The Fine Print – Presented by Insure.com

I came home from vacation this week to find an official-looking letter from Prudential, with which I’ve never done business. But the letter told me that my mother, who died almost six years ago, had.

The nation’s second largest life insurer said she was the insured on a Prudential life insurance policy purchased in 1957. Since the beneficiary hadn’t yet claimed the death benefit, Prudential was writing to tell me that if no one responded, it would turn this money over to the state at the end of the month.

“It is urgent that we hear from you,” read the letter, signed by an associate manager in claims.

Life insurers on the carpet

At first I was skeptical. I had overseen my mother’s day-to-day and legal affairs for years before she died and had never heard of this life insurance policy. My parents always worked with their regular insurance agent from another company. It sounded like a “you have already won” lottery letter or a junk email from someone in need of money. (continue reading…)

It’s spring and the housing market has finally sprung. Homes are selling and prices are rising. But just when homebuyers think it’s safe to go back in the murky mortgage water comes ominous news: A federal agency fined four mortgage insurers for paying “kickbacks” to lenders.

When you seek a mortgage, banks may require you to purchase mortgage insurance if you can’t make a large downpayment. This protects the lender if the buyer should die, become disabled or lose their job and can’t pay the mortgage. Since a bank is among the first stops on a homebuyer’s shopping list, the lender can — and often will — steer the potential homebuyer to a favorite mortgage insurer. But “steering” comes with a price, and both the insurer and — the homebuyer — pay for it. (continue reading…)

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is one of the most popular men in the state and one of the most popular governors in the country. He was also a “heavyweight” in American politics, weighing in at around 350 pounds. But now, after enlightening us about his previously undisclosed lap band surgery in mid-February, he has shed some 40 pounds. Nice work if you can have it — and for the price he paid.

During this surgery a lap band is placed around the upper neck of the stomach, making it more difficult to let food in. The end result: You feel full but eat less. By now we probably all know someone who has undergone this operation, or the similar but more complicated bariatric surgery, which involves having the stomach resized. I know three such people — one successful, one not and one too soon to tell.

Follow the leader

Medical issues aside, having a high profile media star like Gov. Christie as your poster child is a victory “lap” for doctors, hospitals and outpatient facilities that perform this procedure. It is also likely to raise the cost of health insurance. Simply put: Follow the leader or in this case, the governor. (continue reading…)

Call it the luck of the draw. When a series of viral infections destroyed my wife’s thyroid gland she needed to take a hormone replacement drug. Her health insurer mailed a 90-day supply of Levothyroxine, the generic version of Synthroid, which had no effect.

When she refilled the prescription the insurer mailed another 90-day supply, but this time the pill was etched with the brand name Synthroid. Within days she felt better.

This seemed strange, since the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) says that brand name and generic drugs, which can be produced when the brand name comes off patent, are “bioequivalent.” But what does bioequivalent really mean? (continue reading…)

New York City’s multi-billionaire Mayor Michael Bloomberg is the ultimate social engineer. Not content to run our country’s biggest city, Mayor Mike is out to reshape human behavior. He’s gone after tobacco, sugared drinks, super-sized sodas and guns.

Now, like certain dogs, he’s chasing cars. And the result could cost New York, New Jersey and Connecticut motorists more in car insurance — or even make it more difficult for them to get.

Some of Bloomberg’s cockeyed crusades have merit, but he has also butted heads with more rational thinkers. The New York State Supreme Court blocked his plan to stop the sale of 32-ounce sodas in local stores. The International Olympic Committee nixed his bid to bring the games to New York. And his grandiose vision of a pro football stadium on the city’s already overcrowded west side never scored a touchdown.

But let’s give Mayor Mike his due. For a man often described as a “nanny stater,” he definitely knows how to play hardball. (continue reading…)

The annual postcard from my township assessor arrived. At first glance it looked like good news. The appraisal of my New Jersey coast home was lower by almost $60,000, which indicated that this year’s taxes should go down.

Then I thought about it. There was a reason why the assessment was less. Assessments reflect housing values, and my house, like most others in the Long Beach Island area of Ocean County, had been flooded by Superstorm Sandy.

Now we, as homeowners, will be faced with a myriad of new problems and all of them, in some way, seem to involve insurance. My conclusion: it is getting more and more difficult to either repair — or sell — our homes. (continue reading…)

A lot of people are complaining about their home insurance policies. And the loudest cries are from the victims of Superstorm Sandy, who are trying to rebuild on a shoestring budget. These homeowners say their insurance companies, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the banks are keeping a tight lid on the amount of money they thought they would get.

Now we can add the victims of sinkholes such as the unfortunate residents of Seffner, Florida, where Jeff Bush was swallowed up whole and his neighbors forced to flee their homes. Florida allows people to obtain sinkhole insurance, which may cover some of their needs, but the restrictions on this insurance have tightened up after tort lawyers took advantage of it.

Earth, wind and fire

The basic premise of home insurance is that events emanating from the earth, like earthquakes, floods, water seepage, and even mudslides, aren’t covered by a standard homeowners insurance policy. The wind that blows your roof off or flings a branch through your window is a “covered peril.” So is fire damage, assuming that you didn’t intentionally start the fire. (continue reading…)

He got me! There I was, caught like the proverbial deer in the headlights of a police cruiser on a darkened road in the New Jersey pinelands. The red and blue bubble-gum machine lights atop the cop car alerted every motorist within miles that I was getting a ticket.

It was humiliating, and a costly courtroom experience, even when you pled guilty. But my worst fear was that my car insurance rates would go up $400 a year with those dreaded points on my license.

Well, that didn’t happen.

“We don’t raise your rates because you get a ticket,” said my insurance agent. Whew! And when I had an accident that wasn’t my fault but still cost my insurer $1,500, my yearly rate still didn’t go up.

Apparently I’m not alone. USA Today recently cited a study by Princeton Survey Research Associates International that said just 31 percent of drivers who received a moving violation within the last five years were hit with higher rates.

Total recall

Some insurance experts felt that the survey results were bogus. (continue reading…)

It’s no secret that us baby boomers will live longer than our ancestors. But there’s a grim reality. In doing so we will feel older and sicker.

A study by Dr. Dana King recently published in the Journal of the American Medical Association’s (JAMA) Internal Medicine shows that our final years of life will probably be worse than those of our parents. And it’s already happening. King’s survey reports that only 13 percent of those born between 1946 and 1964 say they are in excellent health — compared with 33 percent of the previous generation.

Sofa sadness

It’s our own fault. Despite the feeling that we’re always racing against the clock, baby boomers are notorious couch potatoes. Nearly 40 percent of us are obese and more than half do not exercise regularly. We are legendary pill-poppers of the legal drugs advertised on TV, and 7 percent already depend on a cane or walker to get around.

So is there any good news? Yes. Fewer of us are developing emphysema and having heart attacks, mostly because we stopped smoking. (continue reading…)

At their annual conference in January, auto insurers actually worried about whether theirs was a “shrinking business.”

All newer vehicles come equipped with “black boxes,” which tell police and courts what really happened in an auto accident, providing them with the proper place to put the blame. BMW has already introduced autos that are truly auto — they drive themselves.

Voluntary vehicle monitors in cars, such as Progressive’s Snapshot, which tell insurers if the driver is going too fast or braking too hard, are catching on with motorists lured by the possibility of lower rates for better driving. Progressive is the 4^th largest auto insurer in the nation, but it’s Snapshot program is now the 20^th largest car insurer on its own, with more than a million members, according to analysts.

But most importantly, until recently serious car accidents were trending sharply downward. I repeat, until recently. (continue reading…)