Universal life is a complicated product that contains interest, expense, and mortality risk.
The most common mistake we see with universal life pertains to interest rate fluctuations. The policy is often sold at a crediting rate that is higher than the carrier returns during the life of the contract. The policyholder ends up owning a policy that will lapse well before his or her death due to the contract being underfunded. This happens frequently, so make sure you clearly understand the assumptions your policy projections are based upon and the rationale behind projecting policy values at that rate.
The answers to the questions on this checklist will help you determine whether an indexed universal life policy will perform as projected and whether it will meet your needs.