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Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Life Insurance VS A Retirement Policy

By Graham McKenzie

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.

When you hear about a life insurance policy you automatically assume it is only to be used for death benefits. The fact is that many life insurance policy pay out retirement benefits that are tax free. You can find the policy with mutual funds, stocks or bonds, and even with cash from your bank account.

It is important to have a policy that pays your loved ones in the event of your death, but what about while you are living? The benefit to the life insurance policies that offer retirement packages is that you are able to receive payments from the policy that will not be counted as income from the government. The policies are designed to pay an income for a certain time frame or they can be customized to pay you until you pass away.

The benefits packages can be treated different ways. Borrowing cash from the policy or having annual payments made are two of the most common methods and both have their ups and downs.

Money that is accumulated in the policy that offers retirement benefits is available for you or withdraw without suffering any penalties or taxes. A standard retirement package such as IRA benefits allows you to withdraw the money to but you suffer penalties for early withdraw as well as income tax on all finds you receive from the account. The insurance policy making payments to you that are tax free after you retire is a huge advantage it has over the standard retirement benefit package.

Some people use borrowing money from their retirement policy as a way to avoid income taxes but this can create big problems later down the road. If the cash amount borrowed reaches the policy amount then the policy holder is hit with capital gains tax on all amounts paid in excess of the premiums, this can be a hard thing to recover from for someone who has been paying in to the policy for 40+ years. At your retirement age you are struggling to pay for estate tax and cover the costs of your health care, a huge tax bill could cause you to lose everything you own.

You may have been shown a great retirement package from the agent you bought the policy from and then find out when you retire it is less than what it should have been. The rates change and if you had a great rate at the time of purchase and they have since fell you will not have the benefits you once though. With a standard retirement package you may be able to have more security in knowing what your benefits will be but they will be taxable and you have less chance to increase them over time. With the insurance policy you can add as much cash to your policy as you wish and you will never be taxed on your payments after retirement but you do have a slightly larger risk involved with your money. - 23211

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