Life

  If you’re LGBTQ, you may be fully exploring what it means to be able to build your life around who you love. Strong legal protections in the last 15 years have ushered in more than just external changes. According to MassMutual financial advisor Mindi Wernick with Lee, Nolan & Koroghlian in New York City, these protections have provided validity and certainty, creating an important psychological shift. “Now that gay couples are seen in the eyes of the law as equal, they can build their lives around who they love,” she says. “They’re joining finances, and doing more traditional things, like buying life insurance .” The big shift in life insurance for the LGBTQ community “Previously, life events like getting married and having children were coming up more often for straight couples,” says Tyler Sweigart, a State Farm agent in Washington, D.C. “Now things are changing where we have gay marriage, adoption and surrogacy. We ask about life events with every single customer.” Even s...

  Women: It’s time for you to close the gender gap in life insurance ownership. Just 47% of women have life insurance coverage versus 58% of men, according to the 2021 Insurance Barometer Study by Life Happens and LIMRA, insurance industry groups. Yet women are just as likely to need life insurance as men. “It’s important for women to realize the contribution they make to their households and to have financial protection in case something happens,” says Brittney Burgett, head of communications at Bestow, an online life insurance company. “If you have people in your life who rely on you for their well-being, you’re generally going to need life insurance.” So if you don’t already have life insurance or don’t have enough, here’s what you need to know. Life Insurance Is Cheaper for Women Than Men Fortunately, the pink tax doesn’t apply to life insurance. In fact, it pays to be a woman in this case. “The price of life insurance is based on actuarial data,” Burgett says. “Stat...

  For many LGBTQ+ adults, planning for retirement, investing, and even budgeting are a struggle. Almost two-thirds of LGBTQ individuals surveyed reported living paycheck to paycheck most of the time, according to a new Nationwide Retirement Institute survey of 1,000 nationally representative adult U.S. consumers and 1,000 members of the LGBTQ+ community. That figure jumps to 72% for Black LGBTQ+ members. Moreover, LGBTQ+ survey respondents said that they were less knowledgeable than the general population about retirement planning (by 13%), estate planning (by 12%), and investing in the stock market (by 8%). “The statistics are dire,” Manisha Thakor, a certified financial planner and founder of MoneyZen, told Yahoo Money . The findings underscore the higher costs the community often faces from health care to parenthood at the same time that those individuals find their earning power curbed by biases in the workplace. More than a third (37%) reported that their c...

  It’s officially wedding season! As the US continues to open back up, it seems that everywhere you look someone is getting married, with a double whammy of postponed 2020 nuptials and regularly scheduled 2021 events kicking off. If you’re one of the many couples getting married this year - or perhaps you’ve already tied the knot (congrats!) - chances are there are a few high priority life items on your list to tackle. While life insurance may not be the first thing on your mind post-wedding, it is definitely worth thinking about as you tie your futures together . Marriage is a partnership For most people, marriage is a commitment on many levels: emotional, ethical and spiritual just to name a few, but also financial and practical! For one, there are usually beneficial, fiscal implications to tying the knot. There is even a fancy financial term that describes the relationship between spouses (and business partners): you share an insurable interest, that is to say, one of you will ...

  Why It Matters: Fewer women than men have life insurance policies. Women may need life insurance more than men. Many clients don’t know life insurance can have benefits for the living, too. Back in the 1950s, shows like “I Love Lucy” and “Leave It to Beaver” depicted women as housewives completely dependent on their working husbands. Today, 57% of women in the U.S. participate in the labor force.  Yet, despite the fact that 49% of women are the primary breadwinners and 52% of women in a relationship are responsible for managing the money in the household, fewer women than men hold life insurance policies. Your female clients may not know this, but they may actually need life insurance more than men. Let’s review some of the reasons why. They’re going to live longer Women’s lifespans are longer than men’s, so there will be a greater likelihood of medical needs as they age.   Having a policy that accumulates cash value or has a rider for a chronic illness could pro...

  If you’re LGBTQ, you may be fully exploring what it means to be able to build your life around who you love. Strong legal protections in the last 15 years have ushered in more than just external changes. According to MassMutual financial advisor Mindi Wernick with Lee, Nolan & Koroghlian in New York City, these protections have provided validity and certainty, creating an important psychological shift. “Now that gay couples are seen in the eyes of the law as equal, they can build their lives around who they love,” she says. “They’re joining finances, and doing more traditional things, like buying life insurance .” The big shift in life insurance for the LGBTQ community “Previously, life events like getting married and having children were coming up more often for straight couples,” says Tyler Sweigart, a State Farm agent in Washington, D.C. “Now things are changing where we have gay marriage, adoption and surrogacy. We ask about life events with every single customer.” Even s...

  It's expensive to be a woman in this country. Collectively, we fork over $426 billion a year on our hair, nails, and beauty products. But glamour aside, for services that we all need - like insurance , housing and healthcare, - women are still paying more than men. I tapped Lea Goldman, Features and Special Projects Director at Marie Claire Magazine, whose article, "Why Women Pay More" exposes the harsh realities of price discrimination. "The state of California found, on average, that women were paying a mark-up of about $1,351 that men weren't having t pay for the same goods and services," she says. "We looked at women cross the country...and found that on average women pa $151 billion in extra fees and markups that men don't have to pay." Some of those marked up items include everyday toiletries, such as disposable razors, shaving creams, shampoos and soaps - all dressed in prettier packaging, but functionally identical to those sold to me...

  Shopping for life insurance requires time and research to ensure you’re getting the best policy to fit your needs. But as a transgender individual, the process can be a bit more complex. Do transgender people have to get special life insurance? And what is the best life insurance for transgender people? Below, we examine these questions and everything else you need to know about transgender life insurance . Does Being Transgender Affect Your Ability to Get Life Insurance? Being transgender in and of itself has no impact on life insurance underwriting, according to  Ryan Pinney, president of Pinney Insurance Cente. You shouldn’t be denied a policy or charged a different rate simply because you are transgender. However, some insurance companies still use sex assigned at birth to determine the policy’s rate rather than the person’s gender. The reason is that they base their risk assessment or underwriting on mortality, Pinney says, which is strongly tied to sex. “For example, a...