There are dozens of ways to estimate how much coverage a household needs, and most of them collapse into a single, useful shorthand: DIME. Add up your non-mortgage Debt, multiply your annual Income by the number of years your family would need it replaced, add the Mortgage balance, and add the cost of Education you'd want funded for your children. That total is a serious first answer.
Take a household earning ninety thousand dollars, with thirty thousand in non-mortgage debt, two hundred eighty thousand left on the mortgage, and two children whose college you'd like to cover at roughly one hundred thousand each. Replacing ten years of income brings the income number to nine hundred thousand. The DIME total: about one and a half million dollars. That is not an upsell — that's arithmetic.
This is a floor, not a ceiling. It assumes a surviving spouse who can invest the benefit prudently and spend it deliberately. It doesn't account for inflation over a long widowhood, or for the value of a stay-at-home parent's labor. Use DIME to start; refine it with an advisor who is willing to show you the math, not just the product.
Educational content only. Nothing in this lesson constitutes legal, tax, or investment advice. Insurance products are governed by the policy contract issued by the carrier.