The Build a Life LOC Blog

Build it a little every day

Daily notes for people who are ready to build: design decisions, what the first 90 days look like, starting policies for kids, and the questions worth asking any agent. Education first, and the needs analysis is free when you want your own numbers.

Funding

Where the Premium Money Comes From

Before any illustration gets run, find the money. Locating idle dollars and inefficient cash flow that can fund a policy without strain.

July 28, 2026
Getting Started

Questions to Ask Whoever Designs Your Policy

Same carrier, same product, two agents, two very different policies. The questions that reveal whether your designer is on your side.

July 27, 2026
Getting Started

Decide What the Policy Is For Before You Build It

Family lending pool, retirement supplement, or a child's head start. Why naming the policy's job before design decides everything else.

July 26, 2026
Policy Loans

Nobody Bills You for a Policy Loan. Set a Schedule Anyway.

A policy loan has no required payment, which is the feature and the trap. How to set your own payback schedule and actually keep it.

July 25, 2026
Getting Started

Considering an IUL? Get Clear on the Guarantees and the Taxes First

Before you build an IUL: what the contract actually guarantees, how the tax treatment works, and the questions to ask before you sign anything.

July 24, 2026
Policy Design

One Big Policy or a Ladder of Smaller Ones?

One big policy is efficient. A ladder of smaller ones matches real careers, re-locks your insurability, and gives each policy its own job.

July 23, 2026
Getting Started

What Underwriting Actually Involves, Start to Finish

Application, possible exam, records, offer. The whole underwriting process start to finish, what slows it down, and why plain honesty is fastest.

July 22, 2026
Policy Loans

Taking Your First Policy Loan, Step by Step

The first time you borrow against your policy shouldn't be a mystery. A plain walkthrough of how to request a loan and use it without hurting the policy.

July 21, 2026
Getting Started

How Much Should You Actually Put Into a Policy?

Fund too little and the design underperforms, too much and you strain the budget. How to size a premium you can sustain for the long haul.

July 20, 2026
Policy Design

Base Premium vs. Paid-Up Additions: Getting the Mix Right

The split between base premium and paid-up additions is the design choice that drives early cash value. How the mix works and what to aim for.

July 19, 2026
Getting Started

Building for Cash Value: The Three Decisions That Matter

The new LIFE Pod episode is a build checklist in disguise: start now, design for cash value, and fund it like you meant it. Here's how the three keys land.

July 18, 2026
Getting Started

Your First 90 Days With a New Policy

The policy's in force. Now what? Five unglamorous moves for the first three months that set up everything the strategy does later.

July 17, 2026
For Your Kids

What a Policy on Your Kid Is Actually Buying

Insurability, time, and a money lesson with a real asset behind it. What a small policy on a child buys, what it doesn't, and where to start.

July 16, 2026
Why Start Now

What Waiting a Year Actually Costs

Time and insurability are the two things you can't buy back later. A plain look at what a year of waiting does to a policy you'll own for the rest of your life.

July 16, 2026

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The needs analysis is free and open to anyone. We'll look at your cash flow, whether your base is ready, and what a design built for you would look like. If it's not the right time yet, you'll hear that from me too. No obligation, no chase-down calls afterward. Just answers.

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