Death of a Salesman’s Stereotype
I’m so ashamed, but it’s time to come clean. Just this past week my husband and I finally got life insurance. That means that up until last Friday, we had none. I know. We have CHILDREN for goodness sake. Why weren’t we thinking of the CHILDREN?! Well, we were; I think we just didn’t understand.
Hubby and I agree that we both have a very strong aversion to salespeople, and that this directly influenced our very (very, VERY) irresponsible choice regarding this matter. See, when we started getting mailings about life insurance when I first got pregnant, we just threw them out. All I could think of was those horrible daytime TV commercials for Col0nial Penn - life insurance for the ahem, older folk - Double Indemnity (this is must see, by the way), and Death of a Salesman, of course. In our minds life insurance was a bad thing, a hoax, if you will. And while I’m embarrassed to admit this to the world of the web and as a parent, I do so because there may be others like me.
See, Hubby and I are not ignorant (no we ain’t!), we’re well-educated (we been educated real good!), and we’re responsible parents (Hey, if I don’t hear ‘em, they must be ok!). But we still didn’t think life insurance was something we needed. I think I started to put it together when I was listening to Suze Orman lecture that blond St@rbucks addicted woman on Oprah a while back, and then it hit me. The first thing this woman needed to do was get life insurance on her husband? Really? She didn’t need to cut her caffeine addiction and shopping obsession, or get medical insurance for her children? And here I was sitting there being all smug about the latter - I’d never neglect medical insurance for MY children - but here I was being a big idiot. Huh.
So we started looking into what all this meant. At the time we decided to wait until my husband started a new job to sign up for a plan. He is starting in October . . . I know! We still were going to wait! Ridiculous. Time went on and I found myself becoming more and more uncomfortable about our plan. I started having a lot of anxiety, worrying about something happening to my husband, thinking of all the ways that something could happen to him between now and when he started his new job, knowing that if the worst did happen to him that we had no plan in place at all. In addition to dealing with that type of tragedy, I’d also have nothing in the way of supporting our kids. I decided we needed to sign up for a plan immediately.
If you don’t have a life insurance policy, getting one is a very easy thing to do. With minimal research you can learn the basics that you need in order to feel confident about the terminology and to get a sense of what (type of policy and for how much) you might need. Here and here are good places to start. When you’re ready, you just make a call to a company and someone will walk you through the rest. We had an agent (a salesguy no less, with a briefcase and everything!) come to our house and go through this stuff with us while we fed our kids lunch. He took our information regarding our debt, monthly expenditures, income, and so forth and plugged these details into his handy little program to come up with how much we might need. We had a fairly strong sense of what we wanted going in and were clear that we wouldn’t be purchasing anything we had not planned on, so we felt in control and didn’t have to worry about being “sold” on anything extra. We even have someone coming out to the house to do the necessary blood work. It is all very convenient, simple, comforting, and I can’t believe it took us this long.
We now have an appropriate policy on my husband and myself. Why me, you wonder? Don’t I just stay home? Why yes, yes I do. And separate and apart from all the hubbub regarding what the work we do is worth and so forth, there is a logistical reason that a SAHM needs life insurance as well. This article from April’s issue of Parenting, laid it out pretty well (see topic number 4. Topic 5 deals with retirement accounts and is also somewhat helpful): stay at home moms need insurance not to cover our imaginary income, but to cover the costs that would be incurred by the family if we were not around - childcare, housekeeper, etc. See, if I was gone, in order to keep the income that supports our family, my husband would need someone to take care of the kids and keep the house running, and that’s why we SAHMS need policies as well.
Maybe this is all common sense. Maybe no one is even still reading because you all already knew this. But I tell ya, we were kind of floored that we had let this go so long without doing something about it. So I expose myself to public mockery in the event that there might be a few of you out there who were like me. Maybe you just didn’t know. Maybe you didn’t know how to start. Maybe you just haven’t gotten around to it. But it’s easy to do. And it’s truly important for your children. Think of the children, the CHILDREN for pity’s sake!
