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How a Disability Insurance Plan Saved My Family, Part I

Posted on: Monday, August 31st, 2009

Quite a few years ago when I first started my career, I was like anyone else just starting out – I was eager, hungry for work, and really poor. As most of us do at that age, I opted for as little benefits that I would have to pay out of pocket for as I tried to maximize the amount in my paycheck. However, as I got further on in my career I felt as though I was probably doing myself an injustice in terms of my future and I sat down with a financial planner to see what I should be doing with my money.

The financial planner quickly pointed out that while I was carrying health insurance, I had opted for the bare bones plan – something he thought I should reconsider, especially when I decided to have a family. Further, he noticed that I was not contributing to my 401k – something that he said was like throwing money out the window considering that my company matched funds for vested employees. Additionally, while I did have life insurance, he was concerned that I was not carryingdisability insurance – especially since my company offered disability insurance plansfrom which to choose. He felt as though this was extremely risky considering how early on I was in my career. If I got hurt or sick, how would I be able to support myself until the age of retirement?

Needless to say, I left that meeting quite a bit shaken and committed to making some changes in my financial portfolio. I changed my health insurance policy, upped my life insurance, began contributed to my company’s 401k plan, and not only took advantage of one of the disability insurance plans available through my job, but also purchased a private disability insurance policy as a supplement.

As you’ll read in the next post, this decision wound up saving my family from financial ruin.

Disability Income Insurance: Protecting an Education

Posted on: Wednesday, August 26th, 2009

Most of us who have children begin to put away money for college following their birth. We hope to build a substantial enough nest egg that they can go away to school and study what they want without the burden of student loans on their shoulders when they graduate. But it’s amazing how quickly those hard earned savings can disappear if you do not have the proper tools in place to protect yourself and your family.

Consider, for example, those who have opted not to purchase private disability insurance or take part in company-provided disability insurance plans. Essentially this makes you vulnerable to any possible illness or injury that may take you out of work. And how quickly would most of us go under without even our next paycheck?

An illness that requires a hospital stay, ongoing treatments, or renders someone unable to do their job in the short term or the long term can financially bury a family. An accident that results in an absence or permanent separation from work can mean a complete financial – as well as personal – transformation. How many of us have the resources available to us to be able to survive such an event in our lives?

What generally happens with those who do not have disability insurance is that once all vacation, personal, and sick time is taken from work, they turn to their savings accounts, investments, retirement funds, and even their children’s education savings. These are desperate times and they call for desperate measures. A child’s education could easily be sacrificed to save a family from financial ruin.

With disability insurance in place, however, parents do not have to turn to such extreme measures. Their policy payouts will account for their missing income and keep their family afloat during this period of time so that savings, the family home, and investments are secure.

Disability Insurance Plans Confusing? Turn to Professional Guidance

Posted on: Monday, August 24th, 2009

There are some things that just require some professional input; after all, we can’t be expected to be well-versed in everything. We turn to accountants to help us decipher the tax code; we turn to realtors to help us navigate the real estate market; and for those insurance matters…we turn to the professionals that can help us make sense of the many options available to us.

Disability insurance is something that many of us do not give any thought to until we are in a position where we are responsible for a family – be it our spouse or children. This is around the time when we will undoubtedly explore the many options associated with life insurance; putting elements into place that will protect our family so that a sudden and unexpected death doesn’t mean financial devastation. Additionally, this is around the time when options for disability insurance are explored as well. Disability insurance is also important in protecting the financial interests of families should an earner in the household be confronted with an illness or injury and be unable to work.

Make no mistake that disability insurance is important for families on many different levels. It is crucial for those families with children as they are often the most vulnerable in a situation where an income is lost. But disability insurance is just as important for couples and singles. For instance, those who live alone have no income to back them up if they suddenly find themselves in a position where they can’t work. Without disability insurance the prospects are alarming.

That being said, the many disability insurance plans on the market and the many choices included in them all can sometimes leave prospective policyholders unclear on which way to turn. Working with professional insurance carriers, however – those with a great reputation in the industry and a desire to answer all your questions – will put you on the right track to an appropriate disability insurance policy.

