A mortgage is a long-term financial commitment and you have to maintain the monthly repayments for the full duration of the mortgage. That’s going to be over many years but non of us have the benefit of a crystal ball - so no one knows how your circumstances are going to change. So that must represent a big risk.

Mortgage Payment Protection Insurance (MPPI) is just one of a range of valuable insurances which includes critical illness insurance and life insurance, which you can use to reduce that risk and protect your family’s finances. The purpose of MPPI is to ensure that you have the income to continue paying your mortgage repayments if you’re off work for an extended period due to accident, sickness or unemployment.

The Top Tips

Some mortgage lenders may try to coerce you into taking out an MPPI policy along with your mortgage. If this happens, make sure you find out how much extra the MPPI cover will cost you each month. Then get on the Internet and get some competitive quotations. Most people will find that the Internet saves them up to 60%!

Mortgage lenders will only quote you for the amount of cover you need to meet your monthly mortgage repayments. The author recommends that you extend the cover to include the cost of your home & contents insurance, mortgage life insurance, and the cost of any investment plan you have arranged to repay your mortgage (the investment plan only applies to mortgages where you are only paying the interest each month and will be repaying the capital at the end of the mortgage).

You can take out MPPI at any time. Some people wrongly believe that you can only take out MPPI when you arrange the mortgage.

If your employment is casual or seasonal you will not be able to claim on an MPPI policy. Every policy has what are called exclusions and seasonal and casual work is a typical exclusion. Exclusions are the circumstances under which a claim will be refused. Be sure to read these exclusions before you take out the policy and, if your circumstances mean that you’re unlikely to be able to make a valid claim, don’t buy the insurance! Exclusions on MPPI policies can eliminate 50% of potential claims.

The cheapest is not always the best. So don’t automatically opt for the cheapest policy. The circumstances under which policies pay out do vary - so check them out cautiously. The premium quoted will be a reflection of the extent of the exclusions in the policy, the level of cover provided and the insurers general pricing policy.

MPPI is sold under a number of alternative names. So don’t get confused. It can also be described as Accident Sickness and Unemployment Insurance, Payment Care and Payment Cover. In principle, they are the same - but remember to check out the exclusions!

Most MPPI policies say that you must be off work for a minimum period before you can claim. The longest period you’ll find is 60 days but many policies reduce this to 30 days. Some will then backdate the payment to the first day you were off work. Look out for the details which you’ll find in the policy’s Terms and Conditions. Always check these out before you buy - and remember to compare like with like when you’re comparing prices.

Don’t confuse Mortgage Indemnity Insurance (MIG) with Mortgage Payment Protection Insurance. MIG p rovides insurance cover for a lender for any losses they might suffer as a result of a property on which they provided a mortgage being sold for less than the value of the outstanding mortgage. All payments under a MIG policy go to the lender, not you!

If you have Permanent Health Insurance your may not need MPPI. Check out the terms of you PHI policy and then make your mind up whether MPPI is adding anything extra.

If you already have Critical Illness Insurance be aware that there is a level of duplication with MPPI. MPPI will pay an income during the insured period for any illness that prevents you from working. Critical illness Insurance pays out a lump sum if you have any of the chronic illnesses listed on the critical illness policy (other conditions apply). So if you have a valid claim under your critical illness policy, you will probably also have a valid claim under your MPPI policy. However, if the illness that’s keeping you off work is not listed on the chronic list then only your MPPI policy will payout.

Do shop around. You’ll find that the Internet is the cheapest place to shop for MPPI and many web sites enable you to arrange cover immediately online.

The good bit - if you claim, the income is totally tax-free!

Michael is the chief editor of Express Life Insurance offer life insurance and mortgage life insurance.

Additional reading - What is Mortgage Payment Protection Insurance?

Share This

Banks serve a tremendous purpose in this world.

They take in individuals deposits and pool them together to lend them to businesses or individuals who need the capital for a business opportunity they have. This business opportunity could be a company that wants to expand or an individual who wants to buy a home.

The more that people save, the more money that is in the banking system and this increased money leads to more loans and more economic growth. This growth is natural and healthy because people’s savings represent capital they could use in the future for more purchases. Thus, when a business borrows more money and invests that capital to be able to manafucture more goods it is a smart decision because people already have more money saved to spend on these goods.

This becomes a healthy circular formula that is summarized as such: “higher savings” leads to “more loans to businesses” which leads to “more business investment” which leads to “great consumer choices” and of course more jobs are created along the way which further fuels the economy forward.

Well, most of us are aware that the rate of US savings was actually negative last year, meaning we spent more than we made. This is down from saving 7.5% of our salaries only 30 years ago. So we see that this current economic boom has not been built upon by people’s savings.

On the other hand, economies also grow when interest rates are set artificially low as they were set in the US. These low rates spurred the real estate bubble to new, incredible prices never before seen in the US and the world. And the amazing thing is that there is no economic justification for these high home prices outside of the herd mentality thinking that prices will keep going up.

Well, we have passed that point and are now seeing decreasing prices and increasing inventories of homes available for sale.

The problem with banks is that they get caught up in the herd mentality as well, increasing the amount of money they lend for people to buy homes. And not only that, they are doing so in a riskier and riskier fashion using adjustable rate mortgages.

Currently, US commercial banks face incredible risks because over 60% of their total earning assets are mortgage-related!!! Let me repeat that, over 60% of US commercial bank’s assets are mortgage related - a postwar record high.

As a result of the above risks faced by banks any problems happening in the real estate market would have strong negative ramifications for the US banking system. As an example, the Japanese banking system was crippled after the boom of the 1980’s when they concentrated much of their capital in real estate. Japan spent the following 14 years in an economic doldrum and is now just beginning to see the light of day.

Now that interest rates are going up, and will continue going up, people who used adjustable mortgages are feeling the pinch of increasing monthly mortgage payments. As a result, foreclosure rates are up 38% over last year and bank’s bottom lines are feeling this pinch.

Billionaire Warren Buffet recently said that he has been studying recent bank balance sheets and is very concerned about the growing number of defaults on their books.

The point is that even though banks aren’t prepared and well diversified it means that you should be even more so! How to prepare yourself is discussed in detail in the recently issued eReport entitled “Recession - How To Survive and Thrive”.

Louis Hill, MBA is the creator of the information website http://www.MyRealEstateBubble.com and is the author of the recently published “How To Prosper In The Changing Real Estate Market. Protect Yourself From The Bubble Now”.

Share This