No, we feel the Gerber deals just prey on new parents and grandparents.
We don’t buy the whole life policies either. My ex stepfather was an insurance salesman and most of it is a load of crap, especially whole life.
If you feel like you must get something, term is the way to go.
Still buying life insurance is a gamble you are playing with the company.
We opt do do our own planning and not pay high commissions to greedy salesmen ( not all are greedy).
We do have personal investments which have specific clauses regarding what to do in the event of any of our deaths. We all know that we will someday die, so we plan that on our terms vs some company out to see their profits increase however they can.
That’s just my 2 cents and opinion. I’ve not read other responses. I believe in preparing yourself and being financially responsible.
Absolutely! I took out a $50,000 policy on my son when he was just three weeks old. It is a 15 year pay whole life policy, which means you only pay for 15 years and then the policy is fully paid up for life. It will continue to grow each year as the dividends roll back into the policy. I also bought a GIO rider. That is a guaranteed insurability option so that he can purchase more insurance at different stages in his life without having to show proof of insurability. I am so glad I did, as he has a heart defect that might cause him problems getting life insurance down the road. I also have term life on him through work.
Buying insurance while they are young locks in a lower rate and if you get a whole life policy with a shortened pay term, you can pay it off and never have to worry about it again. I’d research out companies and get quotes. My policy on my son through a major insurance company is far cheaper than the Gerber policies. My dad bought a policy for me at 3 (traditional whole life) and there is no way in the world I could get that much whole life insurance for the premiums I pay, even at age 29. It would be hard to find a term policy for that premium, that’s how low the rate is.
I was just going to say what Amanda H. said! We have a policy on our daughter with and Additional Purchase Benefit (APB) attached. That means that she is guaranteed the ability to buy additional life insurance (I think up to $125K) later in life even if she has a medical condition that would normally prevent her ability to obtain life insurance.
We look at it more as insuring her ability to insure herself for her family, than insuring her for us. Even with that, we pay less than $10 per month for her policy, which seems worth it to us. I would definitely do my research with different companies to find the best one for your needs.
I have insurance for all 3 of my kids through my work plan. I have always had it at al of my jobs. I need to look into something that won’t change…and I do almost everything like that through USAA.
a) whole life insurance is a rip off.
b) financially I will be better off not paying the insurance as it would only be used to pay for funeral expenses.
We only have life ins on Mrs and myself - and that is for the purpose of paying off any outstanding mortgages should one of us pass. Basically - we have enough that the surviving spouse can continue to live in the same house in the same financial situation.
There is no such need to replace income with the kids. Thus, we’ll encourage them to get life insurance when they have a family also, so that they protect their family from loss of income.
here’s Dave Ramsey’s take on whole/cash value insurance policies.
Reading some of the responses - I just want to point out that my wife just recently cashed in her whole life policy that her parents bought when she was a baby. Almost 30 years of “investing” - Let’s estimate 20 years of payments at $50 per year is $1,000 spent on insurance.
We got $400 something on the cash out.
That’s not to even mention that you could have had in your savings $1,970 at just 3% return if you just put that same money in savings (I used the investment calculator on Dave Ramsey’s website).
I’d much rather have cashed out $2k rather than $400. Even buying term would be a better option if you feel you need to protect against funeral expenses
Nope.
Gerber Life and those like it are a sham–especially the part about “using it as a savings account for college later on.”
Whole life insurance is always a bad idea.
If, God forbid, something happened to our child, we can afford his final expenses.
Life insurance, used wisely, is term insurance designed to REPLACE the INCOME of a working adult, if ivested wisely upon receipt. So—20x annual income is pretty much what is recommended for working adults, as I mentioned, to invest so as to REPLACE lost income.
yes 2 of the kids have life insurance the new baby hasnt been added yet, its through the state if oklahoma, my husbands work offers a family plan which includes me and the kids for a couple dollars a month, we got this before the baby was here and havent had a chance to add the baby…
now i was against it when he asked me to fill it out but i wasnt able to have life insurance without adding everyone, i am on the fence with children needing it, i dont feel its right to have life insurance on my babies, but at the same time if something happen to them or all of us at the same time, i want to know that everything was taken care of… im not sure about the gerber i see it but i agree it could be a scam.
if you want insurance i would go with someone local in your home town…i also dont agree the life insurance its self is a rip off, ive seen it used when and it helped out…
Yes, my kids have life insurance plans through a private insurance company. Just small plans that only cost us $15/month but I will continue to increase until they are adults then turn it over to them and then all they have to do is maintain it.
