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I Made a Whole Life Plan MUCH 'Cheaper' (?) than a Term Plan

Updated: Feb 7, 2023

I'm going to provide some potential evidence for why 'Term Insurance' only attitudes are frankly, ridiculous.


Maybe its because the Seedly Finance Festival ended not too long ago, but I've been seeing a lot of feedback from a new wave of BTIR [Buy Term, Invest The Rest] advocates. BTIR does have its merits, even though that's absolutely no statistical evidence in the slightest that it has ever worked or would ever work because behavioral finance - and I would know, having written my own guide on it despite that.


But there's been an interesting argument from BTIR advocates for the longest time that Term was inherently superior to whole life in the majority of situations due to it's affordability. Coming from a Financial Advisory - which offers the majority of insurance companies in Singapore, we can take advantage of competition/inefficient pricing in products and render this particular theory moot.


...while adding insult to injury by using a stubborn Term Advocates Worst enemy - a Whole Life plan. Till 99.

Let's Bring On The Contestants!


Coming from a Financial Advisory that offers almost all the insurance companies in Singapore - the first thing I did was put together the most affordable Term + ECI insurance, and Whole Life till 99 that I could generate on my systems. Naturally, these two policies are from different companies. The profile is Male, Non Smoker, 29 years old [me!] and coverage is till 70 years old. Coverage is for $150,000 : Death/TPD/ECI. 70 years old is actually increasingly ideal - with a country looking at a retirement age of 67, an auto opt in for CPF at only 70 years old and with average lifespans in Singapore having increased by 15 years in the last 3 decades alone...


...it wouldn't really be that surprising for the average mortality in Singapore to be 90+ instead of 82 by the time I'm 60.



Age 30, $150,000 Death/TPD/ECI


$1238.25/yr (Term till 70) vs

Term Insurance Annual Cost


$1322.25/yr (Whole Life till 99)

Whole Life till 99 annual cost

The premium Term here is the same, making it a fair comparison - just some confusion with the company [age next and age last birthday, which is why you see the 40 and 41 premium Term].


By Amping up the multiplier to some degree, not only is whole life competitive against the term plan - but it also provides additional claim values, a higher range of critical illnesses, surrender values and other perks.


But we can pretend that the policies have equivalent value [in terms of sum assured, coverage and perks].


Now, using my guide on Buy Term, Invest The Rest - we can draw some numbers with surprising results.



What Kind of Investment Numbers Do You Need to Invest The Rest Effectively?


Highlighted: The potential range of surrender values of this policy.

When you subtract $1238.25 from $1322.25, you get a solid investable difference of $84. A year.


Looking at the whole life numbers above and running them through a handy-dandy Financial Calculator, you get the following BTIR Factors: or basically, what kind of IRR net of fees that you'd require in order to 'break even' on Buying Term, Investing the Rest.


BTIR ($16,261.55) : 6.63% [GUARANTEED]

BTIR ($20,721)(3.25%): 7.54%

BTIR ($37,790) (4.75%): 9.72%


This means that you need a minimum of 6.63% and a more likely annualized return of 9.72% in order for BTIR to be effective, let alone profitable! You have to INVEST AGGRESSIVELY at such an annualized return for almost 40 YEARS, without taking out a dollar.


I've already written an article how hard it is to achieve this realistically, but I think one picture recap would suffice.



With any luck, someone with critical thinking will acknowledge this.

Some Additional Problems for Hardcore Term Investors would be...


1) Although Behavioral Finance already dictates they probably wouldn't succeed at investing for 40 years in a row anyway [imagine investing in majority equities in your 60s], the return absolutely required is already higher than that of the 20 year return of the SNP500 from 1997 to 2017, or 2000 - 2019, not even including fees.

[6.63% > 6.06%] 2) The value of the Term policy is inherently lower (less coverage range, less features)


3) Investing at that Quantum ($84/yr) is extremely difficult without bundling or having some kind of transaction costs.


4) It is unrealistic to presume that there will be no bonuses accumulated in the 40 year period.


Further Application:


By combining this discovery with my skill set and position as an FA, there's a reasonable opportunity to lower costs of insurance with justifiable replacements - something that I'm currently still writing an article on. I recently optimized a prospect's plan to purchase two Term Insurances - till 58 and 75 with such a structure.

Do ignore the surrender and claim value after 70 part...old format.

