How To Get Senior Term Life Insurance Cheap

By Neal@Wealth Pilgrim on Jul 12, 2010 in Save On Insurance Coverage

How to get senior term life insurance cheap.

More and more senior citizens want to know how to get term life insurance cheap. They are looking into this because they can’t count on real estate equity and stock market investments to “self insure” as they did in the past.

If you are a senior citizen and you are still working, you might need term life insurance to protect your family in case you aren’t around any more to work and bring home that income.

Even if you aren’t working, you may need insurance to make up for the drop in social security and pension income your survivor may have to deal with one day.


Flikr, Horia Varlan


Here are the steps I recommend:

1. Join Organizations

There are many organizations that offer life insurance discounts for their members. I’m told that AARP offers such programs although I’m not familiar with it

Find out if the other organizations you belong to offer group term policies and find out if you can participate.

2. Take advantage of your employer

If you are working, there is a chance that your employer offers a group plan too. If the company doesn’t, ask them to look into starting one. It doesn’t have to cost them anything and it would be a great benefit – especially to people like you.

3. Get lots of quotes.


Insurance companies are run by actuaries. These are the people who determine the likelihood of some terrible thing happening to you in any one year. Each company calculates the risk differently. You want to get in front of the company with the most optimistic actuary – so look around. Get quotes…it doesn’t cost a thing.

4. Consider whole life

I’m not a fan of whole life insurance but this is one of the few cases it might work. If you are very healthy, you might look into a whole life policy that doesn’t build up much cash value. This, in essence, is a term policy and depending on your age, health and number of years you’ll need the coverage, it might be cheaper than a term policy.

What I want to caution against doing is going for a guaranteed issue life insurance policy. Those are the ones they advertise late at night because they know old geezers never sleep.

I don’t like these policies because they have some provisions which may preclude you from ever collecting the benefits. You can read more about guaranteed issue life insurance here. The only time you’d consider this coverage is if you have absolutely no alternative.

And that brings up a very important point.

No matter what policy you buy, make sure you read the fine print. That goes for group policies too. You want to make sure that the policy is issued by a reputable firm, that they’ll pay off if you die and they won’t deny benefits if you die within the first 3 years of coverage.

Of course, while you’re getting your insurance in place, it’s smart to make sure all your other financial and legal matters are in order too.

What steps have you taken as a senior to get proper life insurance?  Are there any other tips you can share?


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  1. 2 Comment(s)

  2. By Split Cents on Jul 12, 2010 | Reply

    So helpful! Life insurance can be completely baffling with all the policy types and options. Most state Attorneys General also have a website and publications with helpful overviews of life insurance, and a list of insurers that offer policies. Because insurance companies tend to be regulated by the states, most states also have an insurance division that is a great place to check for complaints filed against the company, etc

    [Reply]

  3. By Neal on Jul 12, 2010 | Reply

    Excellent point Split Cents. Thanks. Very helpful.

    [Reply]

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