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- Misunderstanding
- Remaining Life Expectancy
- Customized Life Expectancy
- Misunderstanding
- If you have been to the TALC
Rates page or the Loan Comparisons page, you know
how important life expectancy can be in evaluating the
cost and benefits of a reverse mortgage. But many people
misunderstand the life expectancy figures they may read
or hear about.
For example, let's say you read somewhere that the
average life expectancy of Americans is 75 years. This
does NOT mean that a 65-year-old American has about
10 more years to live on average. It means that counting
from birth, the average American will live to be 75 years old.
The number of years of remaining life counting from a
certain age is a different matter. All current 65-year-olds,
for example, have already outlived many people who were
born when they were. So this is a healthier group, and
more of them will live beyond age 75 than the ones who
didn't make it to 65.
- Remaining Life Expectancy
- How many more years will
persons who have already made it to a given age live?
The table below presents the median figure for males and
females aged 65 through 90. This means that about half the
females now aged 65, for example, will live for at least
another 18.4 years - to age 83.4
Average Remaining Years of Life for
Males and Females of Various Ages
| AGE |
Male |
Female |
|
AGE |
Male |
Female |
65 |
14.2 |
18.4 |
|
78 |
7.6 |
9.8 |
66 |
13.6 |
17.7 |
|
79 |
7.2 |
9.2 |
67 |
13.0 |
17.0 |
|
80 |
6.8 |
8.7 |
68 |
12.5 |
16.3 |
|
81 |
6.4 |
8.2 |
69 |
11.9 |
15.5 |
|
82 |
6.1 |
7.7 |
70 |
11.4 |
14.8 |
|
83 |
5.8 |
7.2 |
71 |
10.8 |
14.2 |
|
84 |
5.4 |
6.8 |
72 |
10.3 |
13.5 |
|
85 |
5.1 |
6.4 |
73 |
9.8 |
12.8 |
|
86 |
4.9 |
6.0 |
74 |
9.4 |
12.2 |
|
87 |
4.6 |
5.6 |
75 |
8.9 |
11.6 |
|
88 |
4.3 |
5.3 |
76 |
8.5 |
11.0 |
|
89 |
4.1 |
5.0 |
77 |
8.0 |
10.4 |
|
90 |
3.9 |
4.7 |
Source: National Center for Health Statistics:
U.S. Decennial Life Tables for 1979-81
The figures in this table are different from the ones
provided by life insurance companies. The life insurance
tables are typically based on people who buy annuities,
and these people tend to live longer than the rest of the
population. That's why "annuity mortality" tables have
larger numbers than the ones in this table.
- Customized Life Expectancy
- Want to go beyond
median figures for males and females? Here are two
websites that let you enter a lot more information about
an individual. As you might guess, the results are likely
to be different from the ones in the table above.
www.northwesternmutual.com/siteassets/html/longevity_game_popup.html
www.livingto100.com
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Revised: August 31, 2001.
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