Hundreds of people have emailed me asking questions about the current flooding situation in Iowa. Has my home been affected? How bad is it really?

Well, I’ll let the front page of the Des Moines Register speak for itself.

Where I’m at (luckily), there’s been only minor ill effect. We’ve had some minor flash flooding in our back yard, but nothing disastrous (other than some depressing garden damage - I don’t think the rosemary and other herbs will recover). Our basement water pump has been running almost nonstop for the last two weeks. Many cornfields near my house (including the one I can see out of my back door to the east) are partially or entirely covered in water, however. Road travel in Des Moines is very challenging right now, with many, many roads closed.

I have family in northern Iowa that are being seriously affected by this flooding, and I have a lot of family in southern Iowa and western Illinois that are going to be affected by this in a week, when the high water that’s currently in northern Iowa will have reached them. Here’s the data I’m looking at that will be affecting them soon.

Part of the challenge for Iowa is that a large portion of the Iowa National Guard is stationed overseas, making it difficult for the remaining Guard to respond effectively to local emergencies like this.

What Can I Do To Protect Myself?

Know your flood risk Use floodsmart.gov to find out if the property you live in now (or a property you’re considering buying) is a significant flood risk. My area, unfortunately, isn’t covered by that web site (as of just a few years ago, my home was classified as farmland, so the data hasn’t been updated), so my next step was to contact the FEMA Map Service Center to find out my risk. I have a small risk for flash flooding, but minimal risk for river flooding, which was about what I expected.

Determine your need for flood insurance If you’re in an area with some degree of flood risk, consult your homeowner’s insurance policy to find out what coverage you have in the event of a flash flood or a separate significant flood event. If you live in a flood plain that has flooded in the last thirty years or so, you should definitely have flood insurance.

Be aware of the flood control plan in your neighborhood or town if you do live in a flood plain. Know what rivers you should be watching and what signs you should be looking for that a flooding situation may be occurring. Contact city hall and ask if there is a flood control plan for your town and ask for a copy of it, so you’ll have an idea of what the “concern” levels are for the flood protection in your area.

What Can I Do To Help If I’m Not Affected?

Volunteer, if you can Many towns near major rivers in Iowa, Illinois, and Wisconsin could definitely use sandbagging help. If you’re a college student off for the summer and would like a way to use your time to help people in need, contact the city hall or town hall in some of the towns in southern Iowa and western Illinois that lie along the Des Moines, Skunk, and Mississippi Rivers and volunteer to help in exchange for shelter and food. They’ll be glad to quickly find you a host family.

Consider what’s happened here as a part of who you vote for in November. The candidate who is putting resources into FEMA and the National Guard is the candidate that’s really interested in helping America out. Draw your own conclusions on which candidate that is for each office, but keep it in mind when you vote.

Over the last few weeks, I’ve been carefully considering the above question. I’m twenty nine years old, in good health, with a wife and two young children at home. I don’t commute for work, either, vastly reducing my chance of a disabling accident. In other words, my chance for long-term disability is pretty small.

How small? It’s a question that’s almost impossible to research. Almost all of the data out there on the topic was produced by the insurance companies themselves, meaning that I have to read them with a very skeptical eye.

For example, the American Council of Life Insurers claims that one third of all Americans between the ages of 35 and 65 will become disabled for more than 90 days. Intuitively, this seems like an incredibly high number, and because of the source, I have a very high degree of skepticism about that number.

Another scary industry statistic comes from the Health Insurance Association of America, who claim that 1 in 7 people can expect to be disabled for five years or more. Again, this number seems very high to me and could only be even remotely reasonable with the widest possible definition of disability.

The only real statistics I’ve seen on the subject come from the Census Bureau, which report that about 20% of Americans meet their definition of disabled, but only 23% of those disabled people actually qualify for disability benefits. Why? The vast majority of disabilities that the Census Bureau considers to be disabilities are ones that people work through - vision impairment, hearing impairment, and mobility impairment are all considered disabilities, but are ones that strong and self-motivated people can work through.

The obvious solution - the one that most Americans wind up following - is to just say forget it, believing that the risk is too minimal to bother with - and I can understand that conclusion. I know that’s the assumption I’ve operated on throughout my adult life to this point, and I’m willing to bet that it’s the assumption that many of you have operated on as well. However, as five cent nickel puts it, it makes sense to insure what you cannot afford.

