Mortgage Protection Life Insurance
The type of life policy which pays off your mortgage if you die before it expires.
With mortgage protection life insurance you generally have two choices; a simple decreasing term policy which is generally cheap and cheerful, will pay the mortgage if you die, but leaves nothing else and deteriorates to zero value. Alternatively you can engage a decreasing term endowment policy, which is designed to offer a lump sum upon completion.
Mortgage protection life insurance is a cheap decreasing term policy which repays your lender the loan on your property should you die before the mortgage is paid off. It stops the lender from repossessing your property. Basic policies start from £5 per month per £50,000 covered, so it’s not a huge expense (compared to your mortgage!)
However, there are variants on the standard decreasing mortgage protection life insurance policy- particularly the endowment, which has had some bad press; most of it justified, but not entirely so. There were two problems with endowments. Firstly, they gave the adviser a whopping commission, and most of the hassle with endowments came down to the “mis-selling scandal”; indeed some cases from the 1980’s are still being contested today. But regulation is stiffer now, so don’t worry too much. The second issue was that endowment performance didn’t always come up to scratch- and in the case of mortgage protection life insurance, that would mean the investment didn’t actually cover the mortgage, let alone give your dependants a lump sum to be going on with.
Well, expectations have changed somewhat, and whilst there’s no denying that there’s a risk involved, if you pick an appropriate policy, endowment policies can provide a low-risk way of provide life cover but saving too; so that if you die within the term, your dependents will get a lump sum payout. They won’t get that with a basic decreasing term policy.
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