But what if the finacial detour is more serious, such as with the death of a main breadwinner in the family?  Of course, the best way to protect against that is with the purchase of life insurance.  But what kind?  Keep in mind that there are two major types of life insurance: Permanent and Term.  Permanent Life Insurance (usually Whole Life or Universal Life) is designed for permanent or very long-term needs while Term Life Insurance is designed to protect you for temporary needs, such as mortgage or debt protection or supplemental coverage while you have dependent children for instance.  In other words, you buy Permanent Life Insurance  because you know you will use it in the future, but you buy Term Life Insurance in case you need it.  You're buying

Well it looks as of we are fully into the new season.  No, I’m not talking about spring or summer, but road construction.  Between Oakland and Cedar Rapids there are at least 4 or 5 separate construction zones closing a lane of traffic for several miles.  Sure, that is inconvenient, but road construction is necessary to maintain and keep our streets, highways and interstate highways in good condition.  They didn’t just build the interstate once and figure that it would last forever.  It must be maintained periodically – sometimes proactively, but sometimes it doesn’t occur until after the condition of the road has deteriorated significantly.  Life can be like that – things can be humming right along smoothly when all of a sudden, BAM, we hit road constr

I’ve got a question for you.  Do you like to eat?  Does your family like to eat?  Well, Duh!

Let me tell you about Bill.  Bill is a successful young man whose business has really started to take off.  He is experiencing growth virtually every month and as a consequence of that growth, he has taken his business to the next level and really expanded it.  Trouble is, expansion can get pretty expensive and he has had to borrow a fairly substantial amount of money.  This fact has him concerned that if something should happen to him, his wife (who has no involvement in the business) could end up getting stuck paying off that loan.

As the new year dawns, now is an appropriate time to be reminded that we all need to be prepared for the different things that life throws at us.  Certainly one way to do that is by transferring the risks that we all face to an insurance company(s).  And that is really all an insurance policy amounts to.  In exchange for a periodic payment of money, the insurance company agrees to step into your shoes and assume the risk that you are trying to avoid.  It doesn’t matter if that risk is from your house burning down or the risk that you will cause an automobile accident, the principle is the s

Of course all the talk these days centers around the stock market and the economy and everyone has an opinion on who's to blame, who has the best solution, what to do, what not to do, and so on and so forth.  The person who handles my investments sees a lot of similarities in the market and other situations today as during a certain period of time in the 1990's.  I only bring this up because history tends to repeat itself from time to time.