When do we need life insurance? Well, we need it if someone depends on us financially, like when our family relies on our income - in full or in part. The loss of our income can destroy the plans and dreams of children and surviving spouses and deplete existing resources. Therefore, we replace that lost income with the life insurance benefits. That’s the primary purpose of life insurance and the most common reason for buying it … to protect our income by replacing it, so those we care about can keep on living as if we were still here earning a paycheck.

A spouse who works inside the home also provides indispensable and valuable contributions to the family, raising children, doing laundry, cooking, shopping, keeping house, running errands and transporting children hither and yon. Whether you are a mother, or a Mister Mom father who works at home while mother works outside the home, those household duties must still be done, and they must be paid for if that spouse dies prematurely.

We need life insurance if we own a home, because it can help pay off our mortgage, leaving our family safe and sound in their own home. For most people, the home is their most significant financial asset. Keeping it and sparing one’s family from moving to a different and strange place is an important life insurance benefit. The kids stay in their own school and keep their friends.

We need life insurance to pay off our cars, medical bills, credit cards, student loans and funeral costs, leaving our family free from burdensome debt. If there is no life insurance available, these obligations must be paid from the assets left behind. And doing that can exhaust a family’s resources.

We need life insurance when we marry. These days, many families depend on two incomes to make ends meet. If we died suddenly, how would our spouse cover funeral costs, credit cards, mortgage and other outstanding loans, and daily living expenses?

Even if we are single, life insurance can be important if we are providing financial support for aging parents or other family members, or if we are carrying significant debt we don’t want passed on to family members.

We need life insurance when we have a blessed addition to our family. Raising children is love’s reward, but it’s also expensive. More than that, it’s a major commitment and responsibility to raise those children from diapers to diplomas. And single parents need life insurance as much as anyone because their children rely on them for everything. If death intervenes, we won’t have the time to save the tuition money. Life insurance provides the funding and guarantees our hope they will go to college some day in the event we are not here to help them.

A new job, a move or even a pay raise at work are important times to review our life insurance coverage and consider our need for more. We may not realize it, but when our income rises, our spending tends to rise, too. Updating our life insurance coverage helps ensure that our family is able to maintain its improved lifestyle if something were to happen to us.