The World According To Special Ed! #1000

No, no. I don’t really think I’m special. Family nickname and joke. “Ed’s done so well they named an entire school curriculum after him.” Ha Ha! Today I want to reflect on this, my 1000th post, and the journey and events of the last 2 1/2 years getting here.

I write about life insurance because I am really passionate about what I do. I believe in the product. I’ve seen the results of having it and I’ve seen the calamity of a family death in the absence of it. I’ve talked with widows in both situations and there is a common thread, they both believe in the importance of life insurance.

I’ve found that the more I write, the more opinionated I get. I used to think that you just can’t fix stupid and now I’m on a mission to do just exactly that. I truly believe that if I stand on my cyber soap box and yell long and loud enough, that even the hardest of heads out there will suffer a crack and some common sense will leak in.

I believe with all my heart that the under served life insurance clients of the world deserve the best possible service that I and my staff and the great insurance companies we work with can provide. I believe with all my heart that idiot life insurance companies that decline perfectly well controlled cases of bipolar disorder just because it’s bipolar disorder should have to disclose on their websites those impairments that they don’t want to participate in. I believe with all my heart that agents that take applications for clients with issues such as cancer history, diabetes, heart disease or depression without knowing the company underwriting stance on those issues, should have to leave the business and not come back.

We have made huge gains through this forum for the under served and no group more so than the issues of bipolar disorder and depression. Nearly every client who found us through this blog and was ultimately helped had been declined at least once. It was not uncommon for them to have been declined 2, 3 or 4 times. It is my passion to save or salvage as many people as possible from that degrading useless treatment.

I have used this forum to pound on products that are a rip off to clients sold by agents who profit greatly from those sales. I get my head ripped off occasionally, but if I give people some reason to pause and rethink what is being proposed before they buy whole life insurance or sell their term insurance policy in a life settlement or purchase any kind of policy that isn’t absolutely fully guaranteed then I’ve helped. If I can bail someone out of a crashing universal life or variable universal life before it collapses and they lose everything they were coerced into “investing” I’ve helped. If I can get someone a better rate because they and their agent didn’t know all of the options available, I’ve helped.

If I occasionally rip some heads off, it’s only because I think the life insurance buying public deserves to know. It’s true that I think Suze Orman is a life insurance idiot and it’s true that I believe Selectquote uses advertising that borders on bait and switch. It’s true that I don’t think Zander Insurance does as good a job as Dave Ramsey believes and it’s absolutely true that i don’t believe that the biggest of the online agencies give good customer service. I believe all of us old folks need to know that AARP is not where you should buy your insurance and that New York Life should be ashamed of the products they offer us through AARP. There is no reason for me to hold back on these opinions and plenty of room on the soapbox for those who have joined in the rant.

I have been zealous about educating as well as encouraging self education when it comes to personal health issues. I have shared the last years of my father’s life taken by cancer and my mother’s battle won over breast cancer in the hope that the information would be of value. If a client truly understands their health issue they will deal with it more effectively, live longer and be in a more powerful position to apply for and receive better life insurance rates.

So, for 2 1/2 years I have done my best to make sure that life insurance and the life insurance business is better understood than it was before. I have done my best to make sure the rules are posted where everyone can read them so people can make an intelligent choice as to what team they want to play on. I have done my best, as my Lord would want it, to be a servant to all I can.

Bottom line. It’s a rapidly changing landscape in the life insurance business and because of that I suspect the next 1000 posts will come quicker and provide even more crucial guidance. There is work to be done with financial times tougher and the needs for some bastion of financial stability falling not on investments or houses, but on the rock solid guarantees of life insurance.

My heartfelt gratitude to my office manager/internet translator/great friend Kyra Clark for teaching me what a blog is and encouraging me to try it. I will withhold my opinion on her advise to join the Twitter voice for a while.