When you are putting together your financial planning portfolio, one of the most boring aspects of it is life insurance. You’ve been told a hundred times that you should have life insurance, but what kind of life insurance should you buy?

If you discuss this issue with the majority of insurance agents, they will probably tell you to get the whole life insurance-you know, the one that costs more monthly but builds up cash value over several years as you keep putting money into it.

On the other hand, the majority of non-insurance agents will tell you to go with term life insurance-the one with the much lower monthly payment that only pays out when the policy holder dies.

I am in the camp of those recommending term life insurance, and here are 3 reasons why:

1. Term insurance does what life insurance is meant to do

Term life insurance generally provides a death benefit and does not accumulate cash value. Some people believe that it is more cost effective to get a term life policy and put the extra money that whole life would cost into a separate investment. Their slogan is “buy term and invest the rest”. That is over simplifying the subject. For example, invest in what? And how exactly does a particular whole life policy’s features compare to a term plus investment plan? The truth is that there is no single insurance product that is always best for every person and situation.

As a Houston insurance agent my suggestion is to compare whole and term products if you want life insurance. A good agent should be able to show you rates, and discuss the features and benefits, of different policies. My belief is that my job is to show customers what is available and present options (not to try and sell a customer on any particular product).

Some situations that could favor a term policy include:

When you first learn about cheap term life insurance and what you can get for the amount of money you are paying I am sure that you wanted to get some more information about the different companies offering it as well as the details of such policies. You will probably then start to search the internet as this has a large amount of information contained to get everything started.

You’ve filled out numerous online applications for cheap term life insurance but as the quotes start to come back you’re realizing that term life insurance isn’t really all that cheap, you will find that some of the details will be presented to you whilst some wont until you will be applying for the policy. You may also find that some sites do take their time in getting back to you.