life insurance/critical illness cover?? what do you do?

[Lostalot]

Hi
Just wondered if anyone had any advice about this for single parents? Is the life insurance part relevant, as a single parent you are managing all finances yourself anyway?
Am wanting to feel more secure and thinking about getting some insurance. I am able to afford a small amount but wouldn't be able to afford a lot each month?
Thanks:)

I have enough life insurance to cover the mortgage and a bit extra, but I have had that since buying my house on my own before marriage and DC.

I kept the life insurance after divorce as I see it as a necessity, so that if anything happens to me, DD has an asset to provide for her, ie a house to rent out until she is old enough to live on her own if she wants to.

I would get some through a financial advisor as they will be able to shop around and get the best rates for you.

If you are single, no dependents, critical illness cover. Any dependents, especially children and always Life Cover. You can have it drawn up to leave proceeds ‘in trust’ to your children so that it doesn’t form part of your estate.

I have no children but am married and have both LI and CI.

Whilst thinking about LI also think about doing a will if you haven't done so already because you can leave the LI in trust for yours DCs guardians.

I have CI cover so that it would enable me to either buy in more help or to stop working if I needed to.

You can include critical illness cover in Life insurance btw

I'm in hospital at the moment. There was a self employed female taxi driver here last week. She is single and responsible for all the outgoings but won't be able to work for at least 3 months. I fell down the stairs, broke my shoulder, had surgery, then had complications with infection. I could be off work fir 4-5 months. Fortunately I get company sick pay for 6 months. A lot depends on whether you work but I would put yourself in my situation or worse (critical illness) and plug the gaps as needed x

Thank you very much for your replies. :)
Yes am definitely going to get some cover -though finding it a bit confusing! With work I am lucky in that I would get 6 months full pay and 6 months half pay if ill. I have 2 dependants as a lone parent. Would I get insurance (to leave house to DCs)? and then critical illness cover incase of illness - could any payment be taken as payout to enable reduced hours? Aside from going to financial advisor does anyone have any advise on type of policy etc?
Thanks again

Some life insurance policies include critical illness cover but the terms/illnesses they pay out for will differ, company to company, so you will have to read through them and decide which covers your circumstances best. It might take a while going through different company policies to see what they offer and for how much but it’s well worth it. DH and I have policies with HSBC, Legal and General and Canada Life because they offered different things covering different circumstances we needed at the time.

Oh btw, one last thing, my policies cover my DDs lives too, you don’t have to include that of course and it’s not a pleasant thing to have to consider but I decided if the absolute worst ever happened then we might all need a financial buffer in order to do whatever we needed to do.

Instead of having any Critical Illness payout as a lump sum you could choose a policy with a Family Income Benefit instead. This is designed to pay a monthly sum so more in line with replacing lost salary and for some people much easier to manage.

You could also look at an Income Protection policy which is more expensive than CI but covers more conditions. Costs can be kept down by having a longer deferment period, for example have it kick in after 6 months if long-term sick and salary has dropped away.

You might have life assurance with your work pension - worth checking.

Though if you are ever likely to move to a place that doesn’t offer it, it can be worth buying anyway as it only gets more expensive with age and will pay out in addition.

Thank you all so much for your help. I am going to look into it now. Best wishes :)