Should I borrow against my life insurance to travel?

Dear Liz: My wife and I live on her pension, my Social Security, and enough dividends from our blue-chip stocks to cover our daily living expenses. But at our age (80), we would like to spend a little more in order to travel. We will have to borrow the money for that. I see that I can take a loan against our life insurance, at a very low rate of around 2%. The alternative is to take a margin loan, which currently costs 8.75%. It appears to me I should be borrowing against life insurance (we’re thinking of a loan of $10,000, against the life insurance face value of $900,000), where repayment would be assured from proceeds at the time of death (if not sooner, depending on our regular cash flow). Are there pitfalls to using life insurance loans?

A: There are pitfalls to any kind of loan, so you’re smart to want to educate yourself before you borrow.

Life insurance loans allow you to borrow against the cash value that’s accumulated in a permanent life insurance policy, such as a whole or universal life policy. The cash value is the savings component of your policy that’s typically built up over time. It’s not the same as the face value, which is how much the beneficiary is supposed to be paid when you die.

You typically have a lot of flexibility over how you pay the money back. If the policy allows, you can even opt to make no payments and have the loan plus interest deducted from the death benefit.

The big risk, besides leaving a beneficiary short of funds, is that the debt could grow to the point where it exceeds the policy’s cash value. At that point, the policy can lapse and potentially trigger taxes on the borrowed money.

You may have other options to fund your travel, such as selling some stocks, borrowing against your home equity or even taking out a reverse mortgage. Each option has advantages and pitfalls, so you’d be wise to discuss your situation with a fee-only financial planner for personalized advice.

Dear Liz: Please have another go with respect to answering a recent question about making qualified charitable distributions from an IRA using a debit card, which is something we have also wondered about. Several of the large mutual fund companies tell their customers that checks from their IRA account going to qualifying charities will qualify as QCDs, whether the checks are written by the company to the charity or by the individual to the charity. Hence, it would seem to be functionally equivalent whether one writes a check or uses a debit card. But your answer to the reader’s question seems to suggest something else.

A: You’re right that my answer fell short in explaining the problem.

The original letter writer wanted to be able to use a debit card to make qualified charitable distributions from her IRA to small art organizations that accept online donations, but apparently not paper checks. Qualified charitable distributions allow people to donate money from their IRAs to charity without the money being taxed.

Since IRA custodians typically don’t issue debit cards, the letter writer would have to first have the donation amount sent to her bank account or another account that offers such a card. But this transfer would make the distribution taxable, since qualified charitable distributions must be made directly to the charity without the money passing through the IRA account holder’s hands.

Checks drawn from an IRA account and made out to the charity, either by the account holder or the IRA custodian, are considered qualified charitable distributions as long as other rules are met. For example, the donation must be from a traditional IRA, the account holder must be at least 70-½ and the annual donation limit is $108,000 in 2025.

That said, sending checks through the mail is a risky way to transfer funds. Mail theft and related check fraud are soaring. Electronic payments are a far more secure way to send money, whether you’re paying bills or charities.

If you must send checks, use gel-based pens since their ink is harder to alter and go to your local post office, rather than leaving checks in an unsecured mailbox. Monitor every check you send and report any missing checks promptly to your bank or IRA custodian so they can stop payment.

Liz Weston, certified financial planner, is a personal finance columnist. Questions may be sent to her at 3940 Laurel Canyon, No. 238, Studio City, CA 91604, or by using the “Contact” form at asklizweston.com.