As noted last week a major A+ rated life insurance company has broken into uncharted waters by offering preferred plus (best rate class) rates for private pilots that are not instrument rated.

And that’s just the tip of the good news iceberg. It gets even better when you find out that the company is a heavy hitter in the term insurance wars, showing up in the top 10 rates at preferred plus at most ages and term lengths.

To put this in perspective, for a male age 50 who is a private pilot with a VFR rating, with 100+ total solo hours and flying 26-150 annual hours, before the best they could do on a $2,000,000, 20 year term policy would have been through North American at their preferred rate for just under $4600 a year. With this new underwriting available, given all the same criteria a person could end up spending nearly $1000 less per year.

As I said last week, there is obviously an assumption that aviation aside, all other factors would have to qualify for preferred plus as well. That usually isn’t a huge issue for pilots since, unlike the average population, they get regular physicals and health issues seldom get out of control.

So, where does this fit into your life insurance planning? It’s huge so I don’t throw this out fliply. If you are a VFR pilot in good health and meet the criteria above and you currently have life insurance in force, you need a comparative quote. If you can potentially lower your life insurance bill by 25%, it’s not a review you want to pass up. If you don’t have life insurance in force and have been avoiding it because you can’t stand the rates you’ve been quoted, it’s time to act.

Bottom line. It’s rare when a road block to the best rates is removed. We’ve seen it with a few companies that will allow their best rate with treated blood pressure. We’ve even seen it in the past year, albeit with a very limited window, for people with type 2 diabetes. But, absent a flat extra charge, this is a first for the average private pilot.