How to Shop For a Life Insurance Policy

Hey, what's up everybody. Rob Gill, Epic Financial Strategies. You know, it's interesting. I'm always getting phone calls all the time. You know, people always wanna buy some kind of an insurance policy. They don't really know what they wanna buy, but they call up about purchasing. And today we're gonna talk about how to shop for a whole life policy. It's gonna be very interesting though, because there's a certain dynamic and a strategy that you wanna basically employ in order to be able to do this the right way so in the end you make the right decision. And I'm gonna bring on my partner, our lead elite underwriting specialist here in the office at Epic, DJ Wright, who over the last seven, eight years has really created a strategy and a formula on how to get through the process in an efficient manner. Hey, what's up everybody. Rob Gill, I got my partner DJ Wright. What's up man, how you doing? So DJ is in the house once again. And this is for all you folks out there that wanna shop around for a whole life policy, right? So the beautiful thing about this channel and the folks that are listening and for you out there that's listening is you're seeking education, you're seeking information. And you know all the insurance agents out there don't like the fact that we're giving up as much information as we're giving. But let's talk a little bit about whole life, right? So from a whole life perspective, you have the agent that is captive, which means that they buy or sell their product through one company or an independent like us at Epic, we are independent, we use a bunch of different carriers. So when you make an informed decision, it's really tied to your goals and objectives and sits and fits with your core values as well as what your investment philosophy is. Let's take that back and rewind it back or let's take it and rewind it back. Basically, very simply, it's important to understand that it's very difficult to know what your whole life policy is going to look like until you take the first couple of action steps. And those action steps are typically the application and the medical, correct? Correct. And what does that look like for these folks out there? So the application and medical process. So initially, you're going to give your information to an agent that you connect with in order to obtain your whole life insurance policy. And then you're also going to take a medical. The medical takes five to 10 minutes and it's a blood and urine. And what that'll do is that will give them a medical snapshot that they can compare to obtain a bona fide rating for you. So DJ, let me ask you a question because for the folks that are out there right now, they could be saying to themselves, hey, wait, does that mean I have to buy the policy if I get a medical done? No. No, that doesn't. It's non-binding. That just gives you the opportunity to obtain a rating from the carrier. And at that point, you can determine how you want to structure the policy. But what that will do is it will give you a real offer in writing versus a quote online, which is fictitious. Well, not only that, but the quote you're referring to will be a term quote. But let's go back and I'm going to tell you what I've seen in the past. I'll have a client that will send me a proposed illustration that they were given by an agent. By the way, this illustration they were given wasn't the real one that they were going to be rated on once they got their medical. It was just a super preferred rating for somebody that may have been standard. So now all of a sudden, you out there could have an illustration without getting a medical and it's not true. It's only true until you get a medical and have an offer in writing. So for us here at Epic, we don't just look at one company. We look at, without mentioning names, multiple companies. And then we compare and contrast. And can you get a little bit into that? Because certain companies give different ratings than other companies. Has that been your experience? So certain carriers underwrite differently. So a risk to one carrier may not be a risk to the other. Dig deep into that so they understand what that means. What that means is that you may get a preferred rating. A carrier may rate you more favorably based off your health, your risk factors, than another carrier would. The good thing that we do here at Epic is we utilize a number of carriers, A, so that we can get you a rating if there's a challenge with any of the other carriers, but B, also that we can utilize, if you get a preferred rating, as leverage to the other carriers to say, look, we have a preferred rating here. There's just a small health challenge. The prospect is changing and changing their diet and they stop, or they've stopped smoking, something of that nature. And we're able to leverage and get you a rating that you would otherwise not get. It's all within the guidelines. When everything is proper with credits, there's no, it's not a, we're gonna get you something different because we know somebody. It's because we stay within the guidelines. And for the folks out there, we'll have clients that come through the door that buy policies from multiple carriers because that's sitting and fitting with what they want or you as a strategy overall. So we're not just gonna use one carrier. Time to time, we'll use multiple carriers. But in the end, we wanna focus on rating and what's the best possible strategy that ties for with the client. Is there anything else? Because this is, we're staying in the space of shopping for a whole life policy. I guess the most efficient way to do it is if you're not talking to us and you're talking to another agent, make sure they know that you know that it's not binding. And that you're just, if they're willing to take that risk with you, that's what it should look like. Is there anything else that you should? I would also provide as much as you could to the agent who you're working with for the quote. That way they can have a better understanding of where you're at from a health perspective. Obviously, we don't work in the field of quotes because we determine them fictitious. But if you're giving the agent a more realistic picture of how you are medically, they can give you a more realistic rating instead of just throwing out a preferred, not taking into consideration anything that you have going on. And for you out there, you're protected under HIPAA and the agent, so feel very comfortable in having that one-on-one conversation. If there's concern that, hey, listen, the agent is cousins with my best friend, those are real concerns. So just keep in mind everything that's at play. But being able to get a medical done, to shop around is not something that you can't do. You can do it. And that's when you're gonna be able to get your best possible information so you can make an informed decision. So DJ, quick question. There are certain times when we have conversations with folks and it feels like, based on their medical history, that they may not get approved. Can you talk a little bit about, for the folks that are out there right now that may not wanna get a medical but get a true understanding of what they look like, what do we do in that situation? So in that situation, what we would do is an informal inquiry. What is that called? An informal inquiry. And what we're gonna do is we're gonna take all your information, we're gonna provide it to a carrier, and it's an application, but in the event that you're declined or anything of that nature, it would not be reported to the MIB, which is the Medical Insurance Bureau. Why is that important if you get a decline? Why should they know that? So the decline would be reported to the Medical Insurance Bureau, the MIB, and at that point, that would be on your record going forward. So if you applied for two years, if you applied for insurance within that two-year period, they would see that decline. The informal inquiry alleviates that you don't have to worry about getting a formal decline. So just to clarify and verify, I wanna make sure that I understand this, for you out there, if you do an informal inquiry and there is an opinion that you might not get approved, it doesn't show up anywhere. For anyone else out there that if you ever apply for life insurance and there is a decline, it stays in the system for two years before you can go back in again, if your health changes, just so you have that information. You know, every day, Epic Financial Strategies, we're dropping content, we're providing education at all times. Go ahead and hit that subscribe button below. So when we drop new information, you get that little ding and you can hear us and feel free to add comments. And if you have any questions in the comments section, we will do a video on that comment.