Life Insurance – What’s The Best Age To Lock In Long Term Life Insurance?

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

Life Insurance – What’s The Best Age To Lock In Long Term Life Insurance?

Tim: Now that makes me think something not really related to Divorce per se you’ve had mentioned you’re getting out the workforce in maybe in time.

What about folks kind of later in life 50, 60’s or 70’s retirement age retired? And I’m talking about my folks, specifically.

Jon: Okay.

Tim: My dad work for Union. He had some pensions with Union. Thank God! But he died of cancer.

My mom never worked. And is that a scenario where life insurance would have been beneficial or at that age is it more difficult to get that those types of insurance policies?

Or they cost prohibitive because it caught up my mom in a bad position because she has Social Security and a small pension.

Thankfully, there was at least that small pension that passed on to her. But —

Jon: Had there been insurance?

Tim: But had there been insurance policy to boot?

Jon: Right.

Tim: You know that’s something would get older to help protect their spouses. Is that–

Jon: At that point, it’s great if you can do it. And that’s what people at that age intended by life insurance for it for a State planning issues and all the cost associated with the State taxes.

And that’s other conversation for different expert here.

Tim: Sure.

Jon: So that’s what where we tend to see it. It is difficult for somebody as you start to get passed 55 or 60 it does starts to get fairly expensive because you can’t pay just $30 or $40 a month for a policy.

And they expect a million dollar path because when you’re that old, you’re getting closer to or like where the life companies expect you to not make anymore.

So it’s great if you can do it like maybe around 45 or so. And do something like maybe a 30 year policy.

Tim: Okay.

Jon: Then that way that will take you out into retirement. Then you can make the choice.

So let’s say now you’re 60 or 65 and when you look at your retirement fund and you look at your pension and you say, ‘If I did go is there enough?’

Because then you could stop. You don’t have to continue paying the life policy. But it gives you that choice.

And having that choice when you hit retirement is important because once you hit retirement you don’t really have a choice anymore.

So that’s how we tell people to get it and then we can re-evaluate. If you don’t need it anymore we either reduce it or pull it off.

It depends on the situation.

Tim: That’s good. Now kind of around 45 and try to lock in—

Jon: We should talk the terms.

Tim: Yes, I know we haven’t talked yet. I’ll just tell him I need a little weight to get the premium down a little bit.

Jon: There you go!

Tim: That’s my goal. And I can gain all the way back. That’s the plan. No!

Jon: I didn’t hear that.

California Divorce | Importance Of Changing Beneficiaries After Divorce

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

California Divorce | Importance Of Changing Beneficiaries After Divorce

Tim: Good. The beneficiaries and then we talked about a little bit on health or life specifically.

I don’t know if we touched on the importance of changing beneficiaries after the Divorce has finalized because we’ve all heard the whole stories not only with health life insurance but with…

Jon: Financial services and 401K’s and all those.

Tim: Yes, and investments where they are not changed. And is it going to your spouse?

And I’m sure that if you’re Divorce that wasn’t the intention. Because the important thing to know is, when it comes to you and let me know if this is correct or not.

When it comes to your Divorce judgment your Divorce Decree if you will, if you said, you’re keeping your life insurance policy or these investments, and you die and you haven’t changed your beneficiaries, that beneficiaries will over-way the ruling of the court.

Jon: That’s correct. So once the Divorce is final, that is the time when you are allowed to make the changes and it does makes sense to make the changes.

And then part of that though, one of the natural things to do is to go ahead and make changes on, when I’m going to make my kids as the beneficiary.

The problem with that is you have to be careful is no one is going to give a $100,000 policy to a six year old.

So you only have to worry about that. But the question is who handles that money during that time between until they become age 18?

And even once they become age 18, do you really want your child inheriting the $100,000 not inhering but getting a $100,000.

So this is where even when you separate, it’s the time to look at things like a state planning and things of that nature, so, that you can make sure that the policy benefits really are doled out way you want them to be doled out.

So it’s really a good time to kind of look at all your financial picture. Not just the insurance but the state planning. Look at things like 401K’s, look at things like your own retirement.

Tim: Yes.

Jon: What you’re going to do now? You can’t rely perhaps on your ex-husband’s pension.

Tim: Right.

Jon: What you’re going to do?

Tim: So it’s a really good time to take a step back and kind of put all your financial pieces in order.

