Diabetes
At Worry Free Life Insurance, we offer the lowest life insurance for people with diabetes. Where some companies decline diabetics for life insurance or give them substandard ratings, we routinely help our diabetic clients obtain approvals at standard or better ratings.
Cost of Life Insurance with Diabetes II
In many cases, if your only health issue is diabetes (Type II), you can obtain a Standard approval from at least a half dozen life insurance companies we work with. To see “standard” quotes, use our quote form on the right, and request a Standard quote.
Many factors will affect the cost of life insurance with diabetes. One of which is complications resulting from diabetes. Some complications you may experience after having diabetes for a many years are neuropathy (damage to the nerves, most commonly affecting the legs and feet), eye complications, and heart disease.
If you have experienced any of these complications, this will hinder you from obtaining excellent life insurance ratings. However, you still may be able to qualify for a substandard rating, a no exam diabetes policy, or at the worst, a guaranteed issue policy.
Factors Affecting Diabetics’ Insurance Premiums
A few other key factors which will determine your health classification, and therefore how much a diabetic will pay for life insurance premiums, will be time since diagnosis, average glucose reading/control, and current age.
Generally speaking, the longer someone has been diabetic, the greater the risk of developing complications. So it’s much safer for a life insurance company to offer great rates to a diabetic who has been recently diagnosed (say in the past 5 years) than one who has had diabetes for 10 or 20 years.
Age of diagnosis is closely related to time since diagnosis. The 65 year old who has had diabetes for 10 years will probably obtain a much better health classification than a 45 year old who has had diabetes for 10 years. Most insurance companies penalize you for being diagnosed prior to age 50.
Importance of Controlled Diabetes – Blood Glucose Levels and A1C
Equally important to a life insurance underwriter is how well controlled your diabetes is. This is measured by taking an average of your glucose readings, or if available, checking your hemoglobin a1c level. While your glucose reading provides insight to current blood sugar levels, the a1c measures your average blood glucose control for the past 2 to 3 months
The average a1c for a non diabetic is 5.0. For many diabetics who have their diabetes under control, this number may range from 6.0 to 8.0. And for uncontrolled diabetes this level may approach the teens or even twenties, which would be classified as extremely dangerous blood suger levels. As far as life insurance companies are concerned, the lower your a1c, the better.
The other factor affecting your life insurance diabetes pricing is your current age. Better rates are typically available the older you are. If well controlled, diabetes is a slowly progressing disease, so how risky is it really for an insurance company to insure a 70 year old who was recently diagnosed as a diabetic? Not too risky. Chances are something else will lead to his demise other than diabetes.
Other medical issues combined with diabetes will affect your overall health rating
For example, combining health impairments such as obesity, heart disease, or tobacco use will greatly increase your premiums, since the health risks are exponentially compounded when adding to the diabetes.
To sum up the cost of life insurance polcies with diabetes question, your absolute best deals and lowest prices will be offered to diabetics over age 60, diagnosed recently (within 5 or 10 years), who control their blood sugar well.
How Will Taking Insulin Affect the Cost?
We find for many of the large life insurance companies, whether you take insulin or any other medication for that matter, is not their main concern. Their concern is that your blood sugar levels are well maintained.
Does Type of Term or Whole Life Affect Rating?
Some of our diabetic clients ask if they buy a short term policy such as 10 or 15 year term life insurance, will the insurance carrier give them a better rating. After all, they argue, I’m only going to keep the policy for a10 year duration.
The truth is life insurance companies do not distinguish between ratings based on length of term, because most term policies, even a 20 year term and 30 year term, have conversion options. So a diabetic client can’t argue he will only keep the policy for 10 years, since if he’s unhealthy or dying at the end of year 10, he could convert the policy or pay on an annual renewable term.
You may obtain life insurance approval at a better rating for term life insurance if you apply for over $250,000 of coverage with United of Omaha. At this level, you would be eligible for their FIT credits, allowing someone with a substandard rating possibly get back to standard with credits for things like being a lifetime non smoker or having a college degree.
Diabetics may also find better ratings applying for a permanent type policy, such as whole life insurance or universal life insurance rather than term.
How to Get a Quote
For the fairest estimate, you can start by using our quote form on the right to get a life insurance diabetes quote. Rate yourself as regular, or standard. But please understand you may not qualify for standard, depending on the factors described in this article. Diabetics can also call us for a personalized term life insurance quote at 866-662-6903