So you're interested in term life insurance. Whatever the reason for your fascination with term life, you'll find some helpful tips here to guide you in your search. We hope that you compare term rates to those for other kinds of life insurance to help you decide on an appropriate type of coverage for you at the present time.
Basically, term life coverage is pure insurance that promises to pay designated beneficiaries (typically your spouse, parents or adult children) a certain sum of money in the event that you die. The reason it's called "pure insurance" is because it offers no chance for investment returns; rather, if you outlive the policy, no money comes back to you. There is no reward for this insurance unless you die.
Now that we've probably scared most of you off, we'll go over the reasons why you should consider buying term. A term policy is a great option for short-term needs, such as paying off a home mortgage or high-interest debts, or funding a college education. For a set time, such as 5, 10, 20 or 30 years, you can have life insurance that is cheap and gives you the peace of mind of knowing that if something happens to you, your beneficiaries can get by financially and maybe even have something extra to help them.
One attractive option these days is to buy a term policy and then convert it to a whole life policy before it expires. That way, you have time to prepare yourself for the higher cost of a permanent policy by increasing your savings and your income and paying off your debts.