When you're shopping for life insurance, it's important to think about the assets you're protecting.
You don't want to leave your family with a huge mortgage they're unable to pay without your paycheck.
One way to protect them is to purchase a decreasing term life insurance policy.
This type of insurance is one of the three most common you'll see when you go shopping for a policy.
The death benefit of a decreasing life insurance policy goes down a little bit each year of the contract.
At the same time, the premium stays the same.
You might ask why on earth anyone would want to buy a policy like this, but it's important to remember that the size of the debt you're protecting decreases each year, along with your death benefit.
It means if you live a long time and there's just a small amount left on your mortgage when you die, your benefit should help your family just enough.
On the other hand, if you die soon after you buy the policy and your mortgage is still very large, the larger death benefit will be there to help your family be able to keep the house.
Just remember if you do buy this kind of insurance that the beneficiary will usually be your creditor, and not your family.
This basically ensures your creditor will still get his money even if you die before you finish paying it off.
One bad thing about decreasing term life insurance is that it's not renewable.
This is because the death benefit left at the end of the contract is zero, so there's nothing to renew.
However, this is the cheapest type of insurance you can buy, and if you purchase it around the same time you buy your house, it can provide much-needed protection for your family if something terrible happens to you.