Looking for a simple way to purchase term life insurance? Ethos offers life insurance products with an easy online quote process. And many people can get a policy without having to pass a medical exam, although you may have to answer a few health questions.
In this article, we’ll take a look at how the Ethos quote process works, the underlying financial strength of its carrier and more.
As part of the research for this piece, we shopped Ethos for a variety of term life policies. You can jump ahead to see the price quotes we got or read about the full life insurance shopping experience below.
Here’s What You Need to Know About Ethos Life
Ethos aims to simplify the process of shopping for term life insurance online. Through its 100% online application, you can get instant quotes. And there’s live support available if you need it during the shopping process.
Table of Contents
What Ethos Offers
Ethos offers term life insurance products. You can choose from the following terms:
- 10 year
- 15 year
- 20 year
- 30 year
Coverage amounts start at $100,000 and go as high as $2 million. Any U.S. citizen or permanent resident between the ages of 20 and 65 can apply for a term life policy with Ethos.
Each policy sold by the company also offers an accelerated death benefit rider at no cost.
Simply put, this means if you become terminally ill while the policy is in force, you can get a portion of the death benefit while you’re still living.
When you die, your beneficiaries will receive the face value of your policy minus whatever you already tapped if you chose the accelerated death benefit.
No Medical Exam Policies
Ethos says it offers policies that use algorithms, partially based on your answers to a few health questions, to replace the medical exam. Its system looks at your prior medical and prescription history, among other things, to assess your risk level.
A.M. Best Rating
Some policies sold through Ethos are issued by Banner Life Insurance Company, a Legal & General America company, as a carrier (not available in New York).
The A.M. Best Company gives Banner Life an A+ rating. That’s the second-highest possible mark from this credit rating company that focuses on the insurance industry. (A++ is the highest). To make our list of best life insurance companies, we require that the issuer have a rating of at least A+ and preferably A++ for policies longer than 20 years.
A.M. Best developed its proprietary ratings system because strength and financial stability are important when you’re selecting an insurance company for the long haul. You want to be sure the company you’re getting a policy from today will still be around in 20 years.
While no one can see into the future, A.M. Best’s scale is the closest thing we have to a crystal ball. By looking at an insurer’s balance sheet, financial strength rating, long-term issuer credit rating and other data points, A.M. Best is able to give the best-educated guess in the industry about a particular company’s future claims-paying ability.
Getting a Quote Online
To get a quote through Ethos online, you need to enter five pieces of information:
- Gender
- Do you currently use nicotine products?
- How is your health? (Average, great or excellent)
- What’s your home ZIP code?
- What’s your birthdate?
In August 2022, we pulled sample quotes for 25, 35 and 45-year-old males and females in excellent health who live in Florida, don’t use tobacco and are seeking $500,000 of coverage. Here’s what we found.
| Age | Male | Female |
|---|---|---|
| 25 | $21-$39/month | $16-$30/month |
| 35 | $24-$46/month | $20-$36/month |
| 45 | $56-$106/month | $44-$80/month |
Ethos says it offers a 30-day “free look” period. The company will refund your first premium during the first 30 days that a policy is active for any reason.
Term Life Calculator
Shopping for life insurance is often complicated by the fact that a lot of people don’t know how much coverage to buy.
To address this dilemma, Ethos offers a coverage calculator when you get into the quote process.
Once the Ethos system has your age, birthdate, gender, tobacco use, general health assessment and ZIP code, you’ll answer four questions that the company says will help steer you in the right direction:
- How many kids do you have under the age of 18?
- What’s your yearly income?
- What’s your remaining mortgage balance?
- How much debt do you have?
The calculator will then suggest a recommended coverage amount for a certain term of years, along with an estimated monthly premium rate.
Money expert Clark Howard has long recommended purchasing an amount equal to 10 times your gross annual salary. So, for example, let’s say you make $40,000 a year. Under Clark’s formula, you would buy $400,000 of life insurance to replace your income for your beneficiaries in the event of your early death.
Final Thoughts
Term life isn’t a complicated insurance product. There’s no cash value to the policy like there is with whole life insurance. Term life just pays a straight-up death benefit if you die while the policy is in force.
If you have children or other financial beneficiaries to provide for, you need to have a life insurance policy in case you die prematurely.
And term life is the simplest and easiest policy you can get. Plus, it’s among the cheapest options. You pay one premium that never changes during the life of the policy.
But before making any purchase decisions, you’ll most likely want to read our guide on how to buy term life insurance.
