Why Choose Us For Life Settlements?

It is a privilege to work with advisors and their clients across the country. Every once in awhile, someone will ask: "Why should I do business with you, versus a buyer directly?". This is a question that I am delighted to answer. Here are the reasons to choose us for life settlements:

1) First and foremost, we are life settlements brokers, and we have a fiduciary duty to clients to market their policy to obtain the highest amount of money for it that we can. Buyers (called Providers in our market) do not.

2) Our superpower is leverage. Providers do not have this superpower, because it is not in their best interest. Permit me to explain. Providers are trying to obtain a client's life insurance policy for as little money as possible. The lower the amount, the more potential profit they can make. They are not "bad". It is the business-model. When you or I are trying to buy an asset, say a car, we are not trying to pay the most amount of money for it, are we? Of course not. And, neither are the providers. However, when we are involved - things change. We have access to many different providers, leveraging them against each other to maximize value for client. I have seen the same provider offer 10 different times (literally) on a client's policy. Competition drives up the price for providers, and the value for clients.

Some recent client examples include:

Opening offer $90,000 - Closing at $225,000

Opening offer $60,000 - Closing at $225,000

Opening offer $40,000 - Closing at $230,000

Opening offer $20,000 - Closing at $55,000

3) Placing more policies - sometimes, there is only one provider that wants a policy. Having so many providers allows us to place more clients' policies. With a provider direct, a client may not receive an offer on their policy at all, unless they happen to have contacted the one provider that wants the policy, which is like finding a needle in a haystack. Clients and advisors would not know many of the capital sources that we can access, and some are proprietary.

4) Transparency - a life settlements broker must disclose all offers made on a policy, and by which provider, making the process very transparent. Some providers will say - come to us, we have access to many funds, so you get the best deal for a policy. Of note, providers do not have a duty to disclose all offers, so clients and their advisors do not know which funds offered on the policy or what the offer was. The process is opaque. In addition, do the providers leverage their funds against each other to maximize value, the way brokers leverage providers? There is no incentive for providers to do that. They get the business either way. The bottom line is - you will never know. Most providers have multiple funds that they access. Which is better - working with one provider with multiple funds, or working with many different providers, each with multiple funds? In our market, the more providers with funds that see a client's policy, the better the leverage and the better the opportunity to obtain the highest offer for a client's policy.

Providers will say to come to them, because you don't have to pay a broker commission, or advisors don't have to split a commission. This is true. However, remember the broker's superpower - leverage. Consider the examples above. Each of those clients, had they or their advisor gone to a provider directly, very well may have sold the policy for the opening offer. There are no "comps" as in real estate, so clients and advisors don't know the true value of the policy. Instead, the advisors and clients came to us and received the top offer at which the policy was sold. Only when a policy is marketed, will an advisor and client know the maximum amount that will be offered for a policy. This work is worth commission. And, even if advisors "split" commission with brokers, often the "split" commission is more than the full commission directly with a provider. In a recent case, a client went directly to a provider and received an offer of $36,000 for her policy. Then, she contacted her advisor, who contacted us. We marketed the policy and sold it for $47,000 net of commission. The client benefitted by $11,000 and the advisor benefitted as well.

I appreciate the providers advertising on TV and on-line, because it helps raise visibility for the solution that life insurance settlements can be. However, I also want people to know the difference between a provider and a broker.

The bottom line is we work with advisors and their clients nationwide to maximize value for their client's life insurance policy when it is no longer wanted, no longer needed, or perhaps no longer affordable. We're here to help.