Brighthouse Financial (Formerly MetLife) Review 2020

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MetLife established Brighthouse Financial in 2017 to sell life insurance and annuities to individuals. MetLife, meanwhile, focuses on products sold as employee benefits. Brighthouse Financial life insurance policies are sold only through financial professionals.

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Brighthouse Financial life insurance

Brighthouse Financial earned 3.5 stars out of 5 for overall performance. NerdWallet’s ratings are determined by our editorial team. The scoring formula takes into account complaint data from the National Association of Insurance Commissioners and financial strength ratings from A.M. Best.

Term life: Brighthouse offers terms of 1, 10, 15, 20 or 30 years. The annual price and coverage amount stays level throughout the term. The company’s one-year term life insurance policy is for when short-term coverage is needed, such as bridging a coverage gap between jobs.

Universal life’s fast access to cash value: The company’s Premier Accumulator Universal Life policy gives access to most or all of a policy’s cash value within the first few years. The company says its low surrender charges (the fee policyholders pay in the early years to access cash value) make this possible.

Hybrid life insurance and long-term care: Brighthouse additionally offers an indexed universal life policy called SmartCare. This product allows customers to use part of the policy’s death benefit to pay for long-term care.

Brighthouse Financial complaints and consumer satisfaction

Brighthouse drew fewer than the expected number of complaints to state regulators for a company of its size, according to three years’ worth of data from the National Association of Insurance Commissioners.

Brighthouse Financial scored below average in the J.D. Power 2019 U.S. Life Insurance Study, ranking No. 22 out of 24 companies included in the study.

More about Brighthouse Financial

In addition to life insurance, Brighthouse Financial offers index-linked, income, variable and fixed-rate annuities.

Methodology: Life insurance ratings

NerdWallet’s life insurance ratings are based on weighted averages of complaint index scores from the National Association of Insurance Commissioners for individual life insurance, and financial strength ratings from A.M. Best, which indicate a company’s ability to pay future claims. To calculate each insurer’s rating, we adjusted the NAIC and A.M. Best scores to a curved 5-point scale.

These ratings are a guide, but we encourage you to shop around and compare several insurance quotes to find the best rate for you. NerdWallet does not receive compensation for any reviews.

Methodology: Insurer complaints

NerdWallet examined complaints received by state insurance regulators and reported to the National Association of Insurance Commissioners in 2016-2018. To assess how insurers compare to one another, the NAIC calculates a complaint index each year for each subsidiary, measuring its share of total complaints relative to its size, or share of total premiums in the industry. To evaluate a company’s complaint history, NerdWallet calculated a similar index for each insurer, weighted by market shares of each subsidiary, over the three-year period. Ratios are determined separately for auto, home (including renters and condo) and life insurance.