First, I have two real stories about a family with life insurance and a family without life insurance. The two families' outcomes are totally different after the primary breadwinner died.
The first story is about a family when the husband died in his 40s suddenly from a heart attack. Because he had purchased several million dollar of life insurance, his family did not suffer financially, they were able to keep the house and two children went to private universities, one went to Georgetown and the other went to University Chicago.
The second family suffered quite a bit when the husband died in his 50s from a stroke since the husband did not buy additional life insurance on top of his workplace's life insurance which usually is offered free for the coverage of his annual salary. The family needs to sell the house, the third child was still in college, but he had to temporarily stop his study. The wife has a hobby of collecting Barbie dolls and she had to sell her collection to raise money.
These two stories are telling us that life insurance is important in protecting our families. A life insurance policy should serve one purpose and one purpose only which is to protect our families in the event we meet our maker. The term life insurance serves this purpose. It should not be used as a vehicle to make or save money. That said, any life insurance products with some additional features, like whole life, universal life or hybrid of life insurance are designed for selling which favor the insurance companies and their agents. These products cost significantly more than the term life and you don't need to have a life insurance policy for covering the rest of your life.
There are some people who buy a life insurance policy through their companies, but these life insurance policies are enforced as long as you work for the company. Once you leave the company, the policy is automatically stopped. I would suggest you to buy a term life insurance policy through an outside, reputable, and triple A rated insurance company. You want the insurance company to be around when you need to cash in your policy. Plus, the premium paid through your company's insurance is higher than the ones charged by the outside insurance companies.
To protect your family, you have to buy enough to cover your mortgage, your family living expense and your children's education. How to determine the coverage amount? Some use 7 to 10 times of annual income. I use the following list to calculate the amount:
70% Annual salary + Mortgage + (No. of Children * $300k)
Your income replacement: 70% of annual income with 4% withdrawal rule. If your annual income is $100k, then 70% of it is $70k which needs $1.75M asset to generate.
Mortgage is $300k
Two children's private university education cost is 2 * $300k = $600k
$1.75M + $300k + $600k = $2.65M
You can check https://www.selectquote.com/ website to get more information about life insurance policies and premiums.