The first question thus becomes could I afford the consequences of not having long term disability insurance? A quick examination of my finances says yes - but only over a fairly short term. We’d be fine over the course of a year to eighteen months. Beyond that, things would get very difficult for my family.

Next question: does my employer provide long term disability insurance? Right now, I am self-employed, so I don’t have the benefit of employer coverage. My wife does have this benefit, which would replace 60% of her salary 60 days after a disabling accident, so she’s covered. That still leaves me out in the dark, though.

Given those two questions and the thought process behind them, what I actually need is pretty clear. I need a policy that kicks in in six months to a year after a disabling incident and covers enough income that my family is able to get by, and I only need the insurance over the timeframe that I would actually need it - probably until at least my children are moved out. My impression from these criteria is that the cost of insurance would be quite low.

The next step is to get quotes on this insurance, and this is the step where I’m at. Most large insurance groups offer long term disability insurance and I’ve requested information and quotes from several such groups, including the group that handles my life insurance.

Come on… is this really worth it? This thought has crossed my mind regularly throughout this process, likely because long term disability insurance seems to be an uncommon thing outside of a job benefits package.

Any insurance you buy is a personal risk-reward analysis. Any time you choose not to insure something, you’re taking on some amount of risk. Insurance eliminates (or vastly reduces) that risk. Life insurance? The risk is the loss in income to your family if you were to pass on. Health insurance? The risk is high health care costs, especially for complex procedures. Auto insurance? Homeowners insurance? Renter’s insurance? They all insure your property against unknown disaster.

Long term disability is another risk you can insure against. If you judge the risk (long term disability where you survive but are unable to work) as being smaller than the cost (the monthly or annual premiums), then you’ll probably not take any out, but that balance is different for everyone.

For me, I’m leaning strongly towards acquiring insurance for a very long term severe disability. I can afford it, and knowing that my family would be secure if something rendered me incapable of writing is very reassuring - a risk and reward balance well worth it for me.

What’s your take on long term disability insurance?

One personal finance project that a lot of people overlook is the household inventory. It’s one of those “once in a great while” tasks that’s easy to overlook and forget about, but it’s not very hard and it can pay huge dividends if you’re carrying homeowners’ or renters’ insurance and something goes wrong with your living quarters.

A household inventory is a documentation of every item in your home so that you have this in the event of a disaster, such as a robbery or a house fire. It usually consists of a list of the items and/or a videotaped walkthrough of your home which captures images of the items.

Such an inventory can be very useful when dealing with insurance companies, as it provides documentation of the items that you own, thus helping your case for an insurance settlement.

Eight steps for making your own household inventory
One can make an excellent household inventory in just a few hours on a weekend. I was able to do my own home in about two hours of steady effort. It’s not too hard at all - it just takes time. Here’s the game plan.

1. Get a video recorder. If you don’t own one already, borrow one from someone. A video recording is a great way to document all of the items in your home, even the ones you forget to list.

2. Get a laptop - or a very good note taker. When we documented our home, we found it easiest to take a laptop from room to room in our home to jot down all of the information. If you don’t have a laptop, designate someone to be a note taker (maybe yourself, if you’re doing it alone).

3. Do one room at a time. Go to each room in your home and document all of the significant items in it. It’s not necessary to document individual foodstuffs and individual toiletries, for example, but I’d document things down to silverware and plates - my rule of thumb is that if it’s worth more than $10 and easily replaceable, or if it’s not easily replaceable no matter what, it gets documented.

4. Record as much information as you can about each item. Make, model, serial number, purchase date, and so on are all good pieces of information to have, especially for larger items. For smaller items, just list what they are and make sure that some video is taken.

5. Be sure to videotape or photograph any personal valuables. Jewelry and family heirlooms fall into this area. These are items that are not easily described and are best noted with visual proof of their existence.

6. Store the list/video in a secure place not in your home. This is a perfect item for a safe deposit box at your bank, for example. Just make sure it’s not in your home, as this is an item you’ll only need if there’s significant damage to your home or to the property in it.

7. Update the list semi-regularly. There’s no need to do this monthly, but an annual updating of the list can be useful. You can tack addendums on the end of your earlier lists or videos if you wish, covering any new purchases you’ve made.

