Let's start with some Internet sites that can help you find good term life insurance policies:

1. Quotesmith: www.quotesmith.com or 800-556-9393
2. Accuquote: www.accuquote.com or 800-442-9899
3. Insweb: www.insweb.com
4. NetQuote: www.netquote.com
5. Term4sale: www.term4sale.com. This site gives you a list of "low-load" life insurers that do business directly with customers.

And speaking of insurers, here are a few (among others) that we recommend:

• Ameritas, based in Lincoln, Nebraska. 800-552-3553; www.ameritasdirect.com
• Guardian Life Insurance: 866-425-4542; www.glic.com
• Massachusetts Mutual: 800-272-2216; www.massmutual.com
• New York Life: 800-710-7945, ext. 951; www.newyorklife.com
• Northwestern Mutual: home office phone: 414-271-1444, www.northwesternmutual.com
• State Farm Insurance: home office phone: 309-766-2311, www.statefarm.com
• TIAA-CREF (Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association College Retirement Equities Fund): 800-223-1200, www.tiaa-cref.org. You may know that TIAA-CREF used to be restricted to employees of educational institutions. That's no longer the case. It now has insurance products that are available to the general public in most states.
• USAA: 800-531-8000; www.usaa.com
• Northwestern Mutual and Guardian policies can be purchased only through agents. If you are interested in a cash value policy, insist on one in which the first-year surrender value is at least 50% of your first-year premium. The other insurers listed here do not pay agent commissions, so their cash value policies provide much better value as a rule.
• Insurance Information Institute, 212-346-5500 or 800-472-5800, will provide you with quotes from other low-fee companies. Make sure your policy is rated either A or B by Weiss Ratings. They're the toughest insurance raters around. You can get a report on a company from Weiss by calling 800-289-9222 or by ordering through www.weissratings.com.