Should I Purchase Life Insurance if I'm Going Through a Divorce?

A divorce brings about many changes in your life. These changes will not just be personal and emotional changes. They will also invariably be financial ones, as well. If you and your spouse had a life insurance policy together, it can be one more thing to face purchasing now on your own.

Yet, if you knew how important insurance was while you were married, you certainly understand how much more important it could be now that you are embarking on life as a single person. This is especially the case if you have young children who will be living with you after the divorce is complete. Just as you would look to have them financially protected in the case of losing a parent when you were married, you would want to do the same while being single.

Purchasing the new plan might entail cancelling the older plan if that was one you shared with your former spouse. After this, you would not be harming your children in any way by deciding to purchase a new life insurance plan just for yourself. It will serve to protect them just as the other policy did.

If anything happened to you, there would be a way for them to be cared for financially after a funeral takes place and any final expenses are paid out of the life insurance benefits.

But what do you do if your ex-spouse has a life insurance policy of his or her own? You can think of this as being similar to what it was like having two individual policies as a married couple.

Perhaps you made either partner the designated beneficiary. Now, you can designate the children as the beneficiaries. You may want to look into naming a legal adult as the beneficiary if the children are still minors. However, that person would handle the benefits on the children's behalf after your death.

But, as to having your own separate policy now, the total amount of coverage on either your policy or your ex-spouse's might be the same in terms of protecting your children with two individual policies when you were married. Or, if you are basing the coverage on your income now that there will be a single income, it would probably balance out to the same coverage you wanted for your children out of one policy covering both you and your partner.

Getting a New Policy

The need for getting a policy in place as a single, recently divorced individual is just as important if not more important as when you were married. This might be true if you have children who would benefit by being able to have a financial foundation in place in order to carry on their existing lifestyle in the event something happened to you. However, even if your ex-spouse has a policy of his or her own you may not be able to control or know when or if they cancel that policy for any reason.

Your policy, therefore, could be the one your children depend upon for a better chance at resuming their lives in the wake of losing a parent. Choosing to purchase a life insurance plan can be a wise move during or after a divorce if there are new or higher debts assumed from the divorce, too. If you do not have children, but do not want to risk having these debts become your parents' responsibilities it can be very smart to have your own life insurance in place after going through a divorce.

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