Life insurance can mean more than protection for your loved ones

(BPT) - Most people who own life insurance don’t think about it often. It’s something they pay for under the assumption that the benefit will be received when they are no longer around. But when you own life insurance, you can go to sleep at night with the confidence that you’re helping to protect the ones you love. And with certain forms of life insurance, you can also rest easy knowing that your policy is working for you in another way: growing your cash value.

Are you asking yourself how this is possible? It’s simple. When researching life insurance options for you and your family, be sure to look at “participating” policies. These types of policies are designed to offer the potential to earn dividends for eligible participating policyowners. While not guaranteed, a policyowner’s dividend typically reflects the portion that each specific policy has contributed to the surplus of the issuing life insurance company.

Policyowner dividends can be received in a number of ways. Eligible participating policyowners may use dividends to purchase additional coverage, to help pay life insurance policy premiums, to repay policy loans and policy loan interest, or they can be paid in cash. With the option of using dividends to purchase additional paid-up life insurance coverage, the policy’s total death benefit and cash value increases and the “paid-up addition” insurance is eligible to earn dividends in subsequent years.

A number of leading life insurance companies have strong track records of paying policyowners dividends, including Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company (MassMutual), a company that is run for the benefit of its members and eligible participating policyowners.

“The commitment we’ve made our policyowners is brought to life through our annual dividend payout,” said Roger Crandall, MassMutual Chairman, President and CEO. “Through nearly our entire history, our policyowners have received an annual dividend regardless of what is happening in our world – whether it’s through world wars, pandemics, market crashes, and most recently, a historically low interest rate environment where even three-month Treasury bills are yielding zero percent.”

If you want to learn more about life insurance options, please visit www.massmutual.com.

CRN201611-197895