Why We Don’t Lead With Life Insurance
Every September, our industry spends a month telling people to buy life insurance.
Life Insurance Awareness Month exists for a good reason. Millions of American households own no coverage, and a death in one of those families becomes a financial catastrophe layered on top of a personal one. The campaign does useful work.
It is simply not aimed at the families we serve.
The families and business owners we work with rarely have a coverage gap in that sense. Many of them already own several policies, bought at different times, from different advisors, for different reasons. Their real question is whether any of it still fits the plan it was meant to serve.
A policy sized to a premium the client could comfortably carry rather than to what the obligation actually required. A death benefit built against a balance sheet the family has since outgrown. Coverage accumulated over decades from advisors who never spoke to each other, none of whom ever asked what the whole of it is now doing.
So, we spend September the way we spend the rest of the year. We open with the problem, and we arrive at the instrument only after we understand what it is being asked to do.
In this month’s blog, we explore the four questions we work through before any product enters the conversation, when coverage should be built as a bridge across a defined risk rather than a permanent monument, and five questions worth asking before anyone shows you an illustration.
At C3 Financial Partners, we help families and their advisors bring clarity to what the obligation actually is, confidence that the recommended solution is better than the alternatives, and coordination with the legal, tax, and investment advisors who need to see the analysis before anyone commits.
Life insurance is one of the most powerful tools available in that work. It is rarely the place to begin.
IRS Applicable Federal Rate Update
The latest AFR rates have been released. This month, each of the short-term, mid-term, and the long-term rates increased. To see the updated rates, head to the link below.
And please note – you can access the link on our homepage to check current and historic AFR rates at any time!
See the AFR Report
From the Founder: Insights That Matter
Welcome back to From the Founder.
Todd Healy, Founder of C3 Financial Partners, brings over four decades of experience in guiding families and business owners through the complexities of wealth preservation and legacy planning. His reflections offer clarity, confidence, and coordination. These are the core principles that define our approach. Here’s what Todd has been thinking about lately:
The first meeting I have with a family almost always starts with the same question. What are you afraid will happen?
The answers rarely have anything to do with insurance.
A business owner is afraid his daughter will be forced to sell the company to pay a tax bill she never knew was coming. A father is afraid the child who came into the business and the child who did not will stop speaking to each other after he is gone. A woman is afraid her husband will have no idea what to do with any of it.
Those are the real problems. They have shapes. They have sizes. They have specific dates when they are likely to come due.
Once I understand the shape of what a family is actually afraid of, the work of choosing among the tools can at least begin honestly. It is rarely quick. But it is aimed at something real.
Everything else we do begins there.
— Todd Healy
Founder, C3 Financial Partners
You can follow Todd’s ongoing reflections and planning insights on LinkedIn here.
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Securities and advisory services are offered only to individuals in jurisdictions where Valmark Securities, Inc. and Valmark Advisers, Inc., and their representatives, are properly licensed. These firms are not registered in any foreign jurisdiction and do not offer services outside the United States.
Securities offered through Valmark Securities, Inc., member FINRA, SIPC. Investment Advisory Services offered through Valmark Advisers, Inc. a Registered Investment Advisor, 130 Springside Drive, Suite 300, Akron, Ohio 44333-2431, 1.800.765.5201. C3 Financial Partners, LLC is a separate entity from Valmark Securities, Inc. and Valmark Advisers, Inc.
