Best Life Insurance For Men Aged 63
Expert Review Of The Best Life Insurance Options For A 63Year Old Man
Reviewed by
Jim Tobin, CFP®
Why you can Have confidence in this review
At Life Insurance Help Desk, we value our editorial independence. We keep our reviews strictly factual so you can use them to make informed decisions. Life insurance carriers referred to on this site do not approve reviews.
The introduction to articles like this are usually fluff about being a certain age, meaning different things to different people. But, you already know that. So, here it is: The 9 life insurance questions most frequently asked by 63 year old men. (Click links to jump around.)
Do I need life insurance at age 63?
The question “Do I require life insurance at age 63?” is listed first because if the answer is no, then the rest of the questions don’t matter.
The answer really comes down to this: Do I need insurance to keep the promises I have made to myself and loved ones? If you have the liquid assets (or equivalents) to keep those promises, then the answer is probably that you don’t need life insurance at age 63.
Here are some of the common “promises” we are referring to:
A stream of income for your surviving spouseA means for that spouse to pay off the outstanding mortgage balanceTuition costs for their kids and grandkidsFinal expenses such as burial and funeral costs
What kind of Life Insurance Policies are available at age 63?
This question is a common one, although it is often asked as “How much life insurance do I need and for how long?”
While that may seem like a totally different question it really is tied together with the kind of policy you choose.
There really are 4 types of policies to choose from and each “kind” is best suited for a specific purpose.
Term insurance – Most affordable option on a per benefit dollar basis. This product is ideal to protect you until you reach a point where retirement savings and Social Security will be sufficient for your loved ones to live on. The downside of term is that it expires at the end of the term. Longer terms are more expensive.
Guaranteed Universal Life- This product acts like a term policy and can be designed to never expire (unless you live past age 121!). Unlike other permanent policies, guaranteed universal life is not designed to build cash values. It is more expensive than term, but far less expensive than whole life.
Whole life/ Universal Life– These are permanent policies designed to build cash value. The monthly cost includes an “overpayment” that goes to savings.
These policies require custom design and are not available on a quote tool. If you would like to know more about permanent policies then please contact us.
Burial Insurance– Also known as “final expense’ insurance, these policies are small (max 30K) policies that require no exam and are known for being lenient on underwriting requirements. However, the leniency comes at the cost of higher per benefit dollar expences.
While term insurance is generally used to provide larger amounts of protection at the best price, GUL and burial insurance are used for smaller coverage amounts that are needed for longer periods. Whole life and Universal life are more of a savings vehicle than a protection policy and the added expense is reflected in premiums.
Will My Health Qualify For A Policy At 63?
Regardless of your health, you will qualify for a policy. The more difficult question issue is will you qualify for the type of policy you want?
Term, GUL and cash accumulation permanent products are generally underwritten in the same manner. that is whether there is a no exam option or not, your height & weight, prescription history, driving record and medical history will be taken into account. The underwriting can be stringent and may take as long as 2 months.
Burial insurance is far easier to qualify for with less stringent rules and sameday underwriting. Of course, the coverage is capped and more expensive on a per dollar of benefit basis.
The best way to know if you will qualify is to speak with an experienced independent agency like the Life Insurance Help Desk. If you are not yet ready to take that step, take a look at the underwriting assistant tool. It will provide you with the information that carriers will be looking for from your application.
What Will Life Insurance Cost A 63 Year Old Man?
As you likely suspected, the rates differ by the type of life insurance you purchase. We have provided some samples below for term insurance, GUL insurance and burial insurance. You can access rates for different coverage amounts using the quote tool here.
Please note that we have not included rates for permanent policies, as these policies are best if custom designed for your personal needs.
Term Life Insurance Rates for 63 year old men
Term rates are provided for 10.15, & 20 year terms. The marketplace does not currently offer term rates for terms greater than 20 years for male applicants 63 years old.
Note that we have included Standard and Standard Plus as well as preferred, This will allow for common conditions faced by 63 year olds such as :
Sample term life insurance rates for male age 63 Preferred Class with no tobacco use
Sample term life insurance rates for male age 63 Standard Class with No tobacco use
Sample Term life insurance rates for male age 63 Standard Plus Class with No tobacco use
Guaranteed Universal Life (GUL) Rates for 63 year old man
While this article primarily focuses on term and burial life insurance, GUL is worth looking at as a less expensive option to permanent cash accumulation policies.
GUL Rates For 63 year old Male Preferred Risk, No Tobacco
Burial Insurance for a 63 year old man
The difference between term/GUL and burial insurance is night and day. Here are some of the notable differences.
Not all “final expense” companies operate in all states.Burial policies have same day underwriting and often go in force the same day.The underwriting is much less stringent than term/GUL policies. Benefit dollar amounts are considerably smaller-ranging from 5K-30K.
