Transamerica Life Canada has added an estate preservation strategy to the Monarch series of solutions, which ties life insurance strategies, products and administrative support, together with a consultative approach.

The series, launched in August 2004, strives to provide independent insurance advisors with tailored client solutions that are optimized throughout every stage of the client’s life.

“The Estate Preservation Strategy is an ideal solution for independent insurance advisors to approach their baby boomer clients, providing them with a way to protect the assets they’ve built up over their lifetime,” says Joe Kordovi, avp and pricing actuary, life marketing and product development, Transamerica Life Management.

“The advisor might want to help clients preserve cherished assets like the family cottage, a farm, or a home,” he explains, “and the Estate Preservation Strategy is a sound way to show them what could happen to these assets if they were to die today, or at any point in the future without proper financial planning.”

The estate preservation strategy assists the independent insurance advisor to concentrate client discussions around:

  • increasing a client’s after-tax estate value for their heirs;
  • growing the client’s assets within a tax-sheltered investment vehicle;
  • avoiding probate, legal and executor fees in respect of the insurance proceeds;
  • potentially protecting assets within an insurance policy from creditors; and
  • reducing the cost of a couple’s life insurance protection through a joint life policy.

According to Transamerica Life Canada, the client best suited for the estate preservation strategy has a need to protect the proceeds of his or her estate from taxation when they can’t be rolled over to a spouse or infirm dependent, explains Mitchell Singer, avp tax and estate planning. “They are 50 years of age or older with sizeable personally-owned assets such as stocks funds, and real estate as well as a large RRSP. Most will have assets that hold sentimental value to heirs, like a family cottage, that they would not want to be liquidated or mortgaged to pay any taxes triggered.”

The estate preservation strategy incorporates tools such as a worksheet to record an estimate of taxes and charges, and illustration software, which gives clients a potentially startling look at the realities of taxation while illustrating the best solution.

The strategy is realized through Transamerica Life Canada’s enhanced universal life insurance plan, or alternatively through, a permanent life insurance plan. Both products were re-priced in May 2004.