A million dollars of life insurance can cost less than a cell phone bill.
For a healthy 40-year-old, a $1,000,000 twenty-year term policy commonly runs somewhere in the $45-to-$65-a-month range. The hard part is everything around that number — how much, for how long, which carrier will take your health history, and who should own the policy if a business is involved. Waugh Agency shops the market for you, handles the underwriting, stays on the file through policy issue, and remains available to help throughout the life of the policy.
Four decisions, and they go in this order.
Most people start at the last question — which company, what does it cost — and work backwards. That is how someone ends up with a policy that is the wrong size, expiring at the wrong time, owned by the wrong person. Get these four right and the carrier choice mostly answers itself.
None of this takes long. A first conversation is twenty minutes, and we can usually quote in real time while we are on the phone.
How much — add it up, do not guess
The old rule of thumb, ten times income, is a starting point and nothing more. Add the mortgage balance, every other debt, the income you want replaced and for how many years, and the education you intend to fund. Subtract what is already there: existing policies, the group life at work, savings, Social Security survivor benefits. What is left is the number. For a household earning $150,000 with a $450,000 mortgage and two young children, it is usually somewhere between $1.5 and $2.5 million — which surprises people until they write it out.
How long — match the term to the obligation
Term is sold in 10, 15, 20, 25, 30 and now 40-year lengths, and the right one is the year your largest obligation ends. A 30-year mortgage taken at 35 argues for 30-year term. A newborn argues for at least 20. Where the obligations end at different times, laddering two policies — a $500,000 30-year alongside a $1,000,000 20-year — costs less than one large policy carried the whole way and drops coverage as the need drops.
What kind — and the honest answer is usually term
Term life is the lowest-cost way to buy a large death benefit for a defined period, and for most families it is the whole answer. Permanent coverage — whole life, guaranteed universal life, indexed UL — earns its place when the need does not expire: a special-needs child, an estate-tax liability, a buy-sell agreement that has to fund whenever the death happens, or a final-expense policy meant to cover a funeral rather than a lifestyle. Anyone who recommends permanent before asking about your obligations is selling, not advising.
Who owns it — this is where the money is won or lost
Personally owned, owned by your company, or owned by a trust. The answer changes who pays the premium, whether it is deductible, whether the death benefit is taxable, and whether the proceeds land inside your taxable estate. A key person policy belongs to the business. A buy-sell policy belongs to whoever the agreement says it does. A §162 executive bonus arrangement has the company pay and the executive own. We model these with your CPA or attorney before anything is submitted — and we do not pretend the tax treatment is our call to make.
Three kinds of life insurance. One point of contact.
Individually owned, individually underwritten policies — for a family, for a business, or for both at once, which is more common than people expect.
Term Life & Family Protection
The lowest-cost way to put a large death benefit around a mortgage, an income and a set of children until they no longer need it.
- 10, 15, 20, 25, 30 and 40-year level term
- Premium fixed for the whole term — it never steps up
- Mortgage protection sized to the actual balance and payoff date
- Return of premium, where the maths actually works
- Convertible to permanent later without new underwriting
- Laddered policies where the obligations end at different times
Permanent, Cash Value & Final Expense
For the obligations that do not expire. Coverage that is still in force at 85, with a cash value that can be borrowed against along the way.
- Participating whole life with guaranteed cash value
- Guaranteed universal life — permanent death benefit, minimal cash
- Indexed UL, illustrated at conservative rates rather than sales rates
- Survivorship policies for estate liquidity and special-needs planning
- Final expense from around $10,000 — simplified or guaranteed issue
- Reviewed alongside Medicare at 65
Business-Owned Life Insurance
Policies the company owns, on the people the company cannot afford to lose. A different objective entirely — this protects the balance sheet, not the household.
- Key person life from $1,000,000 to $10,000,000 and above
- Buy-sell funding — cross-purchase, entity redemption or a trusteed structure
- §162 executive bonus — company pays, executive owns
- Collateral assignment for an SBA or bank loan
- §101(j) notice and consent handled before the application, not after
- Paired with disability buy-sell and key person DI
Group life is a benefit. It is not a plan.
We administer a great deal of employer group life, so this is not a criticism of it. It is free or nearly free, it requires no underwriting, and it is a real benefit. It is also typically one or two times salary, it belongs to your employer rather than to you, and it ends the day you leave. Keep it. Own something underneath it.
Two times salary is not a plan for a family with a mortgage. It is a nice gesture from your employer.
The rate is set by underwriting, not by the quote engine.
Every online quote you have seen assumes preferred-plus health. Almost nobody is preferred-plus. What determines your real premium is which carrier reads your file, how they treat your particular history, and which of the four underwriting paths below your case is routed down. That routing decision is most of what a broker is for.
We do it in advance and informally — a description of your health goes to several underwriting desks with no application, no medical records pulled and nothing reported anywhere. You see the offers before you commit to anything.
Fully underwritten — the lowest rate, the longest wait
A paramedical examiner comes to your home or office, takes height, weight, blood pressure, blood and urine, and the carrier may order records from your physician. Three to six weeks, occasionally longer. It remains the lowest-cost route per thousand of coverage, and for a large permanent case or a difficult health history it is usually still the right one.