Whereas, term/GUL policies are graded as Preferred Plus,preferred,Standard plus and standard, Burial policies are categorized as :
Level – Full benefits are paid out with no waiting period.Modified/Graded – Benefit becomes available over a graded period of 1 – 3 yearsGuaranteed – Proceeds are limited to the sum of payments made plus interest (usually 10%) if death takes place within 3 years of purchase. full benefit is available after 3 years.
What does burial insurance cost?
You can expect to pay more per benefit dollar for burial insurance for these reasons:
These policies never expire, the rate doesn’t change and the benefit never decreases.Lenient underwriting w/ no exam
Burial policies are expensive compared to term. However, it’s worth remembering that unlike term insurance, the reason for the policy doesn’t expire. We all know we will pass one day.
Sample Burial life Insurance Rates for a 63 year old man
How Do I Decide On a Life Insurance company?
Term
Deciding on the best company has everything to do with your health and your policy preferences.
As long as you start with the criteria that all considered carriers have good financial ratings, then it is largely about which carrier fits your need, and is most likely to treat you the best.
For example, if you were interested in a 25 year term, you would be eliminating carriers like Prudential. Alternatively, if you wanted a more aggressive living benefits rider, American National would fit the bill.
Beyond policy preference, different carriers have differing appetites for health risks. For example, you’d likely be better off with Banner than Prudential if you were in great health. But, if you have sleep apnea you’d want to go to Prudential.
The best way to negotiate health concerns is to work with an experienced independent agent.
Burial
Although your specific health issues are certainly an issue with final expense, you have far more leeway with your health and carrier niches only come into play on occasion. For example, only a few carriers will give you day 1 coverage with COPD.
The bigger concern with burial insurance is state approval. Most burial life insurance companies are small and do not operate in all states. Mutual of Omaha is the exception, offering “Living Promise”” burial insurance in all states except NY.
As with term/GUL, the best way to know is to use an independent agent.
Are the 63 year old male life insurance Rates accurate?
The quotes in the quote tool are updated on a weekly basis and are almost always correct to the penny. The rates in the charts are correct as of publication. We try to keep up, but acknowledge that we may miss a change now and again.
The major concern with accuracy is not with the posted rates, but rather with the health class you enter. Most people are in better or worse shape than they think and just guess or take the best price (preferred plus). However, only 12 percent of applicants wind up as preferred plus and you are best off speaking with an experienced agent.
If you are not ready to speak with an agent, use the standard rate to price a policy. You can then hope to be pleasantly surprised by the underwriting decision.
Do I Need To Take An Exam?
Term/GUL
Many carriers will offer competitive rates without an exam as long as you have seen a physician in the last 2 years. Some carriers will require additional premium for this convenience, others will limit the amount of coverage. Generally, we strongly encourage no-exam options- seldom do exams bring unexpected good news.
That said, a no exam policy is still underwritten using your medical records, prescription history and driving records. The process is speeded up, but can still get bogged down by an APS request.
Burial
There are no exams with burial insurance. The policies are underwritten by using the answers tio the questions on the application and prescription history. if you are using an off label prescription, make sure your agent knows!
Suicide Exclusion
All burial and term insurance policies come with a suicide exclusion clause, which may range between 1 – 2 years, depending on the state you live in
Why Use The Life Insurance Help Desk?
Although you have a lot of options when choosing who to work with, the options are not equal. For example:
Carrier Direct – This is likely the worst of all the options. You are misled into thinking it will save you money. This is not true. Life insurance rates are set by the DOI in your state. A policy of like terms will have the same premiums no matter who sells it. So by going to the carrier directly, you lose out on the chance for other companies to fight for your business. Additionally, you lose the cost free help of an experienced agent.
Captive Agent- Same problem as above, except the agent “may” have the flexibility to use carriers other than his employer. However, he will undoubtedly be incented financially to use his employer.
National Broker- A better option than the captives, but with serious limitations. The big brokers are independents and have access to multiple carriers, however, they limit the number of carriers to keep negotiating power over commissions.
Apart from limiting the available carriers, call centers have tremendous turnover and this makes speaking with an experienced agent difficult. This situation is made clear if you need any service work done and you call , only to be transferred to the carrier with bad hold music.
The Life Insurance Help Desk , led by a Certified Financial Planner, has access to over 50 A rated carriers and is committed to full transparency. If you want , we’ll share our screen with you while pricing your policy.
Lastly, we are here for the long haul. If you need to make a beneficiary change or to update a policy on your elderly parents, we are here to help and will be for the future.
How do I apply?
The application process is laid out visually on the homepage or you can read about it here. To get started simply fill out the quote request tool and submit. We will be in touch to walk you through the process as soon as we can.
