Insurance Policy

What kind of homeowner's insurance will you need?Before you can complete a home purchase, the lender will require that you take out a homeowner's insurance policy and prepay one year's premium at closing. Even if you can pay all cash for a home, you're wise to insure it against loss.Insurance premiums can vary significantly from one company to the next, so shop around before making a choice. When making comparisons, be sure that you receive quotes for equivalent coverage. Also, talk to someone who recently made an insurance claim with a company you're considering.

Gardiners Furniture might be eating its Super Bowl bet but couldn't be happier about it. Gary Mullaney, co-owner of the Baltimore chain, said Monday that his phone has been ringing off the hook and reporters have been clamoring for interviews since an improbable offer came true. Gardiners told customers all furniture bought between Jan. 31 and 3 p.m. on the day of the game would be free if the Baltimore Ravens returned a kick for a touchdown during Sunday evening's Super Bowl . And then Jacoby Jones returned a kickoff 108 yards for a touchdown to open the second half, forcing the store to give away $600,000 in furnishings.

NEW YORK -- If you need a retirement investment, should it be a life insurance policy -- even if you don't need the insurance?Cash-value life insurance is being widely sold today as the best way of building up money for the future. It's often called a "private pension plan." The insurer pays interest or dividends on the cash that accumulates in your policy. Those payments build up tax-sheltered.There are, as you might suspect, some risks to this plan that the agent may or may not explain.

Therese M. Goldsmith spent most of last week preparing to deal with Cyclone Sandy's second wave: Thousands of Maryland residents who filed insurance claims and began working with contractors and mechanics to repair damage to their homes and cars. As the commissioner of the Maryland Insurance Administration, she's charged with regulating Maryland's insurance industry and making certain that insurance companies comply with Maryland insurance law. The MIA also handles complaints from consumers and helps them work through problems with their providers.

NEW YORK -- Are you starting to think about nursing home costs? Do you have a pool of savings to help provide for your retirement? That combination makes you red meat for certain hard-charging life-insurance agents. Your worry, plus your savings, leave you vulnerable to a financial mistake.Wilma Warner, 65, of Lexington, Ky., says she made that mistake. She bought a life insurance policy in the mistaken belief that she was primarily buying nursing home insurance. To try to recoup, she has just filed a lawsuit against the Prudential Insurance Co. of America and one of its Lexington agents, Dennis Lanzarone, alleging misrepresentation.

Washington - AS THE economy continues in the doldrums, Democrats who worry that they might wake up some morning to President Dan Quayle will be entertaining daydreams that President Bush may be persuaded to drop him as his 1992 running mate after all. They will be wise, though, not to bet the rent money on it.These Democrats will argue that if the recession drags onor gets worse, a nervous president won't want to take chances on his own re-election by...

New York -- All over this country, retirement-income tragedies are in the making. Couples who counted on life insurance to create benefits for the widow or to build up retirement cash will wake up one day to a terrible discovery. The policy may lapse, or it may deliver far lower benefits than were promised.If you're counting on a policy for your old age, go back to the agent who sold it to you, or to someone in his company. Ask for a projection -- on the insurance company's letterhead -- of its death benefits and cash values for the next 30 years.

New York -- Memo to owners of life insurance policies or annuities: You can now find out virtually everything you want to know about whether your policy is safe.A newsletter called The Insurance Forum has just published a special ratings issue, covering 1,002 life and health insurance companies. It tells you: (1) How every established insurance-rating service (A.M. Best, Standard & Poor's, Moody's and Duff & Phelps) evaluates the soundness of your company, or a company whose policy you're thinking of buying.

Only about 8 percent of Americans leave gifts to charity when they die.As a result, the Prudential Insurance Co. has developed a life insurance policy that it says will make such giving a breeze. But some estate-planning experts say it's just a gimmick.The policy is called Charity Plus, and some agents have started selling it.Under Charity Plus, when a person buys a Prudential life insurance policy, he may be offered a second, smaller policy to benefit a favorite charity. The death benefit can range from $2,500 to $10,000.

WHAT HAPPENS to your house if your worst financial nightmare comes true and you suddenly lose your job? Who makes your mortgage payments when you have no paycheck for months on end? Do you have enough savings to cover the mortgage for six months or more? Two years of intensive consumer polling and focus-group research by some of the largest companies in the U.S. mortgage and insurance industries have documented deep-seated fears among homeowners about financial meltdowns triggered by unexpected job loss.