Some benefits include:


a) Lower cost per year: $160/yr b) Lower costs on insurance in total: $11,000+ c) Additional Surrender Value of $34,442 at Age 59 [like one big Ang Pao]

d) Higher coverage range of 39 CIs/benefits more

e) Higher coverage after Age 59 till 75 for Life Insurance ($250,000)


With the summary here, you can take a close look at how the numbers came about in the picture above. I have many, many variants on this, which also recently include family planning (insurance for young children and top ups for new parents).


Final Thoughts


Hopefully some of this showed how important it is to keep an open mind about insurance. While this is just a case study, it's possible to apply it, customize and optimize it across different sum insured's and ages and genders with a little work.


There have been many changes and upcoming changes - some people think that whole life plans (along with other par plan projections) will get significantly inferior (probably) and more expensive (probably not), but ultimately, a good FA will adapt and figure out how to strike a good balance for insurance to be affordable and practical.


As I get older and accumulate more experience - I've been seeing increasingly worse and worse insurance profiles brought about by an attempt to cut out professional advice. The fact that you're reading this portion shows that the market, and yourself - has moved towards people who have a strong vested interest in improving their financial situation. This includes lowering your costs, which is respectable. Sometimes, trying to lower your costs includes cutting out professional advice that could go the other way. ...No one said you couldn't get the best of both worlds.


Money Maverick


11 Comments


Mark Richards
Mark Richards
Jul 28, 2023

Hi Luke. Does the WOL pay the full Death Benefit at all ages. I've seen some BIs where the Death Benefit increases over time, in a similar way to the surrender value, and so coverage is low in the early years.

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cottonumbrella
Jul 20, 2021

Hi Luke, do you mind sharing how you derived 6.63% ?

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Isaac Cheang
Isaac Cheang
Jun 21, 2021

Have u tried this method on other age bands? Did a quick comparison of term + eci till 70 vs WL surrender at 70 for age 32 male, the results were horrible. Returns even at 4.75% rate yield a mere 2.7% IRR


Hope you can provide more clarity

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Luke Ho
Luke Ho
Jun 22, 2021
Replying to

Hi Isaac, I have tried this on other age bands. There is limited success under 35 and larger success under 30. As of May 2021 and July 2021 [bonus revisions], if you use the cheapest Term plan in the market with ECI, this structure is no longer as applicable. The IRR means nothing in relation to this calculation because it is against the Term values that matters, not the actual yield of the policy itself. In other words, if the premium difference between whole life and term is very small, someone trying to IR would have to invest both the minute difference, account for the opportunity cost and the IRR of your 2.7% in order to make BTIR worthwhile. I…

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KCL TSS
KCL TSS
Jun 19, 2021

Hi Money Maverick


Thank you for the article. I have two questions:


1/ Why the premium diff is only $84?


It seemed like it is too expensive for a 40years term plan with only $150k death/tpd/eci.


A quick search from Compare First & MoneyOwl suggested Aviva’s MyCoreCI Plan II or MyProtectorTerm II.


Granted, these two may not be ECI (as it only has the option of CI), the price difference is close to $600.

[CompareFirst: https://www.comparefirst.sg/wap/productDetailsEvent.action ] [MoneyOwl: https://www.moneyowl.com.sg/app/direct ]

Perhaps, if you allow me to extrapolate and use an example MoneyOwl shared with a different coverage [$1mil death cover up to age 65], which in my Point of View a MORE realistic example compared to what Money Maverick has shared.


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Luke Ho
Luke Ho
Jul 05, 2021
Replying to

Hi KCL, much better replies (and very fair statements this time round). I'd be very happy to address these: 1/ You are accurate to derive that for different age groups (and even different genders), this concept is not as applicable. So far, I've had no successful case studies beyond half a mil and above 35 years old. In that sense, your analysis is correct to conclude that there are limitations to such a structure.


2. We will likely disagree on this because significant research has shown that the SNP500 is a declining investment - which SHOULD have fallen significantly if not for quantitative easing. "The US stock Market’s 9.1% long-term historical annualized return can be decomposed into dividend yield, real growth, inflation…


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SG Physiotherapist
SG Physiotherapist
Jun 18, 2021

Are results very different if the term plan is up to 65 years old only? I figure I don't need coverage after my planned retirement at 65 or earlier, as I will be able to afford the 150k sum for early critical illness.

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SG Physiotherapist
SG Physiotherapist
Jun 22, 2021
Replying to

Thanks for the reply! Hope you can share the results if you get to do it.

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