hi,
     i am having a  huge confusion between whole life vs term isurance. I tried asking people ,and insurance agents ..and they all have good things to say about whatever they are selling. I tried googling... and all i could find was pros and cons of either one and people hugely defending their policies... so which one is better.? 

 Based on your own post, its clear that you know the pros and cons of either. So why are you asking us the question? Its like somebody knowing the taste of Laalmohan and Rasbari and asking whether s/he should buy Laalmohan or Rasbari. (I like Laalmohan better btw). 

Rasbari

haina aajkal ka nepali haru k vayeka yaar. amrica aaye vandai ma badi janne hunu parne? eeuta le sidha prasna garcha, aada vanda badi le tedo tedo uttar dincha. haina dina man cha vane sida uttar dinu ni k ko khoya khane jasto tedo tedo uttar diyeko.
@luckygal i dont know the answer, i only replied because i see these kind of answers all the time is sajha.
BTW i like both

I asked cause i read pros and cons of both and STILL couldnot decide which is better for ME. ?? Thought some one here might share some of their stories.. But anyways.. i should have asked this question somewhere else ... My Bad .

 Why getting touchy ni feri. I was just messing with you. I wish I could've provided an answer but I have no clue about it. sorry. 

And I was answering my preference between laalmohan and Rasbari.
Thanks for the lecture session. Maybe you should also lecture on the nature of questions that fit the bill here in Sajha? Ready with my notepad, sir.

Well...I am no expert by any means, but assuming you are young and healthy, why would you buy a term-insuarnce? Term insurance, as the name implies, expires after a certain term (5 yr, 10yr, etc). The beneficiary gets the "benefit" if a certain event, death in this case, takes place within that period. In my opinion, this is a kind of policy that you would consider buying if you are old, hopelessly ill--or in cases where you think you don't have much time left for survival yet want to provide some benefits to your beneficiaries. Term insuarnce is a short-term insurance, of course depending upon the duration of the term.

Whole life is an insurance policy that is in-effect for as long as you live, but then again you will be paying premiums for it as long as you live! If you stop paying premiums in the middle, you lose the coverage! It's a good policy to have, since we are certain to die one day, but then again how much are you willing to pay. Basic economics stuffs-cost vs benefit. So, if you are young and healthy, then most likely you will be paying premiums for coulple of decades! It ultimately comes down to how much are you willing to pay for benefits many years down the road.

But then there are other interesting mix of insurances, where you can even sell your insurance to "buyers." For instance, you are a  75 year old and have a history of heart diseases in your family and no one in your family has survived beyond age 85, then you will find people who will gladly buy you a $500,000 house, pay the insurance premiums for you and do a lot of other good stuffs, if they get to collect the benefits!! This is complicated stuff, but you get the point.

 Which one is better, that's pretty much a circumstantial question. it depends on your need. insurance, term / whole is something that you buy to full fill your personal and financial need, it also depends on how much can you afford and for how long. since am in love with these financial tools, am gonna give you a lesson 101 in life insurance :)

i believe you'r in mid 20's, single, if you were married, ud be talking about this with your husband and not here :). If you'r purpose of buying a life insurance is solely for the reason that , in case god forbid something happens to you, which is you die , you want your beneficiary to get the money, then you should buy whole life insurance. now yes you might argue, why cant you buy a term, 5 yr, 10, 20, geez now days they even have 30, and your argument could be right, but can you guarantee, that you'd die within 5 yr or 10, or even 30 :) NO.. well unless ur planning to commit a suicide, but then remember theres a 2 yr exclusion period, after two year you could try that too :)

let suppose you own a house, ur mortgage is 250k, 15-30 yr term, then if your purpose is to have a life insurance, enough to pay off the house, incase you go to god, then you should just buy a term, long enough to cover the term of your mortgage, coz then that would be ur primary reason. 

now lets suppose, you just opt for a term, say 20 years, ur 22 now, after 20 years, u become 42, and your insurance is gone. but your need is still there, and if you'r not healthy by then, then even if you want to buy whole or term, ur premium will be way too high, atleast 350-500 a month for prolly a 250k, policy. which in 20 years wouldnt be a whole lot, may be a lot to go shopping but not a lot to cure financial burden. 

