re: Term Life vs. Whole Life

Whole Life is a complete rip-off for 99% of cases. In fact, most whole life insurers, upon signing their clients up for whole life policies, then take out term policies on those same whole life policies and pocket the difference.

So term is good enough for them, but not for you.

The cash build up is complete BS. Most of the time you get between 2-4 percent interest (which is a joke considering the market's average returns, which you could invest in with your monthly savings from having term as opposed to whole). Also, you usually have to pay interest to the insurer if you borrow money out of your own cash build up portion of your policy (so you pay interest to borrow your own money).

If you'd like to talk more about it, I can point you in the right direction. I know many people in the business.

This thread has actually been really informative to me.

Sales people always have the inside track on customers because of information assymetry. It's nice to see both sides of the coin, even if it's what I already personally knew.

"a better way to transfer money to heirs federally tax-free."

It is only a good buy for this purpose if:

1) you have a taxable estate too large for other estate planning mechanisms to deal with (generally more than $6.0 million single $12.0 million couple). I know we expect the exemption to return to $3.5, but with use of entity discounting, GRATS, lifetime exemption giving, and other higher level estate planning tools you can easily turn 6.0 into 3.5 without much effort;

2) your estate is too illiquid to pay the tax (ie. all in a business or farm land, etc.) AND it would be difficult to borrow against it cost effectively AND you want your heirs to continue to hold the illiquid assets instead of sell it (they work in the business, etc.); and

3) you buy the policy in a special life insurance trust set up through a lawyer, otherwise its still in your estate anyway and it defeats 1-2.

It is obviously a rare person who needs life insurance for estate tax purposes (most people who might need it can diversify their holdings and/or save from their income to provide sufficient liquidity to deal with any estate tax)

This is the same thread every time. Every one says whole is a waste of money, JPL jumps in and tells every one they look dumb because he thinks its not and tells us he doesn't sell it. Over and over again.

quote:

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Do you really know how much it cost to bury someone? I mean funeral, casket and burial? It's expensive as frick right now. Imagine how much more it will cost in the future.

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Sarcasm? I think the national average for funeral and burial is around $10,000 - hardly an insurmountable sum.

quote:

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And worst case scenario, cremate your loved one, buy a few joint papers and roll up his ashes at your favorite fishing hole

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Name that movie. Ten seconds. Or maybe I'm embarrassed to say I've seen it.

Best use of whole life I have seen is by a company. My grandfather has a huge whole life policy that is paid for by the company payable to the company. Not really feasible for an individual to pay those kind of premiums.

PLOT:

The plot is centered around two underachieving pot smokers - Silas (Method Man) and Jamal (Redman). When Silas' friend Ivory (Chuck Davis) dies, Silas uses his ashes as fertilizer for a new batch of marijuana. While both are sitting in the parking lot before taking their THC (Testing for Higher Credentials, a parody of the SAT) exams for college, neither is able to smoke their individual marijuana stash without the help of the other. They soon discover that smoking Silas' new batch summons the ghost of the recently deceased Ivory. Ivory gives them the exact test answers and both of them pass with perfect scores. Several dubious colleges offer the pair scholarships, but none of them are appealing. Eventually, Chancellor Huntley (Fred Willard) suggests the two apply to Harvard University. They accept the offer and continue using the magic weed to succeed at the university. They meet several interesting students, such as Tuan (Trieu Tran), an Asian child prodigy, Bart (Chris Elwood), a snobby rowing team captain, and Jeffrey (Justin Urich), their roommate who is forced to perform humiliating acts as part of a fraternity initiation. Jamal brought along his fellow pot-smoker "I Need Money" (Al Shearer). Jamal falls for the daughter of the Vice President. Bart is set against Jamal in sports, and Silas in love when the latter falls for his girlfriend, Lauren (Lark Voorhies). The "Ivory" bush is eventually stolen by the nerdy volunteer student guard Gerald (T.J. Thyne), who smokes all of it except for a few tiny leaves. With the "Ivory" now gone, the pair try studying first with no success then try to dig up and smoke the remains of John Quincy Adams, but it doesn't fare any better either. Silas concocts a "truth serum" using the remnants of "Ivory" in an attempt to get an A in botany, getting him above a 2.0 GPA and stay in Harvard on scholarship. In the end, Benjamin Franklin (whose bong was discovered by Lauren) appears back with Ivory at an alumni meeting, and that convinces the congregation that Silas and Jamal should stay at Harvard.

Don't ask why I've seen it

It's been a while, but I think it was pretty funny. I think I remember Ari Gold being in it.