Summary: In our practice, there's often a discussion that develops around the idea of universal versus whole life insurance and we know this sacred battleground for many of our colleagues. Indeed people do have choices which as we all know can be a good thing and a bad thing all at the same time. Something that happens for us very often as we discuss with our prospective clients the idea or using life insurance as an asset, leveraging the cash value accumulation to create retirement income, et. al. is a certain degree of "analysis paralysis". I think most people are familiar with the concept but I'll clarify briefly. For us, it just means typically that people get a little hung-up on which type of policy is the right policy for them. And we are certainly not making light of the decision. Many times our clients are making a substantial financial commitment that will continue for some time well into the future. Not the sort of decision someone makes without a fair amount of consideration. We are well-versed in both universal life insurance and whole life insurance and we hold no allegiance to one or the other. When we have circumstance where one is the clear winner, we recommend that our client go with the option that works best for them. For us it's not often a universal versus whole insurance discussion as it is a which one makes the most financial sense for our client. Why It's not Universal Versus Whole Life Insurance? We deal with both products every day, so we are comfortable with either one. There's no fundamental bias from us toward either product. Ironically, it seems that often times when a person really would be better served by universal life insurance, they choose to use whole life insurance and vice versa. So along the way we hypothesized "Why not just do both?" You could certainly own a whole life policy and a universal life policy, we have clients who do own both and they certainly have their reasons for doing so. So, the idea of owning both seems to check of the "diversification" box that is so coveted in a world that has been infiltrated and brainwashed by modern portfolio theory. And it would seem better than getting bogged down in the universal versus whole life insurance minutiae. But there are times that diversification isn't the answer. And this is one of those times. There I go again saying things that will likely get me in trouble with the financial media overlords...oh well. Seriously--sometimes diversification just waters down your result. Sometimes it means a lack of focus will result in a mediocre returns when we put it in the context of the investment world. Don't overlook Scalability The issue at hand for you with life insurance is that there is a certain amount of scalability to these products. And so, when you don't split your money between two products you don't have to pay to fixed costs associated with owning a universal life insurance policy and a whole life insurance policy. There are times when more premium into the policy equals a higher yield on the cash that is received. In other words, there's a certain scale that exists which allows a higher rate of return on cash by paying a higher premium into one policy. The truth is that we (Brandon and Brantley) live in a world where we are trying to maximize and enhance certain efficiencies within the product for our clients. Which is why we don't spend much time debating such things as universal versus whole life insurance. There are some people within our industry that having many different policies is a great idea. We are not two of those people. Sometimes it is simply unavoidable, for people to have one or more different policies with different companies. Many times those policies were purchased at different periods of their life. Financial situations have a way of changing as we move through life. But from a diversification standpoint it just doesn't work out all that well.
