Life Insurance and Living Benefits

Once upon a time, a million dollars was a large sum of money. If you had it, you were a millionaire, and everyone was jealous. Today the question is often asked: “if you won a million dollars, would you quit work?” Well the answer depends on several factors like your age, your need for money, and even your health. To answer the question how long would one million dollars last, let’s look at it this way: How long will $1,000,000 produce an income for you before it runs out? Let’s say you needed to take $60,000 as an annual income to spend. Let’s also say that you wanted to increase that $60,000 by 2% per year just to keep up to inflation. To run the numbers, we would assume you wanted to invest your $1,000,000 in a relatively secure place. The rate of interest would be around 1.5% if you wanted a guaranteed return, or maybe a 5% return if you wanted to assume some risk. For argument sake, let’s give you 3.5% over time, and income tax at about 25%. With the above parameters, you...

A fact of life is that people do get sick.   While disability insurance is a financial product used to replace an income for a working spouse, a non-employed or stay at home mom or dad does not qualify for disability income protection. This is when a Critical Illness policy can add value.  Aside from medical expenses, child care expenses or medical related travel costs, the working spouse often suffers an income loss when their spouse suffers an illness. Critical Illness coverage can provide a tax-free lump sum payment to help the family financially, and premiums are more affordable than one might think. For example, a non-smoking 30 year-old stay at home mom or dad can purchase a $100,000 policy covering over 25 illnesses for about $30 per month. In comparison, Halifax Metro Transit charges $78 per month for a bus pass, and cable TV and internet cost over $150 per month for a basic plan. A Critical Illness policy offers peace of mind, so you can recover with fa...

If your site and its posts are not easily scannable, you run the risk of losing your reader to another blog. 1. Jot it Down Similarly to Glen I tend to jot down a lot of ideas in my ‘Dream Notes’. I use a Moleskine notebook and Text Files on my desktop (it’s a little chaotic). In my notes I have hundreds of post ideas, half-finished thoughts, ideas for series of posts, possible case studies etc. A lot of it wouldn’t make sense to anyone else but it’s where many good ideas emerge from. 2. Review it Periodically I get my musings and dream notes out to see what might emerge from them. Sometimes I directly take an idea and develop it from the notes I’ve taken (many of my list posts come almost directly from my dream notes which I’ve written down as a list of headings.) 3. Mashup What I especially like about this chaotic little collection of ideas are the points of intersection between ideas. Often an idea by itself is weak; but when I combine it with something else I’ve ...

Good bloggers keep this in mind as they write and will employ a variety of techniques to make their posts visually appealing to read. Some of these techniques include: Lists – Anecdotal evidence here at ProBlogger suggests that posts with bullet point lists in them get linked to ALOT more than similar length posts written in an essay style. Formatting – Use bold, CAPITALS, italics, underlining and teletext to emphasize points. Don’t go overboard as you run the risk of frustrating your reader. Also consider changing font size, color and style to draw your readers eyes to your main points. Headings and Sub Headings – Large, Bold words that act as visual cues of what is happening in the content are effective ways of drawing readers further into articles. Pictures – Research shows that readers eyes are drawn down the page by pictures. Place them cleverly by your key points (especially when they closely relate to the content) and will you have more of a chance of gettin...

W hen we were kids, it was O.K. to be sick. You got to stay home, you were fed ice cream and Popsicle's and the best thing was, you didn't have to go to school. Now the meaning of being sick has changed, now that we are grown-ups we don’t want to be sick. Being ill for the most part scares many people, especially when it comes to long term illnesses. Long term can be defined as the inability to do your job for 90 days or more. According to disability insurance carriers in Canada; if an individual is sick or hurt enough to be out for 90 days, statistics show that you will remain off work for 2-3 year depending on your age at the start of the disability. Protecting one’s self in the event of a disability is a basic financial strategy, yet financial planners often hear the expression “I’m insurance poor”, “I can’t afford the premiums”, or “It’s too expensive”. This is not a new adage either. Found in my desk drawer I keep a booklet first printed in 1920. The client object...