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This article first appeared at U.S. News and World Report Money.

Most personal finance advisors provide solid money advice that will help you achieve your goals. They sincerely want you to succeed, make genuine efforts to understand the specifics of your situation, and do their best to translate those specifics into a powerful plan for you.

As with any profession, however, there are sharks in the water. There are a few advisors out there who place their own interests before yours and strive to use your situation and your resources as a mere stepping stone for their own profits.

There are also advisors who genuinely believe they’re doing what’s best for you but are actually making decisions loaded with conflicts of interest, such as putting your money in good (but not great) investments for which they earn a nice commission.

Sarah and I are subscribers to the “buy it for life” philosophy. In short, it means that we’re willing to pay more for a product that does its job well but, just as importantly, will last a very long time, preferably for the rest of our lives. Here are six principles of “buying it for life” that I suggested earlier, along with a few extra ones:

1. We prefer to pay more now to not have to deal with replacing an item for a very, very long time. Ideally, I’d like to not have to replace it in my lifetime – and I’m in my mid-thirties.

2. We tend to strongly favor companies that put extensive warranties or guarantees on their products.

3. We tend to strongly prefer products that are low maintenance or have maintenance we can do ourselves.

A few days ago, I put an hour aside to watch this amazing presentation from Elizabeth Warren. Entitled “The Coming Collapse of the Middle Class,” Warren’s presentation makes the case that many, many factors are working against the ability of the middle class to maintain their standard of living. She delivered this presentation at the University of California at Berkeley in 2007 when she was a professor at Harvard Law School. If you have an hour, this is something that’s really worth watching. Here’s the video:

Here are six specific points I pulled from the presentation. (If you watched the video and pulled out five points, you’d probably find some different ones.)

Finding a cheap life insurance policy that offers the right amount of coverage is at the forefront of any first-time buyer’s mind. The same goes for someone who’s simply looking for a better rate.

If you want to get the most affordable life insurance, there are several things you can do to minimize costs. I have six tips to help you find cheap life insurance, which I’ll be sharing with you in this article.

It’s true there are factors you have less control over when it comes to the cost of life insurance, but there’s a lot within your control too.

Here are the 2 basic starting points for getting cheap life insurance:

1. Target a term life insurance policy.
2. Get quotes from multiple providers.

For your convenience, I’ve included a quote tool below so you can find the most affordable life insurance in your area.