083: Cost To Maintain Pre Divorce Lifestyle After Divorce Higher

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

In this episode, we’re going to talk about some of the financial concerns or some things you should be considering or looking forward at a Post Divorce or if you’re going to go through a Divorce things that are probably going to come up relatively soon.

When we file Divorce cases for folks, one of the main concerns of course is financial. The distribution of property and assets and debts is a huge portion of your Divorce.

Make sure to listen to the latest podcast to know more how to maintain pre divorce lifestyle.

How To Determine Life Insurance Needs After Divorce

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

How To Determine Life Insurance Needs After Divorce

Tim: So we had a big picture everything that should be looked at when going through Divorce.

We talked about term insurance for covering the spousal support. We talked term insurance for covering potentially the childrens college education or maybe paying off their student loan debt or–

Jon: Exactly.

Tim: What are other things would you throw in there?

If I were talking about insurance today and I was going through a Divorce. And I’ve been married for 19 years.

And two kids are still minors, what things would you say, ‘Tim, if you want to make sure that they’re taken care of aside from the college and the spousal support, what are the things would you throw in there?

Paying off the house maybe or –

Jon: Right, and really it will depend on the situation your spouse is in. But yes, anything like that when there’s a foreseeable expense in the future might be a really good thing to add into the life insurance.

There’s also retirement, if you think about it this way, now the expectation is you’re going to keep working.

And you’re going to keep building the retirement fund. So even though we might replace your income or your child support, that retirement fund doesn’t keep building anymore.

So one of the other things that you can do with life insurance is let’s say, ‘Gee, if something happened and I can’t build that retirement fund, you use the life insurance to build that retirement fund.’

So that’s it. That’s a bigger piece. I mean it can add up to a bigger number but it’s an important factor because I don’t think people think they think well, ‘Gee, I just want to puff my house.’

Well, that’s great when you puff your house, then what? How are you still going to meet your monthly expenses?

And how are you ultimately going to be able to take yourself on the work force?

Tim: Right.

Jon: So I think looking at more than just even the current expenses, it’s looking for the future. What other cost you may have or what other investments you want to make?

And to making sure that the life insurance is there to take the place if your income can’t.

082: Changes To Child Support Stipulations In California

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

In this episode, we’re talking about Stipulations. And specifically, drafting a child support Stipulation.

Stipulations briefly, I’ve talked about a lot. And we’ve done a lot of these.

But there have been some changes recently to what the courts are looking for as far as the language in the Stipulation. You can enter into a Stipulation at any point in your Divorce. It can be before the Divorce is finalized or it can be a post judgment after you’ve been Divorce.

Make sure to listen to the latest podcast to know more about the changes on child support stipulation.

California Divorce & Life Insurance Considerations

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

California Divorce & Life Insurance Considerations

Tim: Let’s talk life insurance. Alright! Now this is big. There’s a lot of moving parts to this.

Jon: Absolutely!

Tim: Right. This is probably going to be the most we’re going to have to talk about here. I mean some of this, there’s going to be an overlap but there are issues of support and potential that to protect people.

Jon: Right. So one of the key issues here, one of the things that people probably are thinking about is most likely those people have life insurance policies have named their spouses as the beneficiary.

Meaning that if there’s something happened to them their spouse will be the one to get the proceeds from the life policy.

Obviously, if you’ve gone through a Divorce and as you’re going through the Divorce, you may want to make this change immediately.

You might say, ‘I don’t want that person to be, well I’m going to pull them off my life policy.’

On California at least you’re not able to pull your spouse off as a beneficiary without their signature prior to Divorce.

Okay?

Tim: And I’ll add to that.

Jon: Okay.

Tim: When you file Divorce on the summons itself, there are what’s called the Automatic Restraining Orders. Automatic Temporary Restraining Orders are going to effect.

They’re called ATROS. And they are Restraining Orders to restrain you from certain actions.

And one of them is removing your spouse as a beneficiary off of any type of policy whether it’d be life, as a beneficiary changing even auto insurance policies, beneficiaries on investments, none of that can be done without signature, without their approval, and without their knowledge until the Divorce is absolutely finalized.

Jon: Right?

Tim: So—

Jon: And even when it is finalized because maybe there’s the Temporary Restraining Order by the time and the insurance companies themselves are going to look and see if it was a spouse, you send them a form, they’re going to ask you to either have the spouse’s signature on it or see that the Divorce has been finalized and a copy of the final Divorce paperwork…

Tim: Right.

Jon: …in order to justify it. So everybody is working on the same page.

