Frequently Asked Questions

Nothing. There's no fee for a review and no obligation afterward. If you decide you want to do something based on what we find, that's a separate conversation. The review itself is always free.

No. If you own an annuity and want to understand it better, I'll review it. Some reviews are simpler than others, but the door is open either way.

From the time I receive your contract documents, plan on about two weeks. The first week is reading the contract, pulling cost data, and modeling the income or accumulation projections. The second week is writing it up and preparing for our review meeting.

Five things:

1. A plain-English summary of what you actually own.
2. A breakdown of every fee and charge in the contract.
3. How the contract has actually performed compared to how it was projected to perform.
4. What your guarantees really are — not what you remember from the sales pitch.
5. A recommendation: keep it, change something about it, or replace it. With reasons.

You've already seen the format if you downloaded the sample review.

The original contract, the most recent annual statement, and any rider documents or amendments. If you're not sure what you have, send what you can find and I'll let you know what's missing.

Yes. Documents are sent through encrypted file transfer, stored in secured systems, and never shared with anyone outside our office. We sign a confidentiality acknowledgment before any review begins.

No. The review is done remotely. We meet over Zoom or by phone, and documents are exchanged electronically. We work with annuity owners across the country.

We can review contracts for annuity owners in all 50 states. Licensing is only required when new business is written, not when a contract is reviewed. If your review leads to a recommendation you want to act on, we'll get licensed in your state at that point. Licensing isn't a barrier to getting your contract reviewed.

Yes. The review is independent — I have no relationship with your advisor or the company that issued the contract. The point is to give you a second opinion, separate from whoever sold it.

Same answer. It doesn't matter where the contract came from. The review is about what you own now, not who sold it to you.

Yes. Sometimes the annuity is fine. Sometimes it's actually a good contract for the situation you're in. The point of an honest review is to tell you which one you have — not to talk you into a change you don't need.

No. The review ends with a recommendation, not a sales pitch. If you want to act on it, we have that conversation. If you want to keep what you have, that's also a valid outcome.

No. The review is yours to keep, regardless of what you decide. If you want to take it to your existing advisor, that's fine. If you want us to handle the change, we can — but it's your choice.

It's a fair question, and one I've written about at length — see "Why 'Free' Annuity Reviews Are Rarely Free." The short version: if you decide to make a change to your annuity through us, the new contract pays a commission, which the insurance company funds — not you. The cost to you is the same whether we handle the change or not.

If your annuity is fine and no changes are needed, we don't get paid for the review. That's the model, and we're comfortable with it. We hope you find the analysis valuable either way — and if you do, we'd be glad to be considered for any other financial or investment needs you have down the road.

You don't have to. Download the sample review (Bruce Wayne version). Read it. See if it's the kind of analysis you'd want for your own contract. If yes, schedule a 20-minute call. If no, no harm done.

No, but they're often the wrong tool for the job they were sold to do. Annuities are insurance products designed to provide guaranteed income. When they're used for that, they work. When they're used as a substitute for growth investing, they tend to underperform — that's where most of the bad reputation comes from.

The guarantees inside an annuity are backed by the claims-paying ability of the issuing insurance company — not the FDIC, not the SIPC, not the federal government. Strong, highly-rated insurance companies have been honoring annuity contracts for over a century. State guaranty associations provide an additional layer of protection if a company fails.

Maybe. Maybe not. That's the entire point of the review. The right answer depends on what you own, why you bought it, and what your alternatives actually are. Anyone who tells you the answer before reading your contract is selling something.

Fixed annuities pay a stated interest rate. Indexed annuities credit interest based on the performance of a market index, with a floor of zero. Variable annuities invest in market subaccounts and can lose money. Each has a different risk profile, fee structure, and use case. The glossary covers each in more detail.