Ladies!! Please, please,please talk with your spouses.

[eliza61]

Just got off the phone with a good friend/coworker of mine. She is distraught. she lost her husband of 30 years about a month ago. Evidently he had a very small life insurance policy. She said every time, over the years she questioned whether or not they were sufficiently covered she said dh always said his company (amtrack) provided benefits for widows.
She just recieved a letter from Amtrack saying she was not eligible.
Small life insurance policy was just enough to cover the burial.

I did not ask any other financial questions because she was crying but evidently the lack of benefits is going to cause a major life style adjustment.

She has 1 22 year old daughter still living at home just graduated from college.

So ladies, I know some times when we get married we tend to leave important decisions to our spouses (especially us older gals. ) but I just wanted to remind every one to think of the future.

 

[Trish Bessette]

Coming from someone who works for an insurance company you hit the nail on the head. People tend to shy away from having life insurance conversations. Some think "what do I care, I'm dead" but that isn't what it's about. It is about leaving enough to protect those you care for. The last thing I would want my poor DH to have to deal with if I die is not having money to cover expenses and help to take care of our DD's.

It may be hard for some to discuss but do it.

Even those of you with children. Life insurance is dirt cheap if you start it when they are born. None of us want to ever think of losing our children, but if you have some protection at least that can help with funeral/burial expenses.

 

[Tarheel Tink]

A good reminder for all of us to double check these things.

 

[PatsMom]

It's not just life insurance. Know what your assets are and where they are. Understand how they are invested. I've had a least one recent widow come to me with boxes of paper - she had no idea how much money, if any, she had. All she knew was that at some point when her husband took his pension she had signed the paperwork giving up her survivor benefit. She turned out to be OK - there was a fair amount of money but she was a good candidate for a scam artist.

 

[taylor3297]

Also get a Will done if you have not done so already. My stepdad died without a Will and what a mess!. Luckily, the state of NC has specific laws on what has to be done in these cases but other states aren't set up the same.

Even with what the state mandated, dealing with estate issues are harder to do without a Will.

My dh and I set up a Will for this reason and for it something happened to us while both kids are young, who would be granted custody of our kids.

 

[Handbag Lady]

This can also be a sign or at least an alert for us to make sure we have enough for ourselves.

My husband gets this glazed look when it comes to insurance, so, I just handled it myself. We both work for the same company, so it was easy for me to see that we are both covered with company-sponsored insurance as well as elective insurance outside of the company.

Unfortunately, all I can do is every now and again point to the files in our office with the paperwork in it and remind him that I do have an extra, older policy with just enough money to pay for my death party.

And it wouldn't hurt for everyone to go ahead and start asking. I would be so unsure of what to do if something happened to him and I didn't know where his bank accounts are located.

 

[Nennie]

I would also add, "Men, please talk with your wives," as in many relationships, the wife earns just as much, if not more, than her husband. Women also need to be properly insured!

 

[Katieinwonderland]

We literally just bought life insurance policies these past few months. I'm 24 and DH is 26 and our friends wondered why on earth why we were buying life insurance so young, but it's just something we wanted to get organised early on. Our policies are high enough to take care of all debt we have (mortgage, car payments etc) and more. My biggest fear would be leaving DH unable to survive financially without me.

I admit that I don't know where our important documents are though. I think I'll ask DH to talk me through all that stuff soon.

 

[BCDisneyFanatic]

Another important point to remember is to not undervalue your worth, even if you are "just" a stay-at-home mom or dad. If something were to happen to you, someone is going to have to look after the kids and the house while DH/DW is working. Over 18 years this cost can really add up!

 

[wdwiala]

I think that people dismiss the need for life insurance (my parents for example) but don't stop to think about what would happen if a spouse was gone.
Loans, mortgage payments, child care because there is only one spouse. You need to ask yourself how much you would be bringing home if only you were working to pay the bills. What if you are a stay at home mom who hasn't been employed for years? How much realistically could you make?

Eat out less once a month and get some insurance.

My opinion...

 

[jfoofj]

Great advice! Also, if you have had any life changes (ie divorce/marriage etc) check to see who you have listed as your beneficiary of your policies and accounts. Until just recently my exhusband was listed as my beneficiary for my 401k and life insurance through my work (1x my yearly salary- work pays for it). Yikes! Missed changing that 8 years ago!

DH and I took out policies last year... it wasn't a fun thing to think about, but at least if something does happen the other will be ok and not have to worry about bills.

 

[mrsv98]

We have enough to cover the mortgage and a bit more. The one thing we are lacking is wills with gusrdianship. Got to get on it!

