By Jesse Hightower, CFP® (National Producer Number 832591), a licensed life
insurance professional at Eterm.com & CIGI Direct Insurance Services - licensed in all 50 states
and helping people get covered since 1986.
Last reviewed: August 10, 2026
Life insurance should not be something you buy once and forget about for the next 20 or 30 years. Your need for coverage changes as your family, income, debts, career, health, and retirement plans change. A good rule of thumb: review your life insurance whenever there is a major change in your financial life - and every few years even when there is not.
One of the most obvious times to review your coverage is marriage. Once another person depends on your income or financial support, life insurance becomes much more important.
The same is true when you have children. Each time you have a child, your coverage should be reviewed, because your financial responsibilities have increased. You may now need to provide income for many more years, pay for childcare and education, and make sure the surviving parent has enough financial flexibility to care for the family.
A mortgage can become a significant burden for a surviving spouse or family if one income suddenly disappears. Your life insurance should be sufficient to help your family remain in the home and continue meeting their financial obligations.
A promotion, career advancement, or substantial raise usually means your family's lifestyle and long-term financial expectations have grown as well. A policy purchased when you were earning $60,000 a year may no longer be adequate when you are earning $150,000 or $200,000.
A job change is one of the most frequently overlooked reasons to review your coverage. Many people receive some life insurance through their employer and assume it will always be there. It may not be. Group life insurance can be reduced or lost completely when you change employers, become disabled, retire, or leave the workforce.
Open enrollment is a great time to take stock. Employer-paid group life insurance is usually a valuable benefit, and in most situations it makes sense to take whatever coverage your employer provides at little or no cost. But take a closer look at any optional group coverage you are paying for yourself.
Group life insurance is priced across a large pool of employees and usually requires little or no individual medical underwriting. That is an excellent deal for someone with significant health problems, because their individual health has less impact on the rate. The flip side is that healthy employees effectively subsidize the cost of covering employees in poorer health. Because group rates do not fully reflect each person's health, someone who is young and healthy can often buy individually underwritten life insurance for less than they are paying for optional group coverage - it is worth getting a quote before you check the box.
There is another major advantage to owning an individual policy: you control it. An individually owned policy is portable - you own it, not your employer. Changing jobs, losing your benefits, or retiring does not cost you the coverage as long as you keep paying the premium. This matters more and more as you get older. Someone who relies entirely on employer coverage can eventually develop a health condition and then discover that replacing that coverage privately is either extremely expensive or no longer possible.
Your coverage should also be reviewed whenever there is a significant improvement in your health or insurability. If you have stopped smoking, lost substantial weight, improved your blood pressure or diabetes control, or otherwise significantly improved your health, you may qualify for a better rate than you did when your existing policy was issued. (If you do apply for new coverage, keep the old policy in force until the new one is issued.)
Starting or buying a business, taking on business loans, purchasing additional real estate, receiving an inheritance, or experiencing a major change in your net worth can all justify another look at your life insurance.
Later in life, the reasons for owning life insurance often begin to change. As children become financially independent and mortgages are paid down, the need for a very large death benefit may decrease. But that does not necessarily mean the need for life insurance disappears.
In fact, retirement is one of the most common - and most overlooked - times to review life insurance. Many people lose some or all of their employer-provided group coverage when they retire. At the same time, they may no longer need the amount of coverage they needed while working and raising children. The question changes from "How much life insurance do I need to replace my income?" to "What do I still need life insurance to accomplish?"
That may include:
Retirement can therefore be an appropriate time to consider shifting some of your life insurance protection toward long-term-care planning. Instead of maintaining a very large death benefit, some people are better served by a smaller permanent policy that can provide benefits during their lifetime if they need qualifying long-term care. Depending on the policy, benefits may help pay for home care, assisted living, or nursing care, while any remaining benefit still passes to beneficiaries at death. This allows the purpose of the insurance to evolve along with your needs.
Marriage, children, buying a home, increasing income, changing jobs, losing employer benefits, improvements in health, starting a business, approaching retirement, and planning for long-term care are all good reasons to review your coverage. And even if nothing dramatic has changed, it is still wise to review your life insurance periodically. A policy that was appropriate 10 or 15 years ago may no longer be the best solution today.
The goal is not simply to own life insurance. The goal is to make sure the coverage you own continues to protect the people you care about and accomplish the financial goals you intended it to accomplish. If you would like a second set of eyes on your current coverage, our licensed professionals are glad to help - call (888) 823-8376 or send us a request.
Review your life insurance whenever there is a major change in your financial life - marriage, a child, a new home, a significant raise, a job change, or retirement - and at least every few years even if nothing dramatic has happened. A policy that was right 10 or 15 years ago may not be the best solution today.
Usually not on its own. Employer group coverage is often limited to one or two times your salary, and you can lose it when you change jobs, become disabled, or retire - frequently at the exact age when replacing it is expensive or impossible. Take the free coverage your employer provides, but treat an individually owned policy as the foundation.
Compare first. Group rates are averaged across all employees and usually involve little medical underwriting, which is a great deal if you have significant health problems - but it means healthy employees often pay more than they would for an individually underwritten policy. Get a quote before you check the box.
Often, yes. If you have quit smoking, lost substantial weight, or improved your blood pressure or diabetes control, you may qualify for a better rate class than when your policy was issued. It is worth getting a fresh quote - you can apply for new coverage and keep the old policy until the new one is in force.
It depends on what you still need it to accomplish. Income replacement may no longer be the goal, but providing for a surviving spouse, covering final expenses, replacing lost pension or Social Security income, leaving an inheritance, or helping with long-term care costs often are. Retirement is a time to reassess the purpose of your coverage, not automatically to drop it.
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