Term life insurance is temporary protection for people with limited budgets. You can get a great deal of coverage for a relatively low premium rate. It’s particularly appropriate for situations where your beneficiaries would need additional help – say, to pay off a loan or provide for the needs of your children – in the event of your death.

My husband and I signed up for term life insurance upon the birth of our first child and that was pretty much the first day I ever felt like a grown-up. He’d just quit smoking and I hadn’t lost my baby weight yet, so our rates were higher than I expected but worthwhile for the million bucks he or I would get if the other partner kicked the bucket.

If you have children, or want to make sure your loved ones aren’t saddled with existing loan payments, term life is something you might look into. Today.

The Wall Street Journal reports, “Rates on some policies have risen between 2% and 15% at insurance carriers such as Prudential Financial (PRU), Banner Life Insurance Co. in Rockville, Md., Genworth Financial Inc. (GNW) and ING Group (ING).”

Why are rates rising? I’ll give you one guess…

Surprise! It’s the economy. “The financial crisis has hit the life insurance industry hard,” said Terence
Martin, analyst at Conning Research & Consulting. “Several large insurance companies, particularly individual annuity companies, have seen significant decreases in assets and surplus, resulting in an urgent need to raise capital at a time when capital markets are constrained.”

If you can lock in a 20 or 30-year term right now, your wallet will be the better for it. A policy fixed annually at $360 today would have cost $1,405 in 1990 policy dollars. Looking at those figures, it seems that the cost of term life can only go up.

Before signing on the dotted line, you better shop around and you should only sign with an insurer that has earned the very top financial-strength rating from an independent rating agency. You can start by figuring out how much you need with this calculator.

Tell them your kid(s), your mortgage, or your wife sent you.