The Mortgage Is Covered. That Is Not The Same As The Family Being Covered.

Two incomes come into the house. The mortgage gets paid, the bills get paid, there's a bit left over most months. It works because both of you are working.

Then one of you dies.

Almost every Irish homeowner has mortgage protection — you can't draw down a mortgage without it. It does exactly one thing, and it does it well: it clears the outstanding mortgage. The bank is paid, the house is safe, and a very large monthly outgoing disappears overnight.

That's real, and it matters. It is also where most families' protection stops — and it is not where the problem stops.

What mortgage protection actually covers

A mortgage is a debt that was always going to end. It shrinks every month, and on the day it's cleared it's gone forever. Running a family is the opposite: it never shrinks, it rises with inflation, and it gets more expensive as children get older.

Over twenty years, a typical family spends about €1.7 million simply existing — food, heat, insurance, school, childcare, transport. Mortgage protection addresses €280,000 of that, once, and less every year that passes.

What stops, and what doesn't

It's worth being blunt about which costs actually die with a person:

Childcare is the one that surprises people. The parent who did the school run is gone, so the surviving parent either pays someone else to do it or cuts their own hours to do it themselves. Either way it costs money — and it lands in exactly the years when the children are least able to manage alone.

What the State actually provides

There is real support, and it deserves credit. The Bereaved Partner's (Contributory) Pension — renamed in July 2025 from the Widow's and Widower's Pension — pays €259.50 a week to a surviving partner under 66 with a full contribution record. On top of that, an Increase for a Qualified Child adds €58 a week per child under 12, and €78 a week for children aged 12 and over.

For a family with two young children that's roughly €19,500 a year. Genuinely useful. It is also nowhere near a replacement salary — and the child portion stops as each child grows up, which happens to be precisely when they become most expensive.

So here is the gap

Take an ordinary family. Two earners on €50,000 and €45,000, two children aged four and seven, a €1,500 monthly mortgage with €280,000 outstanding.

The lower earner dies. Mortgage protection clears the €280,000, so the mortgage payment stops. State support begins. The surviving parent moves to a four-day week to manage the children.

In the first year the family is about €4,400 short. That's uncomfortable, not catastrophic — and it's why so many people assume they'd cope. By year ten the gap is nearly €10,000. By year fifteen, with both children in or approaching college, it is close to €38,000 a year.

Why children make it compound

Raising a child in Ireland now costs roughly €15,300 a year, and about €322,000 from cot to college. Crucially, that cost is not flat — it climbs steeply. Créche is expensive, secondary school is worse, and college is worse again, particularly if a child has to live away from home.

So the family's costs rise for two reasons at once: general inflation lifts everything, and the children themselves get more expensive every year. Meanwhile the State's child payments taper off and stop. The two curves move apart, and they move apart faster the longer it goes on.

And inflation quietly does the rest

Inflation was running at 3.4% in the year to June 2026. That sounds modest. Over twenty years it turns €55,000 of annual household costs into roughly €107,000 — for exactly the same life.

This is the single most common mistake we see in existing policies. A family takes out €150,000 of cover, feels sensible, and never looks at it again. Two decades later that €150,000 buys about half of what it was meant to. Cover that isn't indexed to inflation shrinks every single year you hold it.

The number nobody expects

Add up every year's shortfall for this one fairly ordinary family: €417,000 over twenty years. That is what it costs to keep this family in the life they already had — and it is more than the mortgage that everyone assumed was the big number.

Mortgage protection would have covered €280,000 of debt. The family needed €417,000 of income. Those are two entirely different problems, and only one of them is insured in most Irish households.

What to do about it

• Work out the income, not the debt. The question isn't "what do we owe?" It's "what would this household need every year, for how many years?"
• Index the cover. Indexed cover rises each year to keep pace with prices. It costs a little more and it is the difference between cover that works and cover that quietly evaporates.
• Cover both parents. A parent at home providing childcare has enormous economic value. Replacing that care costs real money.
• Review it when life changes. A new child, a bigger house, a career move — each one changes the number. Cover set up eight years ago was priced for a family that no longer exists.
• Check what your employer already gives you. Death-in-service benefit can be worth several times salary. It reduces what you need to buy — but it usually stops the day you leave that job.

It costs less than people think

Most people significantly overestimate the price of term life cover and significantly underestimate how much they need. The only way to know either figure is to do the sum properly, for your family, with your numbers.

Worked example is illustrative and based on a specific set of assumptions set out above; your own position will differ. Net income figures are approximate. Inflation of 3.4% is the CSO Consumer Price Index for the year to June 2026 and is applied throughout; actual future inflation will vary. Bereaved Partner's (Contributory) Pension rates are 2026 rates and assume a full PRSI contribution record — entitlement depends on individual circumstances. Child cost figures are drawn from published Irish research. This article is for general information and does not constitute personal financial advice. Life assurance products have terms, exclusions and underwriting requirements. Please talk to us before making any decision about your cover.