Insurance and Your Estate Plan

Insurance and Your Estate Plan

by Melinda Gustafson Gervasi

June 28, 2024

Image by M. Gustafson Gervasi, 2024 -- Focus on the Details

Happy National Insurance Day to all who celebrate!  Yes, today, June 28th, is a day set aside to encourage us to review of insurance policies.  It's a thing, look it up!  Let's use this day take a broad view of insurance in your life.  Common types of insurance include:

• Life (whole life or term policy)
• Disability
• Long-term Care
• Health (including dental and vision)
• Automobile
• Homeowners or Renters
• Pet Health Care

Whether you are in a car accident and are too sick to manage your financial world or your Earthly time has come to an end, someone is going to pick up the financial paperwork of your life and begin sorting it out.  Make that task easier by creating an up-to-date account of your insurance policies.  It can be as simple as handwritten notes on a piece of paper; the value is in organizing your thoughts and policies.

List the types of policies you carry along with the company that provides it for you and contact information.  If you can include a sentence or two about how the insurance works, that is ideal.  For example, if you carry disability insurance that kicks in after 90 days paying 1/2 of your salary, that is very helpful information to your Power of Attorney for Finance.

Completing this review may also help you identify areas where you have too much coverage, pinpointing an expense you may be able to reduce.  Or conversely, you may identify a weakness in your finances where adding or increasing insurance may be wise.  For example, if you took out term life insurance when you started your new career but have not reviewed it since getting married, buying a home and becoming a parent.  The policy you needed as a single renter may be very different than what you need today.

Finally, remember that what you write on a beneficiary form controls where a death payment for insurance will go when you pass.  Review those forms.  Are they up-to-date?  If not, make them so.

Thank you for reading.  Remember that a blog is not an attorney nor is it legal advice.  Please consult a licensed lawyer in your home state for advice specific to your situation.  My hope is that my writing will encourage thought and reflection.  Be well.