Your editorial on Vice President Joseph Biden's debate performance against Rep. Paul Ryan seems to have somehow ignored several factual errors by the incumbent ("Biden connects," Oct. 13). For starters, Mr. Biden claimed "we weren't told they wanted more security" in answer to a question about the terrorist attack on the U.S. consulate in Libya on the anniversary of 9/11. In doing so, Mr. Biden was contradicting the sworn congressional testimony of State Department officials last week, prompting GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney to say the next day that the vice president was "doubling down on denial.

Dan Rodricks wrote in a recent column that Howard County Health Officer Peter Beilenson is "sick of the vilification of the uninsured by opponents of Obamacare. " And that he is "sick of people like Rush Limbaugh, who have great health insurance, complaining that people who don't have insurance are just a bunch of freeloaders. It's obvious that neither Mr. Rodricks nor Mr. Beilenson has ever listened to Rush's radio program or they would know that Rush doesn't have insurance.

County officials are urging residents to purchase insurance policies if their homes have recently been added to newly redrawn flood insurance rate maps. The Federal Emergency Management Agency worked with Maryland's Department of the Environment to overhaul the statewide maps, which show which homes and businesses are most susceptible to flooding, and thus are generally required to buy flood insurance . In Howard County, the maps have not changed since 1986. Because of better technology, an additional 360 residences and 130 other structures near rivers and streams will be identified as being at risk of flooding, unless their owners appeal.

BRADENTON, Fla. - The Orioles roster thinned out a little Monday, with several players being sent out of camp including right-hander Brad Bergesen, who pitched in 34 games with the Orioles last year. The Orioles have not yet announced the cuts, but they also include infielder Steve Tolleson, outfielder Scott Beerer and catcher John Hester - all non-roster invitees - who were sent to minor-league camp. Bergesen was optioned to Triple-A Norfolk to be a starter. Also optioned to Triple-A Norfolk were pitcher Jason Berken, who made his spring debut Sunday after dealing with a hamstring issue, and Matt Antonelli, who batted .194 in 31 at-bats this spring.

With NFL dreams and sleepy eyes, small-school standouts, practice-squad castoffs and a pack of unknown draft hopefuls stepped onto the Ravens' indoor practice field Saturday morning. For many of them, it was the closest they will come to playing in the NFL. But it was an opportunity that didn't exist for relative no-names like themselves two years ago. The NFL conducted one of its 11 regional combines at Ravens headquarters in Owings Mills on Saturday. More than 130 under-the-radar NFL prospects - most with ties to the region - slipped on cleats and squeezed into compression shorts, hoping to earn an invitation to the NFL Super Regional Combine on March 30-31 at Detroit's Ford Field and potentially catch the attention of professional scouts.

For years, Baltimore County police were convinced that 24-year-old Heidi Bernadzikowski was killed in 2000 by her boyfriend. Stephen M. Cooke Jr. had taken out a lucrative life-insurance policy on Bernadzikowski just a month before her death. The family sued four years later, alleging he was the killer and shouldn't profit from the death, and called a county homicide detective to testify that Cooke was the sole suspect. They were able to reclaim about $575,000 of the insurance policy through a settlement.

New York -- A private deposit insurance policy has just hit the market. It's being pitched to people or organizations who run at least $200,000 through a single bank, so they're not fully covered by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.That might be small businesses, charitable or civic organizations, professionals with escrow accounts or individuals parking a payout from a company retirement account. Only the first $100,000 is federally insured. The government might also protect amounts over $100,000, especially when a large bank fails.

I am a 32-year-old attorney with a wife, two children and my own law firm. I am in the process of setting up some form of employer-funded retirement plan, and my insurance agent (and family friend) is telling me I should buy variable life insurance. While I have pretty much convinced myself that variable life insurance is not for me, my wife, who trusts the agent, thinks I don't understand the product and says our friend would not steer us in the wrong direction. What do you think? I think even the best-intentioned insurance agents can get excited about a product and not realize that it isn't the best fit. Variable life insurance - a life insurance policy that combines a death benefit with an account that can be invested in stocks, bonds and cash - can be a reasonable, if relatively expensive, option for high-income people who need life insurance and who have exhausted other tax-deferred ways of saving for retirement.