Life Insurance Policies
Life Insurance law is written by state legislature in each state to help protect consumers. Life insurance policies are considered one-way contracts, and if you're considering getting coverage, it's helpful to understand how life insurance policies work.
A one-way contract means the life insurance carrier creates a contract and is held to it as long as your premiums are paid. So in other words, you are not writing a contract together committing to a specific lifestyle and activities that you'll never do, but when you're applying its important that you're honest about your current health and hobbies so that the underwriter can accurately analyze potential risk in your life. Once they agree on a health rating and premium, they are contractually obligated to cover your life for the duration of the term.
Things change in people's lives, and they can't make you stay exactly the same as when you applied for insurance. Nowadays in most states they will even cover suicide as long as the policy has been in place for at least 2 years. If you commit suicide less than two years after coverage begins, they will return the premiums paid instead of the death benefit.
There are a few things they won't cover - if you are enlisted in the military and die due to an act of war, they won't cover that. They usually don't cover private aviation crashes. They won't cover you if you are committing a crime when you die, such as having a heart attack or getting shot while robbing a bank. If your spouse were to kill you to get the death benefit, they won't pay them, so you don't have to worry about that. And they don't like it when you lie about a dangerous activity on your application, such as scuba diving. Lying is considered fraud with things like this, so if they find out you were a licensed scuba diver at the time of application, and died in a scuba diving accident a year later, they probably won't provide payment. That said, if you were not a scuba diver at the time of application, but 10 years from now you decide to get into scuba diving on a vacation and you die, they have to cover that.
And another perspective - if they agree you're healthy during the time of application, but in 10 years you come down with a terminal illness such as cancer, well that's what life insurance is for, and they will pay the death benefit. It's safe to say that people have the will to live, and are going to do their best to stay alive, so life insurance companies will make that bet that you're going to stay alive. It's the applicants that demonstrate a history of reckless and high risk behavior that will usually be denied because they are much more likely to die early.
With marijuana, alcohol, and drug use, they're looking for a history of substance abuse. If you had a DUI on your record, or went to rehab, they would be more concerned and want to take a closer look. The life insurance companies that are marijuana friendly will tolerate a modest amount of usage, but if they detect high levels of usage they may deny your application.
If in a few years you were prescribed medical marijuana and needed to consume more frequently, it wouldn't effect your death benefit unless of course you were robbing a bank really high and died in a car crash during the getaway. And in general, with medical marijuana, Insurance companies are typically OK with you being prescribed it, and they tend to consider the reason why you're prescribed as part of the underwriting process when considering your risk. If in a few years you had chronic pain or couldn't sleep and got a medical marijuana prescription, it doesn't matter because they've already committed to covering your life based on your health at the time of application.
A general life insurance rule is that once a contract has been in place for two years or more, regardless of what information you withheld or changes in your life have happened since your time of application, they have to honor the contract.
People die earlier than expected from tragic accidents and illness, and insurance companies know they will have to pay out from time to time. It's the underwriter's job to approximate the mortality of a large group of people to keep that level of risk at a reasonable and profitable level for the company.
Death benefits can be paid in a tax-free lump sum, or you can choose other options including steady monthly payments until funds are used, or just getting payments on the interest earned, receiving eternal income off of the death benefit.
Whether or not you're a marijuana user, we can help you apply. The best way to get started would be to fill out our instant quoter, and we'll be in touch shortly to help guide you on your way to coverage.