With Disability Insurance, Future is Insecure

Posted on: Thursday, August 20th, 2009

Ever since most of us were children we have had it drilled into our head to save for our future, protect our future, put something away for a rainy day, and all the rest of it. For many of us, those lessons didn’t quite sink in until we were much older and had a family for which we were responsible. Then we understood – now as the parents who were telling their own children to save for their future – just how important it is to make sure that you have provisions put in place for whatever the future holds.

All the savings in the world, however, and even the investments that we make throughout our lifetime, could all easily be at risk if we suddenly find ourselves in a position of having to leave our job and not continue to earn. The economy may be bad, but most of us can’t imagine a scenario where we wouldn’t be able to find something; some way in which to earn some sort of a living. But this only works in a scenario in which we are healthy and physically capable of continuing to earn a living in the way in which we have been doing. But in a situation where we are hurt in an accident and unable to return to work or we find ourselves physically ill and undergoing treatment, we may simply be physically incapable of going to work and earning a paycheck. And without disability insurance in place we could be facing a very insecure future.

Most of what we plan for involves us being healthy and viable enough to have a long retirement but far too few of us plan for those circumstances in which we are not healthy. Disability income insurance can put those provisions in place and we hope never to have to use them. But if we do – we know we are well protected.

Disability Insurance Plans in the New Year

Posted on: Wednesday, August 19th, 2009

The next holiday on our calendar is that of Thanksgiving and, as we all know, following Thanksgiving, the holidays roll in rather quickly after that. Before we know it, the New Year will be upon us and we can start off “fresh” as so many of us love to do. The truth is that we enjoy the opportunity to wipe the slate clean and get down to once again facing those priorities that somehow seem to allude us as the months pass by on the calendar.

One of the things that we should all be looking at as the New Year approaches and as the opportunity presents itself to start fresh for the months ahead, is our disability insurance. For some, this may be looking at the current disability insurance policy they have in place and making adjustments according to their current lifestyle. For others, this may mean looking at disability insurance plans for the first as they may have been putting off the process of putting such in insurance in place up until this point.

Disability insurance plans are expansive – from short term disability to long term disability and with a variety of provisions that can be chosen to fit the needs of policyholders in a variety of circumstances. But having at least some kind of disability insurance under your belt is by far better than having no disability insurance at all. If you were to become sick or injured and not be able to continue working how would you support your family and pay your bills – including your mortgage or rent?

So now is the time to check out disability insurance plans if you have not already done so. Get your ducks in a row in preparation for the New Year and have a plan in place to protect the interests of yourself and your family.

Disability Income Insurance & Significant Debt

Posted on: Friday, August 14th, 2009

Debt has become something that most of us are all too complacent about; the average American, in fact, carries an average of $9,000 in credit card debt – something that is born from our inability to pay for those things we want in cash. With the economy struggling even more so today, more and more of us are finding ourselves in the position of carrying significant debt. It is, unfortunately, something that many of us just accept as a by-product of the economy. And we hope that by at least continuing to make minimum payments every month – until we are able to make some headway with a bulk amount of cash at some point – we can stay in the good graces of the credit bureaus and one day find financial independence.

This plan is all well and good on paper until there is a sudden and dramatic loss of income, such as what can happen when an earner find themselves out of a job due to illness or injury. In that kind of situation, without comprehensive disability income insurance in place, a consumer can very easily find themselves overwhelmed and eventually in default.

Disability insurance can put protective measures in place so the loss of a job doesn’t have to necessarily mean the end of the world financially. When an injury or illness causes someone to be identified as disabled and someone who cannot continue in their present line of work, the stream of income ceases. In a perfect world, the injured or ill person has a spouse that is able to make up for this loss of income; but often this is not the case and families wind up turning to savings and investments in order to fill their financial need.

With disability income insurance, however, policy payouts begin after the policy-stipulated waiting period and policyholders are able to meet their financial responsibilities – including debt payments – even with the loss of their paycheck.