now there are several term insurance, than you can buy as term, but you have an option to convert them to whole life in future, you can opt that now. since it will be cheaper, you dont have to worry about the big payments and so forth. 

if you'r already making money, then just go buy a whole life, you can start with small amouth, with option to increase the amouth ( face value) in future. that will give you an option to increse the policy as your need gets larger . 

now there are other insurance, such as variable whole life, universal whole life and so forth, that you can buy, very similar to whole life, and your premium, or i should say portion of ur premium will be invested in stock market, or mutual funds within the policy,so you can actually still have the face value as a benefit, and accumulate money too, tax deffered ( now thats a diff lesson ) 

theres one other benefit of whole life, lets say you buy a whole life, 250k policy, you'r premium will be about 150-200 a month. how the whole life works is, as you pay, i guess about 10-12 years. the policy will be fully paid for, meaning, the cash value of the policy, will by itself generate sufficient money to cover your premium. 

remember these whole life policy isnt just designed to pay only if you die, you can actually accumulate money within the policy that you can borrow in the future. ofcourse if you do not choose to pay after 10-12 years, your policy would still be valid, but then you wouldnt accumulate cash value, as you would if u kept paying the premium. 


anyways, more than life insurance you should think about openning, ROTH IRA FIRST...open a savings account, save atleast 4-6 month of your expense, and go on from there. 

in the mean time, if u have to, then buy term insurance. afetr u get married, then your situation would change, then you can buy whole life :)

sorry for the typos . 
and yea term you can buy for any, if u buy whole life, buy from mutual companies , the ones that are not traded , such as NYL, MASS MUTUAL, MUTUAL OF OMAHA 

 and  ya i forgot to mention, dont just listen to isurance agents, they will push for whole life coz they make a lot from whole life than term, and i mean a lot more :)

I think "tranquility" has some good knowledge there. Like tranquility said, the comissions that  agents make is huge, in some cases 200% of your first year premiums and may be 5-10% of your second year premiums. So, obviously it's in their best interest to get you to buy their products.

I mean the first question I would ask myself is: Why do I need this product? Am I worried more about my retirement or more worried that I may not get to retire ( i.e. to go to god early)? How many kids do I plan to have? If you are young and healthy and in the U.S., then you will definitely have to worry about the retirement, may be not this early but at some point in time.

Personally, I don't see the need to buy one of those products. May be that scenario will change later, who knows. But I would rather look into annuities, which pay a fixed income, for a term or till death, after retirement so that I have a stable income in the latter part of life. Then you couple that with 401K, IRA, Pension, Social Security--then I think you can have a pretty decent retirement.

Phew... Kya complication! To make things simple, i'd say i still like lalmohan better.

 well i wanna shed some more light to what arbiter said. 

Annuity -  generally, are used to two type of people, for mostly specifically 2 types of need. 1 ) asset preservation, what that means is IRS has a law that even if you are sued or bankrupt, or whatever happnes, legally no one can touch the money in your annuity . 

2) if you ahve a fix amount, and thats all you have, and you are old and you dont wanna take risk, and you want a annuity, mostly fixed annuity. example you have a 200k, and you open an annuity, you get prolly, 2000 a month till you life. and its gone. if u want join annuity, with your wife, then you might get 1500 till you live, and after you die, your wife gets 500 a month till she lives. pretty much i think its a shitty tool at our age. later in life, it might be usefull, but def not right now, def not till you have some hard cash. now one might say, if i have 1 mil, or 2 mil, then id get 10k-20k, a month, which is good income, then ur a fool, u can get much more return with that kinda money using it in somewhere else rahter than annuity. 


Pension  - Goodluck with that :) unless you work for govt, no one has pension these days :) the ones those did, are cutting it off, or already have. 

401k - great tool. invest fully, to the cap. 

SS - like rick perry always says, ss is a scam, and it really is. if you die, ur spouse gets 800 as a death benefit. your retiretment income from ss, as of now, is 1200 avg. ya try living in that after 30 yrs. 

ROTH IRA -  Best for young working adults. THATS THE WAY TO GO, TO START. 


btw as a rule of thumb, ur insurance policy should be 10 * your annual salary. keep in mind, insufficient coverage is as good as no coverage. 

and if you feel lucky, as your name states, play lottery lol :) goodluck. hey all u gotta do is get 6 numbes :P