The
fact that one person (much less 1
million people) buy a particular
life
insurance plan from a particular company
is not exactly a reason to go out and do
the same but it's interesting to at
least take a look at market share.
Let's get a snapshot of the U.S. life
insurance market by company share and
see if we can gleam any information that
helps us make a better decision.
First, we'll list out the top 10 carriers.
Keep in mind that life insurance can
come in many forms from
whole life to
term life and everything in between.
Most of the data on market share is a
measurement of premium amount and whole
life by definition is going to make up a
big part of that since it's so much more
expensive than term life. Now for
the drum roll of the top 10. This
data is from 2007 and needless to say,
things have changed a bit.
1.
AIG (American International Group).
This isn't exactly a ringing endorsement
that bigger is better. In 2007,
AIG had 18% of the market share with
almost 30.5 Billion (yes that's billion)
in premium for the year. That's a
staggering figure...especially in
hindsight now that we know how AIG
almost collapsed. Life insurance
policy holders are protected up to a
point by
State Guarantee Funds for $250K
to $300K of total life insurance policy.
Still, the take-away from the biggest
becoming one of the most unstable means
we need to find other measurements.
$250K is typically under what many
people choose as a life insurance amount
so we don't want to rely on State
Guarantee Funds to protect our life
insurance protection into the future.
2.
Metropolitan Life (also called Met life
with the Snoopy mascot). Less than
half of AIG, MET Life comes in at over
7%. Met is a strong life insurance
company that has managed the storm well.
The company is conservative but in the
right way.
3.
Hartford. Hartford comes in at
just under 5%. As we go down, the
separation between market share
percentages narrows significantly.
Rounding out the spot 3 through 7 are
long established life insurance
companies. At this point, it comes
down to the carrier rating and life
insurance rate for your particular
situation.
4.
Northwestern Life. 4.75%
5. Prudential LIfe 4.53%
6. New York Life 3.79%
7. Aegon 3.54%
8. Lincoln National 2.9%
9. John Hancock 2.83%
10. Mass Mutual 2.56%
Needless to say, there are countless
other life insurance companies, many of
which are very competitive and included
in our term life insurance quoting
engine. You almost can't be
in the life insurance business (in our
view) without very high ratings from the
rating agencies. New companies (at
least, new to life insurance) are
bringing products to the market that are
innovative. We constantly
re-evaluate the market to make sure we
have best offering of life insurance
plans for you. We're not so much
concerned with market share as finding
the best fit for our clients. It's
what we do.
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