8. Make sure that everyone knows where the list is, including a person or two who doesn’t live in your home. That way, if a real disaster strikes and you’re incapacitated, others can retrieve the list and help with insurance issues while you’re recovering - or can help your survivors get the insurance settlement that they’re due.

This week, The Simple Dollar attempts to address challenging questions in personal finance by looking at both sides of the story and figuring out some of the factors you need to look at to make a decision.

Over the last few months, I’ve received many, many emails from people thinking about a career change, usually towards starting their own business. In most cases, they’re not too worried about the money aspect - they tend to be much more concerned about health insurance.

Health insurance is the 800 pound gorilla in the room for decisions like these. For some, the risk of devastating illness or injury isn’t worth it and they try to stick with their primary job while building the business on the side. Others believe in the adage of you only live once and go for the gusto. Here’s the argument for both sides.

No, Don’t Abandon Health Insurance

Your personal health is your most valuable asset. A healthy body and mind enable you to get up in the morning and go through your tasks for the day and enjoy your life. Health insurance is your safest bet for making sure that you’ll continue to enjoy good health, by taking most of the financial burden for medical care off your shoulders.

Furthermore, if you have children or other people depending on your health and continued ability to earn money, a severe medical crisis without health insurance can utterly devastate your family. Health insurance enables an unexpected situation, like a serious illness or a car accident, to not completely transform the way of life of your family in a negative fashion.

If you value your own health and have a sense of responsibility to others, health insurance is a must. Don’t take the leap into an area without health insurance. That doesn’t mean you can’t investigate other options, like COBRA or self-insurance, but you shouldn’t take the leap into the unknown without a safety net if others are relying on you.

Yes, Go For The Gold!

When a truly great opportunity comes along in your life, one that fills you with joy and passion and drive, you should never let it pass by. Sure, there may be risks - and one of them may be a period without health insurance - but the sense of personal fulfillment and accomplishment and the possibility of great successes more than makes up for it.

First, the opportunity to do something with your life that fills you with excitement and energy is something rare and beautiful, and if there’s any way to take it without throwing away your most important responsibilities to others, you should always jump on board. A fulfilled life is a great life, and doing something that fulfills you can completely transform your life. Plus, when you let that opportunity pass, you’re bound for a great deal of regret.

Even more importantly, doing something you’re truly passionate about holds a far greater chance for success than doing the same old thing. If you take that leap, you have a chance to do something truly great with your life, something transformative. If you have that chance to do something amazing, you shouldn’t let it slip by because of a temporary lapse in health insurance.

Obviously, if you have the opportunity, use programs like COBRA and self-insurance to acquire health insurance, but don’t let a period without insurance cause you to not take the leap for your dreams. The risk of a major incident over a short period is much less than the continued pain of a great opportunity left untaken.

My Take

If you’re single, have no one relying on you, and are in reasonably good health, I say go for it. You aren’t responsible for the lives of others, only your own, and if it’s an opportunity you’re passionate about and believe in, it’s a path you should always take. If you don’t, you’ll regret it for a very long time, likely the rest of your life.

On the other hand, if you’re in poor health and have children to support, stick with the safety net. Those children depend on you, and if you were to fall into a dangerous health situation, they would suffer as well. The future of a child is not something one should play ball with - a childhood should be filled with relative safety, positive reinforcement, and opportunities for growth, not with the apocalyptic situation that a severe illness of a parent without health care would bring.

If you’re really on the fence about it, though, you should probably make the leap, provided your bases are as covered as you can make them. When a great opportunity passes you by and you make the “safe” choice, you’re often left with only one thing: a belly full of regret.

What’s your take?

Eventually, it happens to everyone. Something unexpected and disastrous happens, leaving us with a giant medical bill or some other enormous expense. Maybe you wake up one morning with more than a pint of blood having poured from your ear (it happened to me in college) or you have a heart attack on Thanksgiving morning as you’re about to pull the turkey out of the oven (it more or less happened to my mother). Maybe you’re awakened by the sound of a car running into and mostly through your house (it happened to the parents of a friend of mine). Maybe a tornado picks up your car and drops it in an abandoned rock quarry (it happened to a friend of mine). Maybe you buy a house on Tuesday and it burns to the ground on Friday (it happened to my cousin and his wife).

Sometimes these things just happen - they’re devastating, and often they tear asunder things you’ve been planning. There’s not too much you can do to really prevent them, but there are a lot of things you can do to minimize their impact on your life.

