I don’t give money to those GoFundMe campaigns and probably I never will.
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve seen folks beg for monies like street corner panhandlers because their mom died or their best friend died or their spouse died and now they need money to pay for a funeral or to settle the estate or for some other purpose.
Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying these people are bad people. Maybe they were very nice people. Maybe they worked very hard to live the best life possible (or the best life they knew how to live).
What I am saying is… these folks were financially irresponsible and it finally caught up to them.
I know some people will find this highly offensive and cruel, but my tough love advice to these folks is: use this as a learning moment. Buy life insurance and don’t be irresponsible like the sorely departed.
Too harsh?
Nay.
Not harsh enough, I say.
Here’s why I say that:
I recently read a sob story about a wife who was left penniless, with 2 children and a third on the way when her schmuck of a husband was shot and killed by a police officer in a hotel room on account of a phony phone call made by another hotel guest (guy was innocent but that’s another story for another time).
I say he was a schmuck because he didn’t have any life insurance… a policy to cover three children’s expenses for the next 20 years would have been rather inexpensive… probably the cost of dinner at a cheap restaurant.
Would that have fully insured his life?
No.
But it would have provided something, which would have been more than the family has now.
The wife is suing the city for wrongful death (good luck).
Meanwhile, the kids get to live in poverty.
And before I get hate mail over this… no, of course it’s not the husband’s fault that he was killed. I’m not saying it was his fault for being shot, obviously. But… it is his fault for not protecting his income and savings from the inherent uncertainty of life.
This is the basic premise of life insurance… that you are not guaranteed a long life and that you do not know what your future holds. The purpose of the death benefit is to make the uncertain, certain. And, for those with gumption, a custom whole life insurance policy can provide you with more certainty: certainty about your uncertain future savings as well as certainty about what happens when you die — a 2 for 1 deal, so to speak.
And if you still think all of this is highly offensive, let me state in my defense I’m not in the business of making people feel good. I’m in the business of protecting the income and savings you cannot afford to lose. I’m not going to go out of my way to offend people, but I’m also not going to sugarcoat anything to protect peoples’ feelings.
If that’s not too offensive for ya, sign up to my email list to learn more about what I do and how I do it.