Convertible Term -

convertible 20 year term life insurance gives you the option of exchanging your term life insurance coverage for permanent lifetime insurance. BUT! This exchange can be done in the future with no medical evidence required, and you receive the same health class that you qualified for in your original 20 year term. That mean that if you become completely uninsurable during the 20 year term, it’s a simple matter to switch to lifetime coverage, no consideration to your insurability AND you get healthy rates at that time (even if you’ve had a heart attack). The convertible option effectively locks in and guarantees your health status when you’re young, and allows you to get a new policy with that original health status when you’re older.

The convertible option is used frequently when Canadians become uninsurable, but it’s also often used simply to transition from a larger amount of term life insurance, over to a smaller permanent life insurance policy closer to retirement. The lack of a medical exam makes it an easy way to get a permanent policy when you’re older.

Important Note -

all the companies we quote on this website are renewable and convertible term. You should ensure that any term policy you purchase has these options. If your term policy is not renewable and convertible you won’t care during the course of the 20 years – but these options can become the most important feature at the end of the 20 years; it may be the only way you can get life insurance coverage at that time. A non-renewable non-convertible term policy simply expires at the end of the 20 years and leaves you with no coverage and no guarantee that you’ll be able to get more coverage.

Second Important Note -

The conversion option is often only available to ages 70 or 71, though it varies by company. If you’re in your 50’s or older, you’ll likely want the conversion option to be available as long as you can get. So when you run your term life insurance quotes on our website (at the top of this page), check the conversion expiry age and make sure you consider the companies with the oldest age. 

When to consider 20 year term

20 year term is the most purchased type of term life insurance in Canada. It’s extremely well suited for young families with kids, mortgages, and expenses. It’s inexpensively and very competitively priced and the coverage is guaranteed level for 20 years – close to long enough to get the kids out of the house, pay off the mortgage, and develop some retirement savings.

20 year term options

Some 20 year term life insurance policies have additional options. These options are included in some life insurance company’s term life insurance policies for free (and we show these options in our term life insurance quotes you can view at the top of this page). We have already seen our first two options – renewable and convertible term.

Exchange option –

The exchange option lets you switch term a term 20 to a longer term (generally to a term 30). You can make this switch without any medical considerations. If you’re unsure if you want a term 20 or term 30, you can choose a term 20 temporarily and then switch up to a term 30 later. Availability of the exchange option for each company is shown in our term life insurance quotes.

Accelerated death benefits –

not used very much in Canada, but some companies make this option available. If you have extremely limited mortality (i.e. you’re going to pass in the next year or so, for certain), some companies will provide you a partial loan against your death benefit while you’re still alive. Again, availability of this option is shown in our term life insurance quotes. 

Specific company options: Here are a couple of companies that provide options on their term 20 life insurance policy that don’t fit neatly into our online term life insurance quotes.

RBC Insurance – RBC offers a variety of options that become important at the end of your 20 year term. (Aside: many people don’t care too much about end of term options.....until they get towards the end of their term. Then these options become much more important. So we suggest you consider these options to some extent, now). Their first option is the Term Switch Program. Term Switch allows you to transition from a term 20 to another term 10 or term 20, with only a 5 question medical questionnaire. And, they offer a 10% discount for those customers. The second option RBC has is their Partial conversion with term reset. This program allows you to convert a minimal amount of term over to permanent (currently as low as $25K) and convert the remaining term coverage to a brand new term. It’s a very effective way to get another 10 or 20 year term policy at the end of your first term. Lastly, RBC does generally not require a ‘medical exam’ for people up to age 50, up to $2MM of life insurance. They do put a caveat on this that they may occasionally ask for a medical exam anyway, but generally RBC clients can skip this step when applying for life insurance.

Foresters – Foresters Financial is a fraternal life insurance company, not a stock company. So they push their profits back to the community and their customers. Here’s a full list of the benefits you receive as a policyholder from Foresters: https://www.foresters.com/en-ca/member-benefits