First of all, don’t panic. If you find yourself getting extremely upset and losing control, separate yourself for a little while and calm down. If you really can’t handle the emergency yourself, call 911. That’s what they are there for.

Second, don’t avoid it. As soon as you’re in control of your faculties, start dealing with the situation. Find out all of the resources available to you that can help, and start using them to correct your life. If you lost your job, don’t sit around for three weeks playing video games in the basement - polish up your resume and start hitting the pavement now.

Third, it is often useful to let down your guard a bit and contact someone you really trust to help you; for example, if your spouse is in dire straits or just passed on, you may need someone to step in and help you with the affairs of the moment. If you don’t have anyone, contact a local church (preferably the one most similar to your faith and upbringing) as most pastors are glad to help out someone truly in need.

There are also a few simple ways you can prepare now so that when the bad thing happens, you’re ready.

The first (and perhaps most important) thing is building up an emergency fund. Each week, you should have an automatic withdrawal from your checking account into a savings account - say, $25 or so. This money should just sit there in that savings account until a disaster strikes. That way, if the transmission dies in your car, it’s not panic time - it’s just time to go get money out of your savings account. This will help for smaller emergencies that can mostly be dealt with with cash.

The second task is to cover yourself and your spouse with life insurance, especially if you have children. This is especially true if you are in a two-income home, where both people work and both incomes are required to make payments - life insurance will help to prevent a financial disaster later on. A term policy for a person in their twenties is quite inexpensive - this should be a precaution that many people take.

Most states require some form of automobile insurance and many employers (though not all) provide health insurance. If your employer does not provide health insurance, it is well worth your time to seek out an employment situation that does provide it, as it is incredibly valuable. If you are self-employed, you may need to insure yourself, but there are many plans available for this.

If you take home nothing else, though, it’s this: build an emergency fund and don’t be afraid to use it when you need it. It will serve you well time and time again when life, well, kicks you in the teeth.

I have a close relative who is always complaining about how he’s broke because of various elements of bad luck. His car’s broken down, his water heater leaks, he got a speeding ticket - there’s always some reason why he can’t get ahead financially. The problem is that when times are good, he often spends his money in a frivolous fashion.

While it’s fine to spend some money, a bit of careful planning can ensure that “bad luck” comes around less often. Here are thirteen (ooh… unlucky!) tips for reducing the impact of unexpected expenses of all kinds in your life.

Build an emergency fund This is the best thing you can do. Each week, deposit a little bit of money into a savings account that you designate as an emergency fund. Then, when a disaster strikes, you can calmly pull the money from your emergency fund and take care of the disaster. How much should you have? Many people offer a “cap,” but I generally believe that it’s a good idea to put that small amount in weekly forever - if you ever get “too much” in the account, then pull out some for other purposes.

Make your investments diverse Don’t make the mistake of putting all of your money in the same investment - or the same types of investments. When you start investing, make sure that your money is in several investments that don’t have significant overlap. For example, you might want to own some domestic stocks, some international stocks, and a few bonds. A great way to diversify yourself is to use broad-based low-cost index funds.

Build up multiple streams of income This can defend you against job loss or other unexpected changes in income. How can you do it? Start a side business. Buy investments that continually earn a reliable income. Produce a one-time item that can earn an income over a long period, like a book or a detailed website. There are lots of possibilities.

Back up your data regularly If you keep financial or other important data on your computer, back the data up regularly. I keep most of my important stuff backed up on two separate 4 GB Flash drives that I keep in the safe - I back data up to this weekly and it’s saved me at least once.

Change your passwords on occasion If you use online accounts significantly, changing your passwords occasionally can protect you against identity theft. I change my passwords every three months. If you’re ever suspicious that anyone may have access to an online account of yours, change the password immediately.

Ensure your checking account offers some overdraft protection Everyone makes little mistakes sometimes, but if you do the math wrong on your checking account, you might just get dinged with a big unexpected fee. Once, with my old checking account, I got dinged with an ATM fee and an account maintenance fee - together, they overdrafted the account and cost me a lot of money. Make sure your checking account offers some form of overdraft protection - I particularly like ING’s overdraft protection on their online checking, which basically covers the overdraft, doesn’t charge you a fee, but charges you a low interest rate on the amount of the overdraft.

