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Seven out of 10 of the 114 mortgage professionals surveyed by Financial Times Business Research felt life insurance was the form of protection most wanted by first-time buyers and 63 per cent felt the same about people wanting to remortgage.

But more than half (52 per cent) of the advisers, who were polled online in May, deemed income protection should be the product of choice when it came to ensuring a roof remained over their client's head.

The general feeling among respondents was that the popularity of life insurance was mainly down to cost and the ability to understand what this cover was needed for.

Clearly budget is an important consideration for first-time buyers, which would explain why advisers found these clients more often than not take out minimum protection and only opted for life cover.

In the current climate it will be music to most advisers' ears that the majority of those polled felt people who were remortgaging were more interested in increasing their protection as they tended to be a bit more experienced and saw the benefit of protecting income.

Advisers said people remortgaging were more likely to have life insurance already in place but would consider other protection, particularly critical illness cover, as more affordable and important than when they first took out a mortgage.

A lot of the advisers surveyed said one of the main reasons for why different clients chose different products came down simply to affordability.

While understanding people can be on a strict budget, advisers do not think clients fully understand the value of sickness cover and how, although life insurance is cheaper, it does not cover the real needs or consequences of critical illness cover.

Alan Lakey, senior partner at Hertfordshire-based IFA Highclere Financial Services, said: "Life insurance is so cheap and few people can argue against it. I agree remortgagers are inevitably more experienced than first-time buyers and probably can afford more cover, however I sometimes find many first-time buyers will attempt to avoid taking out any cover at all on the basis they have stretched themselves to the limit to buy the property and now they have nothing left.

"I have clients who foolishly, some with children as well, do not have any cover at all. They are taking that risk, which is utterly stupid and they know they are being stupid but when you talk to them they insist they will do something about it, but they never do.

"If you talk of the whole population then of course everyone really needs life cover to cover their mortgage. There are the odd exceptions in terms of what people should have, the self-employed for example, and also many of the employed whose employers do not provide any worthwhile sick pay or indeed any at all then for them the first port of call should always be income protection."

There is obviously confusion when it comes to buying protection insurance and mortgage professionals feel clients simply do not really understand the benefits of each individual product.

Mr Lakey said: "If you go back 20 years, every lender had it as a condition of the mortgage you had to have life cover.

"Nowadays people have the ability to save themselves a few quid by opting out of the pension plan or by not having life cover and relying totally on what the state may or may not throw at them when they become ill or retired.

"It is this apathy, this thinking that a) it will not happen to me and b) if it does, someone will look after me and my children so I do not need to worry. That is the problem."

A massive 95 per cent of respondents to the survey agreed taking out a combination of protection products was particularly important in today's economic climate however 56 per cent of the adviser polled said they had not noticed any increased consumer demand for several policies.

About eight out of 10 (83 per cent) of advisers agreed all first-time buyers should have life insurance.

More than 60 per cent believed they should also make sure that they have income protection and critical illness cover.

To encourage clients to take out protection, advisers surveyed believed the role of the intermediary and their ability to explain the products, their risks and benefits and ultimately sell them is key to ensuring people take out appropriate cover.

Fundamentally, clients need to know the benefits surrounding protection and be aware of the risks concerned when not having any.

Mr Lakey said: "At the moment it is something like 2.7m people who have been receiving state sickness benefits for more than six months.

"That is a significant percentage of the population so when people say to me 'well it will not happen to me', actually the odds are far greater of that than if you were to die."

What Mortgage Adviser's research has shown is while life insurance is the most popular form of protection among first-time buyers and people wanting to remortgage, intermediaries know clients need to be aware of all the forms of protection available and fully understand the benefits of having insurance and ultimately the risks of not taking cover.