How Do I Enter My Whole Life/Universal Life Policy?

A whole life or universal life policy combines annual saving and the annual purchase of term life insurance. The amount by which the cash value of your policy rises each year is the amount of annual saving you are doing within the policy. Note that you need to adjust future cash value amounts for inflation to see how much saving in today's dollars you are actually doing from year to year. The face value of the policy in a given year minus the cash value represents the term value of insurance for that year. Again, you need to adjust the term value by inflation to understand how much term insurance the policy is giving you each year measured in today's dollars. (If X is the amount of either the cash or term value Y years in the future that you want to convert into today's dollars, you need to take X and divide it by the quantity 1 plus the inflation rate all raise to the power Y.)

You should not try to enter a whole life policy into ESPlanner. Instead, you should look at ESPlanner's recommended annual saving and term life insurance amounts and compare them with the saving and term holdings each year that the policy is having you do. If ESPlanner is recommending more saving and more term insurance in future years than the policy is delivering, consider increasing these amounts. If if is recommending less, consider buying a different whole life policy that entails less inside build up (saving) and less term insurance.

Larry