Get some insurance If you rent, renter’s insurance will protect your possessions in the event of a fire. If you own a car, look at comprehensive insurance options. If you have a young family, you should definitely look at life insurance. These all reduce your personal risk and, in most cases, are worth it.

Don’t speed or blatantly break other traffic laws Every time you speed, you’re basically taking a chance that there won’t be a police officer with a radar gun to catch you. Remember that each time you drop the pedal to the floor - it could seriously cost you. Besides, speeding is expensive for your gas mileage - most cars are optimized to go the speed limit and they get far worse gas mileage if you speed.

Keep an updated list of your possessions in a place not inside your living space This is a very important protection to have in the event of a disaster in your living quarters. List everything of value in your home, along with as many serial numbers as you can find. Be specific with the model numbers, too. This way, if something disastrous does happen, you can use this list with your insurance company to get replacements on the items.

Put a high value on reliability in your purchases - use “total cost of ownership” Don’t just go for the cheap items when replacing an appliance or an automobile. Instead, do some research and look at the total cost of ownership. For example, quite often the most expensive options end up being the cheapest if you look at energy costs and lifespan into account - if you spend $1,200 on a washing machine, for example, it might use half the energy and have twice the lifespan of the $200 model, meaning that it’s actually cheaper over the lifespan of the machine than the other one - plus, you’re less likely to have an unexpected nasty surprise.

Don’t put your money in speculative investments I get tons of emails about various hot stocks, and I hear lots of “tips” from various people on hot investments. Ignore all of them. Most of those investments are either highly speculative or are set up for you to fail at them. Don’t ever put your money in an investment based solely on one person’s unsolicited recommendation or on one article you read in some investment magazine. Play it safe with your money and it won’t fly away.

Make every payment well in advance of the due date Every bill I have dings me significantly for being even one day late. In order to avoid that unexpected expense, which sometimes happens even if I mail the bill a day or two early, I make sure to get my bills in the mail at least a week before their due date. Don’t let your utility bills ding you with unexpected fees - keep up with your bills.

Don’t carry a balance on your credit card If you can avoid it, don’t put anything on your credit card that you can’t immediately pay off. As soon as you start carrying a balance, you start getting eaten with finance charges, which make it harder to get the debt paid off. When it starts piling up - which it easily can when you start carrying a balance - you’re putting yourself in a dire financial position. If a big unexpected expense comes up, first try to find other ways to pay for it - clean out your media collection, for instance, or sell a few savings bonds. Use your credit card only as a last resort because it will bite back - hard.

My wife and I switched our auto insurance coverage recently and paid our full annual premium up front. It was a painful little payment, even though we had shopped around and such. This led us to both researching various methods with which one could save money on auto insurance. Here are seven useful and applicable tips that we discovered.

Look at a combination home and auto insurance policy. We did this (because we happened to be moving at the time as well) and found that a combination package that covered both of our vehicles as well as our home was substantially less expensive than the independent insurances would have been. If you’ve got home and auto insurance through separate companies, call up your agents and ask for quotes on combination packages - likely, that will save money.

Take a defensive driving course. If you have a speeding ticket or other minor violation on your record, it generally boosts your premiums on your auto insurance. Most states keep track of your violations through a point system - each violation earns you a number of points and each year sees a small reduction in points. Your point total is what insurers use to adjust your premiums upward - the more points, the more you pay. Taking an optional defensive driving course offered by your state for a small fee (some states, like Idaho, even offer these online) can net you a reduction of a few points, directly saving money on your insurance. A $30 course and a few hours can see as much as a 10% reduction in your premiums over the next few years.

Increase your deductibles. If you’re in good financial shape with a well-built emergency fund, look at raising your deductibles. This will directly lower your premiums, but still cover you in the case of a major accident. I found that if I raised my deductible from $500 to $1,000, that $500 difference is paid for in just over a year by letting me put that $500 in my emergency fund instead. After that, it’s just cheaper monthly bills.

Work on improving your credit. If you have some dings on your credit report, this can negatively influence your premiums. Insurance companies use as much information as they can get to estimate how risky of a driver you are, and if you have lots of credit issues, you’re much more prone to risky behavior. Keep all of your bills paid on time and work on lowering your credit card debt.

If your car is old, remove collision coverage and just go with liability coverage. My rule of thumb is that if a car’s cash and/or trade-in value approaches $1,000 (or less), you should just go with liability coverage. A car in that state is nearing the point of replacement anyway, so if you get in an accident, it’s probably going to simply need replacement and the cash value of the car is negligible - you’ll probably not get much less selling it for scrap. So don’t throw out good money in this situation - move to just liability coverage.