Tim: To protect each other and make sure that people are doing things they shouldn’t be.

Jon: Right.

Tim: Yes.

081: Can I File For Divorce In California I Wasn’t Married In California

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

Today we’re talking about why it doesn’t matter where you were married for purposes of getting divorced.

When it comes to divorce, it’s basically a jurisdictional issue as far as California is concerned, if you’ve lived in the state for six months and in the county for three months, that is the court that you would file in.

So, if you live in Los Angeles County and you’ve been in the state for more than six months and the county for more than three, you would file your divorce in LA County.

Make sure to listen to the latest podcast.

Beneficiary Options For Children During Divorce – California Divorce

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

Beneficiary Options For Children During Divorce – California Divorce

Tim: As it pertains to life insurance and with having young children and making them the beneficiaries, going through a Divorce, what are some of the options folks have?

Can they assign other beneficiaries or how does that work and how does that ultimately get transfer?

Jon: Yes, so changing beneficiaries for some is very easy. And it’s usually one page form. You say, ‘Now I want my brother to be the beneficiary.’ and you sign it.

It’s that simple.

So what we usually encourage people to do is that they’re not going to go down the road of some sort of trust, is to name a family an adult family member who’d be the one that they would expect to handle their affairs when something happened to them.

And so that maybe, I mean it’s still be a parent depending on how old you are. It maybe a brother or sister or somebody or an extremely close friend but that’s your choice to make.

And the changing it like I said is very simple.

Tim: Simple!

Jon: And then if a year from now you know you’re going to fight with your brother and you don’t want him to be the one, you change it again.

There’s no cost to changing beneficiaries. And it’s done within like a week or two. So it’s a very simple process.

080: What Is Included In The Divorce Judgment

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

In this episode, we’re talking about child custody and parenting plans and the different ways you can go about determining that.

We handle a large volume of cases in California and I wanted to address this because it’s a big part of getting a divorce which is dealing with your children, if you have them obviously.

And that is what kind of parenting plan are you going to come up with after you’re divorced. What kind of parenting plan, who’s going to have custody, the visitation and do you even need a parenting plan. That’s what I’m going to talk about.

Make sure to listen to the latest podcast.

Process Of Divorce In Torrance, CA Torrance Divorce Paralegal

Posted by Tim Blankenship on

Process Of Divorce In Torrance, CA Torrance Divorce Paralegal

I want to explain the process of Divorce. What is the Divorce Process in Torrance California?

As you know there’s a Court House in Torrance that handles Divorce cases we service as a Paralegal Firm in the Torrance, California Court House as far as Divorces are concerned.

So I want to explain to you what is the Divorce process, what would we do for you if you hire us to help you with your Divorce in Torrance? What will that look like?

So first of all when you contract for services with us, we will take care of everything from start to finish.

All the forms, go down the Torrance Court House, file them, help with service with your spouse either by mail or personal whatever needs to happen, all the financial disclosures all the agreements from A to Z we’ll complete your case.

But initially the Divorce process looks like this, filling out that initial documents. One of you needs to decide who is going to be the petitioner.

Get and take it down all the completed documents after we get your signature. And take them down to Torrance, getting the case number issued and then that needing to be serve on your spouse.

Step two is pretty much financial disclosure stage. The court wants you guys to exchange information about how much you make, where you work, the bank account information, any assets and debts, cars, debts and credit cards and all that sort of things.

All that needs to be disclosed so you guys can figure out what’s going to be fair and equitable on the division of property.

Once you guys figured out what’s fair and equitable you guys let us know what’s that’s going to be. And we put that down in the appropriate court forms and submit what’s called your judgment.

Now keep in mind if you have trouble, if you’re unable to come to certain agreements it doesn’t mean you have to run out and hire an attorney.

There are other services such as Mediation that we can set you up with. Affordable mediation by the way and help someone sit down with you can come up with those agreements.

So you guys can come up with an agreements, we can put down in paper and it can be done without having the extra cost of hiring an attorney or having to litigate your case.

So that’s pretty much how the divorce process in Torrance works. But the initial steps just to get the initial documents completed.

We just need a few minutes on the phone with you. And you don’t have to come to our office.

We’ll get those signatures from you which can be fax to us and we’ll take them down to the court get then filed and that’s kind of have things start off with the Divorce Process in Torrance, California.

Please give us a call for free consultation. I’d love to help you out with your paperwork with your Divorce.