Carlo and I put out a new LIFE Pod episode this week comparing policy loans and bank loans. The teaching version of that comparison is over on Lifetime LOC. This site is about doing, so here's the doing version: pick your credit tool before you need it.
Borrowing decisions made under pressure are usually the expensive kind. When the transmission dies or the roof starts leaking, you take whatever credit says yes fastest. A bank's timeline is the bank's timeline. The episode gets into how long approval can run, and a week feels long when the bill was due Tuesday.
The episode also covers something that deserves a spot in your planning: banks can close or reduce a line of credit in a downturn. Banks are still fine tools for plenty of jobs. Just know which of your options can disappear on someone else's decision, and don't let your only plan be one of them.
If you already own a cash value policy, here's a twenty-minute homework assignment for a calm week. Find out how your insurer handles loan requests, what the current loan interest rate is, and how the interest gets billed. When you're done, you'll know exactly how fast you could reach your own money and what it would cost. Most policy owners never do this until they're in a hurry. Do it bored instead.
You may want to watch for this: a policy loan reduces your available cash value and death benefit until you repay it, and repayment runs on your discipline, not a bank's billing department. I wrote about building that habit in setting your own payback schedule.
If you don't own a policy yet, the episode is a decent picture of what people build one for. The borrowing power is one real part of the case. Getting started lays out the first decisions in plain terms. Watch below or at this link.