Most life insurance companies sell similar coverage plans, making the marketplace increasingly competitive. So many options at disposal can confuse the buyers. Moreover, often to stand out, companies adopt aggressive marketing tactics that can drive the customers to make the wrong pick. Therefore, as an investor you should compare and smartly weigh all the pros and cons before choosing a life insurance policy, ensuring that there are no hiccups while you secure the future of your loved ones.

While browsing through various plans, here are some factors that you scrutinize. The following factors will help you choose the best life insurance policy.

• Types of plans (term, whole or universal)
• Additional benefits
• Financial strength ratings of the provider
• Overall coverage costs
• Average customer ratings and any complaints filed against the insurer

To help you further, here are the five companies offering the best life insurance policies for the year 2018.

Haven Life
One of the freshest entrants in the insurance business, Haven Life facilitates online life insurance sale without the intervention of an agent. This feature has won the Haven Life a lot of praise among customers as it ensures both, efficiency and convenience. Its online procedure is streamlined, so you don’t have to worry about any hassles with the application. Since it only offers term life policies, Haven Life is an excellent choice for young and healthy individuals looking for affordable plans. Moreover, the backing by MassMutual, one of the oldest insurance companies with excellent financial ratings makes Haven Life a reliable pick.

New York Life
This insurance provider has unswervingly received the highest ratings from the most renowned evaluation agencies for the past many decades. It offers simplified term life insurance with up to $150,000 and doesn’t require any medical exams, you will just have to provide the agents with some health details. They have designed a wide range of life insurance policies including whole, term, universal, variable and variable universal. According to your profile and type of plan chosen, the New York Life extends key features such as term-permanent conversions, premium waivers, guaranteed renewability, guaranteed level premiums, and accelerated death benefits.

Prudential
One of the biggest and long-standing insurance organizations, Prudential handles over $1 trillion worth of assets for clients based across the globe. Furthermore, it has earned high scores from multiple insurance rating agencies. Offering a huge selection of life insurance policies including permanent (universal, variable universal, indexed universal, and survivorship universal) and term coverage, Prudential also has non-life insurance coverage option such as disability, accident or critical illness. Moreover, they have a niche underwriting for smokers, i.e., they don’t consider tobacco chewers as smokers.

AIG – American General
Like Prudential and New York Life, AIG is also one of the internationally recognized insurance companies, with strong performance ratings by numerous assessment agencies. They furnish a variety of coverage plans such as whole, term, universal, and guaranteed issue whole. These are excellent for people looking for life insurance policies with reasonable monthly premiums. Also, AIG currently has one of the highest maximum payout, i.e., $10,000,000 or more. Depending on the product bought, one can enjoy some great features such as refundable premiums, fixed rates, policy conversion, and guaranteed renewability.

Mutual of Omaha
The Mutual of Omaha only deals with whole life insurance and doesn’t mandate medical exams for policy values between $2000 and $25,000 meant for people aged from 45 to 85 (in New York, 50 to 75). A graded death benefit is administered during the first two years of the plan, i.e., in the event of a natural death, beneficiaries will receive all the paid premiums along with 20% of the full amount. Full benefits are given in the case of accidental injury. Moreover, the Mutual of Omaha’s policies develop a cash value that can be borrowed by the insured in the future.

Apart from the above-stated companies offering the best life insurance policies, you can also take a look at these popular life insurance providers.

• MetLife
• Northwestern Mutual
• PolicyGenius
• MassMutual
• AARP
• Transamerica
• Guardian
• State Farm