Not currently, ex quit paying, but we used to. Not gerber, but through our life insurance company. I wanted it to be minimal (the idea of profiting from my sons death disgusted me) BUT I was talked into (rightly) of seriously upping it.
So the family law person worked out the amounts needed for all funeral expenses (including headstones which run into thousands and thousands- like 5-20k), medical expenses for myself in trust (I would expect to lose my mind in grief, like most parents), and a trust to see that the mortgage is paid, bills are paid, etc. for a 12mo period so that I/we didn’t end up homeless and jobless and unable to afford inpatient or outpatient psychiatric care while grieving. It was a significant amount. It was also all tied up in trusts and oversight except for the very initial funeral expenses.
Both of my kids have life insurance through my husband’s work. It isn’t a lot. I think it would be enough to cover funeral costs in the unimaginable instance where something horrible would happen but since they don’t have any debt or assets really that is all you need.
My mom got it when each of my kids were born and though we hoped to never have to use it, in 2008 my 15 year old son was killed by a 12 year old “friend” playing with a gun. We was able to use it to pay for his funeral. We never want to think of our kids dying before us but the sad fact is it does happen! I also loss my daughter in 1998, but she was only 2 weeks old and so the policy didn’t cover her funeral, I don’t think it goes into affect until they are like 6-8 weeks, and it was hard enough planning the funeral let alone trying to figure out how we was going to pay for it!
We have child-riders on my husband’s life insurance policy. It is only $6 per year for $10,000 in coverage.
(To compare, the Gerber plan is $72 per year for $10,000. Gerber makes it sound like a good investment for the future - is isn’t.)
The reason we have it is if the unthinkable happens, we won’t also have financial stress trying to pay for arrangements.
If you and your husband do not have policies, look into that first. If something happens to a worker, that income is gone. If something happens to the primary caregiver, the worker has to pay for childcare and such. (Get term, not whole/universal.)
I would not do Gerber, but I would suggest contacting Matrix Direct and getting a quote for life insurance on yourself and your children.
I would suggest a term life policy as it is cheap and you want to insure yourself and your children while you have not been diagnosis with any diseases that would make you or them uninsurable. You would also what to have expenses covered in the event of their death. The premium (Monthly cost) will be lower based on your health and if you are not a smoker, the term sometimes also lowers when you have children.
Kids dont ‘technically’ need life insurance, but we have it as a rider on our family policy it was pennies no matter how many kids as we had. Life insurance is to take the financial burden off your family should the ‘supporter’ pass away suddenly. I had Gerber for my kids when they were younger but it is a waste of money, you pour all the money into it and get hardly nothing in return. Whole life in general is a waste of money, very low rate of return and many rules to go with it, stick with term life. The rate of return on Gerber and many others is horrible you would do better in the stock market. Insurance agents often sell it as a ‘college’ plan, again you’d make more money investing that monthly payment yourself in the stock market.
The rider I have covers each of my kids for $10,000 and these days thats not much for a funeral.
yes. one for each kid. Gerber Life $15,000 policy that when they turn 21 will double and still only cost them each $10 a month.
There are several ‘non-insurable’ health conditions that run in our family. Getting them the policies now insures that they will have something in the future in case they ever develop one of the health conditions.
Of course not. What are the chances that my kids are going to die and why would I need to benefit financially from their deaths? Money wouldn’t be of any comfort to me and I don’t depend on my kids financially. We have enough money to bury them. Life insurance is money that goes to a beneficiary when you die. A policy on your kids is not money that they get when you die, that’s what YOUR life insurance policy is for. Children do not need life insurance unless they are a child star whose work supports their parents/sbilings financially. You’re better off to open a tax sheltered college savings plan than waste money on kid life insurance.