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Income tax, more often than not, hurts your purse dearly whether it’s your take-home remuneration or investment returns. Thus, it is essential that you choose tax saving investment options and for this purpose, equity-based investments are far better. This article deals with how you can use Unit-Linked Insurance Plans (ULIPs), an equity-related investment vehicle, in a clever way to get the better of the stock market. Here are some unique features of ULIPs that can help your hard-earned money grow exponentially over the long-term.
1.Equity Advantage
The USP of Unit Linked Insurance Plans is its equity advantage. ULIPs divide the premium paid into different asset classes via different funds. However, investing in equity funds for long-term can help take care of your goals, including, buying a house or a car, marriage, child education, retirement etc.
2.Flexibility
What’s the most tedious thing about shares? The fact that you must constantly check how well the company is performing. But in ULIPs all you have to do is opt for a certain ULIP plan, pay the premium regularly and wait for your funds to grow. Also, it allows up to four fund switches a year and what’s more, that too free of cost! So, in case your goals change or risk appetite changes, you can quickly change your fund allocation accordingly to grab the best of the market conditions.
3.Multiple Investment Options
Today’s generation is slowly shifting from FDs to market-linked investments when it comes to investing their hard-earned money. Moreover, Unit Linked Insurance Plans provide investors with a plethora of options, including debt and balanced funds, which are relatively less risky, and an investor can invest in them depending on his/her long-term goals and investment capabilities.
4.Better Returns than Peers
Many past incidences have shown how private investors have beat Sensex with ULIPs! Yes, you read it right! Unit-linked Insurance Plans of private life insurers have outperformed the Sensex. There are instances where ULIP’s equity fund have provided returns as high as 15.99 percent in the duration of six months.
5.Lower Charges
Earlier when they were initially introduced, ULIPs were high-cost options with high mortality charges when compared to mutual funds. However, ULIPs are now lowest in cost, if insurance and investment are clubbed together, which has made it the most sorted investment options of the current times. That said, with the new ULIP plans, the mortality charges are low. Let’s understand how:
Suppose a person buys a ULIP plan having Rs 1 lakh premium for 20 years, he will get covered under the plan with a cover of Rs 10 lakh (10 times the annual premium). However, the insurer will charge mortality premium for only Rs 9 lakh as the total risk for the insurance company is Rs 9 lakh. Furthermore, with every annual payment of the premium, the risk of the company will go down, reducing the mortality charge. Thus, when ULIP’s fund value exceeds sum assured, your mortality charges start reducing, and the entire amount goes into investing in the funds of your choice.
The Ending Note
Investing in Unit-Linked Insurance Plans would be a steal, especially now when the rates have gone down considerably. The stock market is unpredictable and totally out of our control, but with long-term investment vehicles such as ULIPs, it is far easier to take advantage of it! However, you must do your research first and carefully buy one, because, at the end of the day, only you would know what suits your investment horizon and long-term goals.