Term life insurance is the simplest form of life insurance. You pay a premium every month to get the death benefit in a lump sum amount to your beneficiary in the event of your death. Term life insurance goes from 10years to 20years. So if you survive at the end of the term you lose the premium to the insurance company. And that's why it's very cheap.

On the other hand universal life insurance is the most complicated form of life insurance. You pay higher premium here and your coverage doesn't get over at the end of some finite term. A part of the premium goes towards fees (this is a huge part), a part goes towards paying for the death benefit and a part goes towards investment. Again the investment instruments chosen by the insurance company for you would always be very expensive and might include front load (a front load of 5% mean you pay $100 but only $95 go into the investment. $5 is taken by the broker.). Sales agent pitch for this product as this looks like a holistic approach to life insurance - you get life insurance forever, you invest a part of the premium and there is no term expiration. The only problem is that it's too expensive.

Just ask yourself if you need life insurance for all of your life? I personally think that we need life insurance only to help our family members stay in home and lead a nice lifestyle in the event of some eventuality. But once the kids are grown up and earning I don't think there is a need of life insurance. A 20 year term life insurance is much cheaper than a universal life insurance. The rule of the thumb is buy a 20yrs or 30yrs term life insurance and invest the difference of premium between term and universal life in a low cost index fund.

You can check out ReliaQuote.com to get a comparison of term premium quote.