Jun
22
2007
Thanks for your question. This is a good time for a quick family history review regarding cancer.
To most term life insurance carriers, cancer is cancer regardless of gender. So, if your mother had breast cancer, this is considered against you when applying for a term life insurance policy. Same if you are a female and your father had prostate cancer.
However, some life insurance companies have cancer exceptions. These include:
- ReliaStar-ING – ignores cancer completely as a family history issue, and will be a great nitch.
- West Coast Life (and Protective Life & Annuity in New York) do not underwrite against gender specific cancers for family history. A woman will not be downgraded due to testicular or prostate cancer in male family members, and a man will not be downgraded if there is a female family history of breast, uterine, or cervical cancer.
- Prudential takes the West Coast exceptions a step further by ignoring lung cancer family history if the applicant has never smoked.
The best advice I can give is to tell you to shop around and make sure you deal with a broker that deals with many life insurance carriers. This is the only way he/she will be able to find you the best rate for your particular situation.
