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Archive for February, 2010

It’s always better to start article with good news. This sets a positive tone to the piece and keeps people reading. So, let’s start with good news. The premiums for life insurance have been dropping! Yes, you can believe your eyes. It may not feel like it, but there has never been a cheaper time to buy a life policy. How come? Well, unlike other forms of insurance, the policy only pays out in the future when the life insured ends. If you go back to 1980, men lived to an average of 70 years, women to 77 years. In the latest figures released by the Center for Communicable Diseases, men now live to an average of 75.6, with women now into the 80s at 80.8 years. As an aside, the poor quality of the US healthcare service is highlighted by the life expectancy figures. The US ranks only 38th in the world. That said, since the obligation of having to pay out on a life policy is disappearing into the future, the cost of the benefits payable can be collected over more years. This makes premiums fall. Read the rest of this entry »

As someone looking around for a house to buy, the cost of insurance is not always the most important thought on your mind. Even if you do think about it, the most common consideration is the state of repair and how easy it would be to repair or rebuild should there be a fire. This calm confidence tends to continue when buying the insurance policy. You sign up for an all-perils policy and take the words at face value. If you are insured against all perils, that surely means you can sleep peacefully at night. Except that confidence is too often misplaced. Looking around the US right now, it’s one of the coldest winters on record with heavier snow fall than usual. When the weather warms, the melting snow will flood into the rivers. . . That’s a joy to come. So let’s list the most common events that damage your home: landslides, subsidence, floods, hurricanes and tornadoes. Live in the wrong states and we add earthquakes. Now take out your policy and check that exclusion clause. You will see magic phrases like “surface water”. That excludes every possible source of water no matter whether it comes in as a high tide, wind surge, rain or local sewage drains backing up. When you add up everything not included, even the top-of-the-range policies from the supposedly best insurers often end up as covering rebuilding costs from fire and wind only – that’s wind and not tornadoes or hurricanes. Read the rest of this entry »

In most states, car insurance rates are likely to go up for at least 3 years if you are convicted of drunk-driving. You will also become familiar with SR-22.

Different states use different terms for drunk driving: driving under the influence, driving while intoxicated or operating a vehicle while intoxicated. If convicted of any such offense, your insurance rate is likely to go up before you can drive again.

If convicted of impaired driving in any US state, your driver privileges will be suspended for between 30 days and a year. Read the rest of this entry »