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Financially Savvy African-Americans Building Wealth with Life Insurance

life insuranceBy Bekitembe Eric Taylor

When most people think about death, they often immediately equate it with despair. However, Marcal Graham, 39, thought it was just common sense to be prepared.

“When we had our first daughter in 1999,” he said, “the first thing I did was get life insurance so that my family wouldn’t have to worry about anything if something were to happen to me.”

Within nine years, Graham, a financial services rep, and his wife welcomed their second child, and purchased an amended policy privately and one through his employer that are worth nearly $600,000.

“Working in financial services, you see regular white people come in all the time working a 9 to 5, and the want to cash in a $60,000 policy to invest in their future while they continue working,” said the Douglasville, Georgia, resident. “Life insurance is just one way to make sure that your family can live debt-free and better off when your time comes.”

According to www.worldlifeexpectancy.com, the average life expectancy for all American citizens is 79 years old, but it’s 74 for African-Americans. Black women, the site revealed, will live as long as 81 years old in Massachusetts while Black men may not live beyond, on average, age 66 in Washington, D.C. While heart disease is the No. 1 killer within the Black community, in lower-income communities of Louisiana, homicide is the leading cause of death.

Robert Thornton, an independent insurance sales rep in southwest Atlanta, believes that these staggering statistics make it easier for African-Americans to purchase health insurance than life insurance, especially since the former is now required by law. “People purchase health insurance just like car insurance because it’s the law,” he said. “Life insurance is something that they will typically purchase once there is an illness or other life-changing condition present.”

Graham, whose father-in-law died in October from a long illness, said that his wife’s father paid into his policy until the day he passed away. “No matter how tight things got toward the end, he made sure that his wife and his daughter wouldn’t have to want for anything,” he said. “Most Black people I know aren’t really taught the value of investing in their futures this way.”

On the low end, average funeral costs can range from $8,000 to $10,000, depending on the funeral home and any special arrangements that the family requests. Graham said that his uncle in south Georgia often sees families who have to scrape together whatever funds they have to bury their departed loved one because there was not enough disposable income to purchase life insurance.

A 2013 study conducted by LIMRA, an insurance marketing and research consortium, stated that while 85 percent of Americans realize the need to purchase life insurance, only 62 percent of all Americans actually have it. The study also said that “44 percent of U.S. households had individual life insurance as of 2010 — a 50-year low. In 1960, 72 percent of Americans owned individual life insurance.”

The LIMRA study also revealed that 80 percent of African-Americans are more likely to buy life insurance so that they are not a burden on their families during their final days. However, the study also revealed that Americans as a whole are more likely to only have life insurance, which averages at $10,000 per employee, from their jobs.

“There are already enough seminars for financial advancement from every church to programs online,” Graham said. “As a community, we don’t need another seminar on how to buy life insurance or become more independently wealthy. It’s all over the Internet.”

To get more information about life insurance, contact our sponsor, Chinyere Norman.

As a Licensed Financial Strategist, Chinyere Norman has been in the insurance/financial services industry for ten years. For more information on the many benefits if life insurance contact [email protected] or call (404) 552-8745.

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