It’s nice to get to the place in life where you don’t have to live from paycheck to paycheck. You don’t have to worry about scraping together enough money to pay your rent. You don’t have to worry about the lights being shut off because you couldn’t pay the bill. You can walk into the grocery store – the good one, with all of the interesting foods imported from around the world – and not have to bring a coupon. You can also pay too much for term life insurance.

Wait, what? OK. Sure, you don’t want to clip coupons and you pay your bills. That doesn’t mean you’re just itching to throw money away. Your term life insurance is an important part of securing your family’s wellbeing, but that doesn’t mean you need to pay too much. Here are the things you’re doing right now that will cost you more than you need to pay for your term life insurance:

• Smoke. States all across the country are banning smoking in public places. It just isn’t cool anymore. Lung cancer kills, and in huge numbers. In fact, lung cancer kills more women than breast cancer. Smokers are likely to pay as much as twice for their term life insurance as non-smokers.
• Be fat. OK, so being financially secure has its downsides in terms of your weight. There’s a reason the rich are called “Fat Cats.” If you’re obese, you’re at greater risk of a number of diseases. Depending on your weight, you may be denied life insurance, or have to pay much more.
• Take unnecessary risks. Dangerous jobs and hobbies put you at risk. Sure, you’re not going to quit your job as a sky diving instructor just to save a few bucks on insurance. But you might think twice about picking up skydiving as a hobby.
• Lie through your teeth. When you apply for term life insurance, you need to be honest. Just because you know what’s going to raise your rates doesn’t mean you should lie about it. In many cases, life insurance companies don’t require a physical exam anymore. That means you could, in theory, lie about any of the above issues. Don’t do it. If you die and the insurance company can prove you falsified your application, your beneficiaries will be screwed, in some cases even if you died from an unrelated cause.

Photo via Steve Punter