 

[livie1205]

My dh and I did all this last year..we have 3 kids ds13 , dss12 and dd4 and I am the sole ben of everything, after me the kids evenly....its the same for my ins. he gets everything and then the kids.We thought everything was like we wanted it but found out the papers were not filled out right...my ex and his ex would have had control of the ins. because we did not fix it right.

 

[Silent1CB]

That stinks.

When it comes to ME and money and how will I be taken care of, I want to see stuff in writing. DH told me similar stuff and I made him get the info for me from HR in writing. They give it out, people just don't keep it.

Previously working in insurance. Its not all that hard to read if you just try. Then ask questions.

Same for any insurance. Not just life insurance. No one is going to care as much about YOU as YOU do. Don't leave important things up to other people. At least make the effort to check if they are correct.


ALSO, I'm not a woman that leaves financial stuff to DH. Everything is discussed together, and I handle most of it in the end anyway. My mom is the elderly lady in complete darkness about what they have because dad doesn't tell her anything. We don't live that way. Its 2010. Not the 1940s.

 

[PatsMom]

My dh and I did all this last year..we have 3 kids ds13 , dss12 and dd4 and I am the sole ben of everything, after me the kids evenly....its the same for my ins. he gets everything and then the kids.We thought everything was like we wanted it but found out the papers were not filled out right...my ex and his ex would have had control of the ins. because we did not fix it right.

When blended families are involved, estate planning can be a bit trickier. If you don't want your ex to control money left to the children, then it is really simple to set up a revocable living trust. You should never name young children directly because of the control they get at 18. Also, if a trust is set up in your will then it is always subject to probate court supervision which is a pain in the butt and can be expensive as well.

 

[minkydog]

Just got off the phone with a good friend/coworker of mine. She is distraught. she lost her husband of 30 years about a month ago. Evidently he had a very small life insurance policy. She said every time, over the years she questioned whether or not they were sufficiently covered she said dh always said his company (amtrack) provided benefits for widows.
She just recieved a letter from Amtrack saying she was not eligible.
Small life insurance policy was just enough to cover the burial.

Such a terrible thing! My step-dad used to joke with my mom that he was going to leave her a rich widow. Then he up and died and guess what? Step-dad had never changed his beneficiaries! So he had a small policy, about $10,000 that went to my mom, his wife of 16 years. He left a larger policy, $40,000, to his second wife of 9 months. And he left his first wife(20 years) a whopping $100,000 in life insurance! The second wife graciously signed over her benefits to my mother, knowing that it was simply an error that SD had not cleared up. But the first wife just took her thousands and ran with it.

Of course, $50,000 is better than none at all, but my mother was left faaaarrr from a "rich widow." In fact, SD so entangled his estate that my mother can do almost nothing without consulting his surviving child and grandchild. Makes me so sick. If my step-dad knew what he had done he'd be rolling in his grave.

 

[Mermaid02]

My dh and I have large policies. The cost is really minimal and we are protected if anything should happen to either one of us.

 

[Tinkermommy]

Honestly, this is one reason why I work. If the worst were to happen to my DH, I would not only have life insurance (DH and I both have life insurance through work and then more on top of that) but I would have a job with benefits to support me and my children.

This is one of those things you hate to think about, but it is critical you plan for.

 

[bettymae1121]

DH thought I was insane, but a few months after we got married I dragged him down to State Farm and got us both $250k policies. He said we didn't need it, we had no kids yet and he had insurance through work, and if I died he didn't care about gettting money. I told him that since he is diabetic, we needed to get him a policy while he was still young (33 at the time) and relatively healthy, if we waited we might not be able to get it or afford it even if a company was willing to insure him. As it was, his policy was 3x the cost of mine! I told him getting it now would mean we wouldn't have to worry about it once we had kids, it would be in place already.

On top of that, and this is important, if you have a policy through your employer YOU SHOULD STILL GET A PRIVATE POLICY. If you get fired or layed off, that coverage disapears and if you die before getting a new job or a private policy in place, your spouse and/or kids are up a creek in a leaky boat and no paddle.

Now, no matter what our work situations are like should one of us die, the surviving spouse gets $250k, mimimum. Not enought to retire on, but enough to make a difficult time much, much easier.

We do still need wills though...that's on my to-do list but I keep forgetting to do it. Not out of feeling it's morbid, but I just can't seem to get both time and inclination together at the same time to get it done.

 

[STLDisney_Freak]

Honestly, this is one reason why I work. If the worst were to happen to my DH, I would not only have life insurance (DH and I both have life insurance through work and then more on top of that) but I would have a job with benefits to support me and my children.

This is one of those things you hate to think about, but it is critical you plan for.

I totally agree with you.