Accelerated underwriting — no medical exam, commonly to about $400,000
The carrier substitutes data for the needle: prescription history, motor vehicle record, credit-based mortality scoring and an electronic health record check. Answer the questions, take a phone interview, and a clean file can be approved in days rather than weeks. Age and amount limits vary by carrier and move fairly often, so treat $400,000 as the common ceiling rather than a fixed one. Standard-plus and preferred rates are available on this path — you are not paying a penalty for skipping the exam.
The saliva swab — higher amounts without blood or urine
On many cases from roughly $500,000 through $1,000,000 and above, an oral-fluid specimen taken with a simple swab does the work that the blood draw used to. It screens for nicotine, HIV and cocaine, and it can be collected at your kitchen table in a couple of minutes. For people who are needle-averse, travel constantly, or simply cannot get a paramed appointment scheduled, this is the single most useful development in life underwriting in twenty years. Availability depends on carrier, age, amount and state.
Impaired risk — the file that needs a human
Type 2 diabetes with a controlled A1c, treated sleep apnea, high cholesterol, elevated blood pressure, elevated liver enzymes, a cardiac event years ago, a cancer history now well past its waiting period, sport aviation, a DUI on the record. Carriers disagree sharply on all of these, and the spread between the best and worst offer on the same file is regularly two or three rate classes. If you were declined or rated in the past, that decision belonged to one carrier on one day, and it is worth re-running — particularly if the condition has since been treated or a waiting period has run out.
Simplified and guaranteed issue — when nothing else will take the file
A short list of health questions, or no questions at all, in exchange for a smaller face amount, a higher premium and usually a two or three-year graded death benefit. Used for final expense, for late-stage health situations and for small business cases that have to issue on a deadline. It is the most expensive coverage per dollar and we say so plainly — but coverage that costs too much still beats no coverage at a funeral.
If one of these is you, it is worth twenty minutes.
Almost every one of these conversations starts with a specific event — a closing, a birth, a diagnosis, a partnership agreement someone finally read.
New mortgage, young children
The single most common case, and the least expensive to solve. Thirty-year term sized to the loan and the years of income you want replaced, bought while you are young enough that the rate is barely noticeable.
Declined, rated or postponed before
Diabetes, sleep apnea, cardiac history, elevated enzymes, a cancer now years behind you. A decline is one carrier's opinion on one day. We shop the file informally before anyone applies.
The founder whose company is the asset
If the bank has a personal guarantee, if a co-founder's family would inherit their shares, or if the business could not replace you inside a year — the policy belongs to the company, not to you.
Partners with a handshake buy-sell
An agreement that says the survivors will buy the shares, with nothing behind it, is a promise to write a seven-figure cheque during the worst month of your life. Insurance is what turns it into a plan.
Retiring, or leaving a job with good group life
The schedule reduces at 65 and the coverage ends when you do. Conversion is available and expensive, and the window is short. Buying underneath it a few years early is the less expensive move.
Covering a funeral, not a lifestyle
Final expense from around $10,000, issued on a handful of health questions or none at all, so a family is not fundraising for a burial. Small policy, straightforward, and it should be sold that way.
Rooted in the Northeast. Licensed nationwide.
We write from Andover and the Merrimack Valley across Boston and the 128 corridor, the North and South Shores, the Cape, Worcester and Western Massachusetts, down through Connecticut and Rhode Island, across New York City and all five boroughs, Long Island, New Jersey and Jersey City, into Pennsylvania and Philadelphia, and up into New Hampshire and Maine.
Beyond the Northeast we serve clients in all 50 states — directly where we are licensed, and through trusted affiliates elsewhere. A couple who live in Boston and own a business in Texas is an ordinary case, not a complication.
Independent, and not owned by a carrier
There is no house policy we are expected to place. We quote the market broadly — Legal & General America, Protective, Pacific Life, Lincoln Financial, Prudential, Principal, Symetra, Corebridge, John Hancock, MassMutual, Penn Mutual, Nationwide and Mutual of Omaha among them, plus the simplified and guaranteed-issue markets when a file needs them. More on our about page.
We are a benefits shop first, which changes the advice
Waugh Agency is a group health and health-reform compliance firm. So when we look at an individual life case for a business owner, the group life schedule, the §125 plan, the ERISA wrap and the census are already in front of us. The individual policy gets designed around what you actually have rather than around a guess.
Tech-forward, including the paperwork
Applications are electronic, signatures are electronic, and status updates come to you rather than waiting for you to chase them. For our business clients, enrollment and eligibility run through Employee Navigator — provided to eligible client groups at no cost, with the agency absorbing the subscription fee. AI-assisted plan building, automated compliance tracking, online enrollment and 600+ carrier, payroll and TPA integrations. Employee Navigator acquired Ease in 2023, and through 2026 we are moving every client onto the modern portal. It is the reason we can stand up a full benefits package for a startup that has no HR department at all.
Reviewed periodically, not filed away
Health improves. Term policies approach their end date. Businesses get bigger and buy-sell valuations go stale. A policy bought at 38 after quitting smoking can frequently be re-underwritten at a materially better class at 41. We also look at disability and health coverage at the same time, because it is the same conversation.
Tell us your age, your health and roughly what you owe.
That is enough for a real rate comparison rather than a teaser number — and enough for us to say which underwriting path your case should take. Submit the form and a licensed specialist will be in touch within one business day, or call and we will quote it while you are on the phone.