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One night while cooking dinner, I could hear my rarely serious husband calling my name from the next room. There was a solemnity to his voice that I wasn’t used to hearing and it startled me a little a bit. When he came to where I was, he told me he had a question, which made me more nervous as I’m used to him just blurting things out. He finally came out and asked if I would be comfortable with him securing an insurance policy for my stepchild’s mother. He explained that he wanted to be sure that my stepchild had an additional cushion of financial security in the event that, God forbid, something should happen to her mother. I told him that I wouldn’t have a problem with it at all, so he reached out to his co-parent to see how she felt about it. She shared that she was also on board and thus, the process began.

Despite not being together romantically, raising children together leaves co-parents financially connected in many ways — whether they care to acknowledge this fact or not. Since life insurance is essentially supposed to cover your financial responsibilities in the event that you pass away, it’s crucial that co-parents have these sometimes uncomfortable conversations as their ability to overcome these awkward hurdles will always benefit the child in the long run.

”Even if you do not get along with your former spouse, it is still important to protect the child or children you had with him or her,” advised Daniel Hochler, managing associate at Forrest Hill Financial Group in New York. told MadameNoire. “Taking out a life insurance on your former husband or wife, will protect your children in the event you are no longer able to, and provide them the life and education you would want them to have.”

First and foremost, it’s important to know that you cannot take an insurance policy out on a person without their knowledge or consent. This is considered insurance fraud and a headache that you definitely don’t want, so the first step to take is to have a conversation with your co-parent. The next step is to find a life insurance provider that allows you to purchase coverage for another person. In order to act as a policyholder for a third party, many companies will require you to provide written consent from the insured.

Although your ex may have their own insurance policies, taking out a policy on them can be helpful to you as their co-parent because it places you in the driver’s seat. As the experts at Fabric point out, you are in the position to determine who the beneficiaries are and how much the payout will be. Additionally, you know for a fact that the policy is being maintained and premiums are up to date.

”As you move apart from your prior spouse, you can guarantee the children you had with him or her are protected,” Hochler explained. “The policy that you take out on your former spouse can be guaranteed to go to the children you want it to, which may not be the case if the existing policy has other beneficiaries, including a new spouse or additional children.”

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