Episode 23 – The Basic Rules of Purchasing Insurance: What, Why, When and How Much!

Welcome back to The Rational Reminder Podcast. Today we are joined by Glenn Cooke. Glenn is a fixture on the personal finance Canada sub-Reddit and spent many years as the President of Lifeinsurancecanada.com, which is an online platform for insurance information. Today, Glenn is the President of Insurance Squared where he works with market research departments at life insurance companies and shows life insurance agents how to generate leads online and sell non-face to face.

Glenn has a very matter of fact, rational approach to insurance and that’s what we talk to him about in today’s episode. He shares with us about the mistakes he commonly sees in insurance, especially the fact that most people way under buy the amount of life insurance that they truly need. Glenn also describes permanent insurance, what it is, when it makes sense and what situations it is best suited for. We hear about when it’s important to use investments versus not and as long as consumers stick to those basic rules, it’s hard to go astray. So for an incredible interview, keep listening to hear more!

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Key Points From This Episode:

• Over the phone and online – why that approach worked so well for Glen. [0:02:24.0]
• Understanding field underwriting. [0:03:17.0]
• Why some people are hesitant buying insurance online and prefer in person. [0:06:27.0]
• Most common questions people are asking when buying insurance. [0:07:27.0]
• Mistakes people are making when buying life insurance. [0:07:56.0]
• Justifying how much you need. [0:09:31.0]
• How disability insurance ties in very closely to life insurance. [0:10:34.0]
• Settling for group disability insurance through your employer. [0:13:23.0]
• What is permanent life insurance and where would it make sense. [0:15:25.0]
• Two general categories of permanent insurance. [0:19:30.0]
• Glen’s views on critical illness insurance. [0:21:21.0]
• Three ways you can use life insurance. [0:25:46.0]
• Ways you can get money out of your insurance policy. [0:28:08.0]
• Glen’s observation about financial literary in Canada. [0:32:05.0]
• And much more!

Tweetables:

“The amount of insurance that people buy is almost never enough.” –  Glenn Cooke  [0:08:02.1]

“Head towards the guaranteed version. If you are just looking for the cheapest way to get life insurance when you die, you want level premiums, everything fully guaranteed.”– Glenn Cooke  [0:20:27.1]

Links From Today’s Episode:

Rational Reminder on iTunes — https://itunes.apple.com/ca/podcast/the-rational-reminder-podcast/id1426530582.

Benjamin on Twitter — https://twitter.com/benjaminwfelix

Benjamin on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/benjaminwfelix/

Cameron on Twitter — https://twitter.com/CameronPassmore

Cameron on LinkedIn — https://www.linkedin.com/in/cameronpassmore/

Reddit — https://www.reddit.com/r/PersonalFinanceCanada/

Glenn Cooke — https://www.linkedin.com/in/glenn-cooke-5320485/

LifeInsuranceCanada — https://www.lifeinsurancecanada.com/

Insurance Squared — http://www.insurancesquared.com/

Manulife — https://www.manulife.ca/personal.html

Download the transcript of this episode: The Rational Reminder Episode 23 – Transcript