living benefits can create a “safety net” for stay-at-home parents in the event that something unexpected occurs—this safety net can make all the difference in ensuring that a family’s financial goals are not derailed.
How to Get Life Insurance with Living Benefits
Since all life insurance policies are not created equal, it’s important that stay-at-home parents take the time to understand the different types of policies that are available and their associated living benefits. There are three primary types of life insurance policies that stay-at-home parents should consider: term life, whole life, and universal life.
Term life insurance contributes to a family’s financial security with a death benefit that can replace lost income in the event of an untimely death. Whole life insurance goes beyond death, however—it’s a form of permanent life insurance that offers a cash-value component within the policy. That cash-value is guaranteed to grow over time and can be used as a source of emergency funds if the family experiences a financial hardship.
Universal life insurance also allows the policyholder to access part of the policy’s death benefit—this type of policy can be particularly beneficial to stay-at-home parents who stand to benefit from its flexible premiums and death benefit. That being said, universal life insurance does come with a higher price tag due to its long-term cash-value potential.
Making the Right Choice
Working with a trained and experienced independent life insurance advisor can help stay-at-home parents navigate the complex sea of products and providers—and it can also ensure that their particular goals and objectives are being addressed.
An advisor can work with stay-at-home parents to help them to make the right choice for their family’s particular needs. A qualified advisor can also provide advice on how to best use the policy’s living benefits to their advantage.
Stay-at-home parents are the unsung heroes of the family system—they deserve to have adequate life insurance coverage in the event that something should happen to them. With the right life insurance policy and the help of an independent advisor, stay-at-home parents can keep their families safe and secure.