Post-Pandemic Life and Your Clients' Life Insurance Needs

I know I am not alone in thinking that since the start of the pandemic, time has lost all meaning.

What used to feel like an hour now sometimes feels like a day, and what used to take a month now happens in a minute.

However, like many others, I've come to realize that what matters is not how fast or slow something happens — but rather that we take a moment to assess where we are, what we're doing and where we want to go.

Shouldn't that be what life is all about?

In that spirit, there is no better time for financial advisors to help clients do the same.

Ultimately, when clients are able to assess where they are today and where they want to go tomorrow, especially in the wake of a pandemic, they can have thoughtful discussions about what they need to get there.

In many cases, what will best bridge that gap is having long-term financial security in-place.

Here are a few ways advisors can help clients stop and take stock of their goals, and how life insurance can be a part of that analysis.

Discuss what's changing.

While no one can predict what the future of COVID will look like, there is growing consensus that most people want to find a "new normal."

Every individual will have to define what that means for them and their family.

But, for advisors, this is a unique opening for them to help clients think about what the implications of those decisions could mean financially.

Consider the case of a client who has watched countless others partake in The Great Resignation, and is finally ready to go out on their own too.

Doing so might entail giving up their workplace-sponsored group life insurance coverage, as well as taking out a small business loan.

Should a client pass without their own individual life insurance coverage, let alone before the loan is paid back, advisors know that family members could face a significant financial burden.

On the other hand, an advisor might have a client who is looking to purchase a new home — after all, it is no secret the real estate market is booming.

Ultimately, whether it is a client that moved to the suburbs during the height of the pandemic and is ready for a return to city living or vice versa, new property often means a new mortgage.

Does the client have sufficient coverage in place to cover mortgage costs should the unthinkable happen?

Acknowledge what is (somewhat) staying the same.

For some, post-pandemic living might look very similar to life before March 2020.

Sure, we might mask up when headed indoors, but especially for clients with kids, a return to normalcy means a return to the status quo.

For these folks, this might mean that their financial situation or commitments will largely remain the same in our "new normal".

But, even still, circumstances and context have changed.

For clients with older children (or even for themselves), student loan payments, for example, were paused through May 1, 2022.

Some also moved their children into private schools — as many public schools experienced prolonged closures — introducing new expenses.

In other words, while clients priorities might have stayed the same, the ways in which they are funding those priorities could look and feel a bit different.

It's therefore incumbent that advisors talk to clients who might not have otherwise indicated an interest in a big life adjustment to make sure that, should the worst happen, their existing life insurance coverage is still sufficient to cover the evolving ways in which they are meeting their objectives.

We are all assessing what it means to live in a post-pandemic world.

Doing so is essential.

As we collectively go through this process, advisors who use this time to proactively reach out to clients to see how their priorities are or are not changing will be best positioned to help clients securely achieve what it is they most desire.

Wade Seward is head of distribution strategy at Haven Life.