Group life through Intel, Nike, or OHSU: what it covers and what it doesn't.

What group life typically gives you

Most large Oregon employers provide basic group term life at no cost to you, commonly one to two times your annual salary. Many also offer supplemental coverage you can buy through payroll, sometimes with limited underwriting during your first enrollment window.

That's genuinely valuable, especially the guaranteed-issue portion if your health history would make individual coverage expensive. Take it. The problem isn't the benefit, it's treating it as the whole plan.

Gap one: the amount

Two times a $140,000 salary is $280,000. Against a Hillsboro or Beaverton mortgage that's often less than the loan balance alone, before you've replaced a single year of income or paid for childcare.

Run the arithmetic for your own household: mortgage plus other debts plus the years of income your family would need. Compare that to your group benefit. The gap is usually large and it's usually a surprise.

Gap two: it ends when the job does

Group life is tied to employment. Change companies, get laid off, go contract, retire — the coverage stops. In an industry where people move between campuses every few years, that matters a lot.

Portability and conversion options exist, but they're often expensive and time-limited. The version of you who needs them will be older and possibly less healthy than the version reading this.

Gap three: supplemental coverage is age-banded

Employer supplemental life usually re-prices as you age, stepping up every five years. A personal term policy locks your rate for the entire term. In your twenties and thirties the payroll option can look cheaper; by your late forties it frequently isn't.

How to fill the gap

Keep the free basic coverage. Consider the supplemental portion if your health makes individual underwriting difficult. Then add a personal term policy sized to the gap, owned by you, priced at today's age, and unaffected by your badge.

For most of the engineers and healthcare workers I talk to in Washington County, that means a 20- or 30-year term somewhere between $500,000 and $1.5 million. It's usually a much smaller monthly number than people brace for.

One more thing: check your beneficiaries

Group life beneficiary designations get set once during onboarding and never looked at again. If you've married, divorced, or had a kid since then, log into your benefits portal today. It takes two minutes and it's the single most common expensive mistake I see.