Want_vs_NeedsLife Insurance is definitely not something that people want to buy. There is something about pondering one’s mortality that turns people away, and rightly so. After all, who wants to talk about dying? Not a fun subject in anyone’s book. As Insurance Advisors, we have a knack of clearing rooms when the infamous question comes up…What do you do for a living? If we say we sell Life Insurance, the conversation can be real short, and often is.

But let’s face it, what we do is so powerful and few people can truly state that what they do changes lives. But we do! When I first started in the business, I was told that I would never understand the power of what we do until I delivered my first death claim check. There is no statement more true until you have done so. So let’s talk about WANT v. NEED. People (all of our clients and prospects), want certain things. They want…

  • Their families to be safe
  • To have enough money to not struggle
  • To be successful in their careers
  • To provide for their families so they can enjoy life

Sometimes the WANTS are materialistic in nature. New Cars, Big Houses, Large Screen TV’s, the latest Smartphone, Video Games, etc. are often on the list. These things fall under the category of their families enjoying life, and there is nothing wrong with that.

But if we step back a moment and think about the dreaded WHAT IF Scenario, will all these things be there ? What if the major breadwinner of a family dies early before they were able to provide all of these things? What happens to the families? Will they have enough money to not struggle, can they go on and enjoy life? The truth is, the average family doesn’t really have the means to continue on financially since they rely so heavily on that major breadwinner to maintain all of the things that are often taken for granted.

A few years ago when Hurricane Sandy struck, I think we were all reminded of the ”things” that we all took for granted like the ability to walk into a room, flick on a light switch and go about our everyday lives. For some of us, that simple pleasure was gone for a couple of weeks.

Using Sandy as the barometer for life’s disruption, let’s go a few steps further and think for a moment of that major breadwinner suddenly being out of the picture and the WANTS now being in jeopardy. Now let’s assume that there was little or no life insurance in place. What happens next? I’m sure we can all agree that the lives of the survivors would be turned upside down to say the least. All of the WANTS listed above can be gone in a blink of an eye when it could have been easily avoided.

Now, let’s shift to NEED. In our scenario above, a means was needed to secure all of the WANTS. Life Insurance could have maintained the integrity of the WANTS. The Financial Security Blanket provided by the Life Insurance can help that family go on and achieve the WANTS in life. We all know that money can never replace the emotional loss, but we live in a world that Financial Security is key to moving forward and allowing us to pursue our WANTS and DREAMS. Whether it’s Income Replacement, Mortgage Protection, College Funding, etc., we all need to take a step back and realize that what we do is so powerful and truly change lives.

WANT v. NEED. It is a Harsh Reality, but in order to protect the WANTS, we NEED to have Life Insurance.

I apologize for the lecture but September is Life Insurance Awareness Month and in the spirit of that, it’s always good to take a step back, put things into perspective and reiterate how important we are as an industry and by the stroke of a pen, we have the power to change lives.