Buy a car that’s less prone to theft or accident. Insurers also take the type of car you’re buying into account, even down to the color. A flame-red Mustang is going to have far higher premiums than a silver-colored Honda Odyssey, for example. Why? Aggressive colors are often linked to aggressive drivers, and vans are often a sign of a stable and secure situation (what kind of person drives a minivan versus what kind of person drives a Mustang). Consider the statement that your car makes about you - and consider that same statement is being made to the insurance company.

Pay your annual premium all at once. If you pay semiannually, quarterly, or monthly, you’re likely paying a fee each month for this “convenience.” Instead, just save up the premium in a savings account and pay it once a year. Let’s use an example of a person whose annual premium is $900 a year, and each payment plan charges a fee of $8.95 a payment. If one pays monthly, that means a monthly bill of $83.95 every month. Instead, a person could put only $73.50 a month into a 5% APY savings account and pay the whole thing once a year without payment fees. That’s a savings of more than $10 a month.

Remember, if you do all of these things and your premiums don’t budge, it may be time to shop around for new insurance. Don’t hesitate to get quotes from other insurers if you suspect your current insurance is way overpriced.

One of my closest friends in the world completed a Ph.D. in mathematics recently and became an actuary for a very large life insurance company. I had lunch with him recently just to catch up on things and we spent about ten minutes talking about life insurance itself. He basically told me that if I am a financially sound person, I am throwing my money away on life insurance unless I meet a few strict criteria (young, a relatively low net worth, and young children). This kind of blew me away considering he’s in the life insurance business, but when he broke it down for me, it made a lot of sense. Note that the advice that follows is based on a conversation between friends and shouldn’t be viewed as professional advice and you shouldn’t just follow it blindly without doing your own research, but it is quite interesting and worth sharing.

First of all, unless you are a financial train wreck, you should never buy anything but term life insurance. Insurance as an investment is a great investment for the insurance company but a terrible one for you. If you want insurance, get insurance; if you want to invest, buy an investment. Don’t mix the two - it’s akin to buying a box of bad cereal to get the cheap plastic toy inside. Why not just save a buck and get a better box of cereal, then spend the buck to get a better toy?

Second, if you have no dependents and no spouse, don’t buy life insurance. Ever. Don’t let a salesman talk you into it.

Next, the more net worth you have, the less insurance you need. This means that before you start thinking about life insurance, know what your net worth is. This is an important number for figuring out how much net worth you’re going to need.

After that, think about your family’s needs carefully. Look at how many people are in your household (spouse plus dependent children) and multiply that by five, or maybe a bit more if your children are very young - this number is the number of years worth of your salary that would be needed to support each person in your house should you pass away. He suggested multiplying it by six in my situation, but I wanted plenty of security for my kids, so I used eight. I then multiply it by the number of people in the household, four. That gives me thirty two. This number is the number of “salary years” that I should leave behind.

Then, multiply your calculated “salary years” by your current salary (or reasonably expected salary in a few years) to see how much net worth you should leave behind. Let’s say I make $50,000 a year; times thirty two, that means I need to leave behind $1.6 million. Ouch. That’s a lot.

However, one should subtract from that their net worth. I would make a little dent in that number, but not a big one, leaving me with still quite a sizeable policy. If I went with a lower multiplier (say, my friend’s recommended 6), I could reduce the policy quite a bit.

Once you have your magic number, get a relatively short term policy for that amount, usually long enough for your children to have left the nest. For my example here, that means I would get a twenty year term life insurance policy for $1 to $1.5 million. The premiums on that would be $600 to $800 a year, or $50 to $65 a month. He suggests doing this so that one can potentially get a better rate with a twenty year policy instead of a ten year one, but that policies that extend past the children leaving the nest are a fool’s game.

When your policy expires, don’t renew it immediately - recalculate. Let’s say that in twenty years, my children have left the nest, leaving my wife and I home alone together. We’ve built up some serious savings, our home is paid for, and thus our net worth is in pretty good shape. I sit down and recalculate and discover that in fact my net worth now exceeds ten times my salary (five times the people in household, which would be two), so I just don’t bother with life insurance again, leaving me with $50 a month more to enjoy or invest.