<prompt> Human: Ive been trying to learn about the many options and opportunities that different life insurance products offer. What are your thoughts on investing in one of these plans vs or in addition to putting money into a 401k, a standard brokerage, real estate, etc?  <response>: Im a former financial adviser. The first question is if you really need life insurance. That is, does anyone directly depend on you? Do you have a wife or children whos life would be seriously impacted by your death. If so, term will almost always work out for you. The only times it really makes sense to have whole life insurance is if there will be a huge estate at your death and you may need help paying the taxes. I worked a lot with farmers who would need to pay the state estate taxes when they left the farm to their kids. Or if they wanted to leave a business to one child and make sure another child got something. But the main take away here is that insurance should not be looked at as an investment. You can almost certainly beat the returns you earn and can be confusing. The other trap people fall into is borrowing from their policy which can lead to it lapsing if the funds arent repaid. 