This site is for entertainment purposes only. I am not a financial advisor (whoo Nelly, I sure ain’t!) this post should not be construed as financial advice.
Labels: Hubby, Learn More Every Day
I think this is a great decision on your part and probably one that you’d be surprised how many people (especially stay at home moms) aren’t thinking like this, but should. My Father in law is in the Life Insurance business, so we’ve been covered in this area since before marriage! But not everyone has someone close to them to show them the importance of it all!
Steph
Comment by Adventures In Babywearing — April 1, 2008 @ 8:53 am
We got life insurance when I was pregnant with our first, and we got way more than I had originally planned to because he said things like, “well, you want to have enough money that if something happens to your husband, you can take the luxury of lying in bed and grieving for a month.”
Play the pregnant lady’s heartstrings like a fiddle, folks… but he was right, albeit not so tactful.
Comment by kelli in the mirror — April 1, 2008 @ 9:13 am
Hee. You crack me up. Although you are totally right thinking about this issue. Our little guy was about ten months old when hubby started his current job and that was when we got all insured. He has GREAT life insurance. We joke that he’s worth more dead than alive right now, even though it’s really not funny at all. The other thing I know a lot of people neglect is choosing and naming an appropriate gaurdian for your kids if something happens to both of you. You don’t even have to do anything legal, really–just a simple note signed by both of you and the chosen gaurdian in the firebox is plenty to ensure that your kids go where you want them to.
Comment by Amy — April 1, 2008 @ 11:38 am
Your husband is an attorney. You two should have wills too.
Comment by jaybee4000 — April 1, 2008 @ 2:08 pm
Amy - You are so right. That is yet another thing we’ve avoided doing. We’ll get on it.
Kelli - I must say, that’s a pretty good salesman, in a tacky sort of way.
Mom - Yes, mother.
Comment by Beth — April 1, 2008 @ 2:25 pm
We do have insurance for ourselves as well as A. She is set up for life which is extremely cool I think. She may not have everything that money can buy but she will never have to worry about her own insurance policy. What we do not have are wills. And I KNOW we need them too.
Comment by Mama D — April 1, 2008 @ 9:41 pm
No mocking here! You are wise.
We have life insurance because I don’t want to be like my great-grandmother. My great-grandfather died when she had five small children at home. She went to college and got a degree in social work and education, but she had to split up her kids for awhile, farming them out to relatives. How awful—to have your family literally torn apart by a death and then finances!
They were all eventually reunited, but not without some pretty deep scars.
Comment by gretchen from lifenut — April 2, 2008 @ 12:24 pm
Good for you!! It’s okay to admit you were a little naive about it all now that you’ve gotten it taken care of. Just make sure you don’t get whole life insurance or whatever it’s called these days.
We’ve always had insurance on Sweet Hubby through his work and we got some on me when our oldest was a baby. But with the addition of 2 more kids, another car and mortgage (all of which we didn’t have when we got my insurance), I’ve been getting the feeling lately that it may not be enough. Because of your post, I’ll be talking to hubby about that tonight.
Comment by Alli — April 2, 2008 @ 1:15 pm
I remember when we sat down and made a guardian for our then only child and arranged life insurance and how FREAKED OUT we were.
Now we have to up our life insurance, because we have 100 kids and all. Adulthood is AWESOME.
Comment by Rebecca — April 2, 2008 @ 1:17 pm
Great advice. We got life insurance last year as well for all the same reasons. Do you have a living trust yet? That is something we are working on now. Without it, the government will take a huge chunk of your money (that would have gone to your kids) to pay for the fees to go through probate - or something like that. It’s really expensive to have a lawyer draw the papers though but if you have assets under $1M (including life insur), check out Suze Orman’s Will and Trust Portfolio kit. It will save hundreds of dollars and is really easy to use. (Sorry for going on about this!)
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