You may have seen advertising for life insurance settlements on TV, the radio or the internet. This is good, as it raises visibility for life insurance settlements as a solution for clients.
More often than not, the advertising is from buyers advertising for direct business. Why? Answer: there is no competition that way. Providers will say to come directly to them, they are the biggest, they are the best, they have many funds behind them, etc. This sounds good, and I appreciate good marketing, but that is not the whole picture.
In our market, buyers are known as "providers". They:
Do not have a fiduciary duty to clients to give the highest offer. When you or I try to buy a car, we are not looking to pay the most amount of money, right?
May have many funds behind them (most of them do), but you do not know how many of those funds your client's policy has been sent to. All of them? Only a few? The one that pays the provider the most money? And, have the funds been leveraged against each other to obtain the highest offer? You don't know, the process is opaque.
Conversely, life insurance settlements brokers (like us):
Have a fiduciary duty to you and your clients to market their policy to obtain the highest amount of money for it that is possible.
Have access to many different providers, with many funds behind them, giving us the opportunity to place more clients' policies and maximize the value for clients' policies. More is better.
Leverage providers against each other, allowing us to obtain the highest offer for policies. Many providers seeing a policy equals competition, which increases leverage. Many times, providers will make ever increasing offers on policies, as they are driven higher by other providers.
Detail every offer a client's policy receives in the sale contract. Commissions are also disclosed and detailed in a broker disclosure statement.
Case study:
We are currently closing on a client's $350,000 universal life policy with no cash in it. The opening offer on the policy was $10,000. By the time we were done marketing it, the closing offer was $72,000. Had the client or his advisor gone direct to a provider, the policy may have sold for $10,000. This is a win for the client.
What I am not saying is providers are bad or terrible. They are important. They purchase clients' policies. But, what I am saying is that life settlements brokers maximize value for your clients, and for you. There are no "comps" like in real estate, so unless your client's policy is fully marketed, you do not know the true value of the policy.
If you do not have a partner for life insurance settlements, it would be a privilege to be of service to you. If you do partner with a provider, and would like to see the advantage of a life settlements broker, I invite you to send your next case to the provider and to us at the same time, and we will see which way is best for you and your client.
We're here to help.
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