The valley ยท Life insurance
What's left at the bottom.
Most people treat income and legacy as two separate errands. They're one conversation.
Why it belongs here
It isn't only about dying.
Coverage bought at 35 answers a different question than coverage considered at 60. At 35 it replaces a paycheck. Later it tends to be about a surviving spouse's income, taxes, equalising an inheritance between children, or covering a specific obligation that outlives you.
Those are retirement questions. Which is why we don't hand them to someone else.
The usual jobs
What people are actually solving for.
The survivor's income
When one spouse dies, household income often falls further than household expenses do. Two Social Security payments become one. A pension may reduce or stop.
An uneven estate
One child gets the house, another doesn't. Coverage is one way to even that out without forcing a sale.
A debt that outlives you
A mortgage, a business obligation, or a co-signed loan that would otherwise land on someone else.
Final expenses
Smaller, simpler policies meant to cover the immediate costs so family isn't making financial decisions in the first week of grief.
How we approach it
Right-sized, or not at all.
The question is never "how much can you qualify for." It's what specific job the coverage is doing, for how long it needs to do it, and what it costs to keep in force.
Plenty of people are already adequately covered, or have a policy that simply needs reviewing rather than replacing. That's a legitimate outcome of a first conversation.
Coverage, cost and eligibility depend on underwriting, health and the specific policy. Nothing here is an offer of coverage or a guarantee of insurability.