Life Insurance VS A Retirement Policy PDF Print E-mail
Written by Graham McKenzie   
Monday, 26 July 2010 09:30
Many people find out at retirement that they have not enough money to live the lifestyle they are used to. There are too many people in this country that have no retirement benefits and will be living on social security benefits alone. For someone living on social security benefits their lifestyle will change dramatically and they will find that they may not have enough money to keep their home and retirement becomes a burden rather than a joy.
by GrahamMcKenzie


Many people find out at retirement that they have not enough money to live the lifestyle they are used to. There are too many people in this country that have no retirement benefits and will be living on social security benefits alone. For someone living on social security benefits their lifestyle will change dramatically and they will find that they may not have enough money to keep their home and retirement becomes a burden rather than a joy.

A life insurance policy means to most people a way to pay out to loved ones after death. A life insurance policy can be much more than death benefits, its can offer a retirement package that is tax free payments after you retire. You can fund these policies with stocks and bonds, certificates of deposit, mutual funds as well as cash you have saved in your bank account.

Having the security of death benefits for your family is very important but having peace of mind about your financial well being after retirement is a huge concern for most people. The life insurance policies can be created to offer payouts over a specified period of time or can be paid for your entire lifetime. The best feature of the policies is that you put in it what you want to invest in your future and the payments will not be considered taxable income.

Retirement benefits can be utilized in many ways with the life insurance policies. You can borrow from cash values or have a payment plan designed to meet your needs. In both instances there will be certain pros and cons.

Money that is accumulated in a life insurance retirement policy will be able to be withdrawn at retirement age without paying tax or taking any penalties. If you are using an IRA for retirement you can expect payments to be made to you but you will have that amount taxed as income. The tax free money is a huge advantage to the life insurance retirement policy.

If you are borrowing cash from the retirement policy as a method to avoid having to pay any taxes on the money you may be surprised that you could be hit with capital gains tax on any payments that aware in excess of the premium, this is for the lifetime of the policy so if you paid over for 40 years you can expect a huge penalty. If you are now 80 or 85 and are trying to just get by with paying estate taxes and pay the high cost of health care this tax could put you in the poor house and cause you to lose everything you own trying to pay it back.

Your agent may have shown you a wonderful retirement package that was based on the rate that you received when you purchased the policy. The rates are subject to change and this will affect your retirement policy as well, meaning rates go up you travel the Mediterranean after retirement, they go down you are living in a trailer eating TV dinners every night. But with the security of the standard retirement package comes taxable income and lower payments and the insurance policy offers higher payments and tax free benefits but the risk may be slightly higher on your money.

DISCLAIMER: This article is provided as information only and is not to be taken as financial advice.

Graham McKenzie is the content syndication coordinator a leading South African Life Insurance and Life Cover website.