Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 <silence>
Speaker 1 00:00:05 This is annuity Straight talk. Since 2008, your host Brian Anderson, has helped clients nationwide navigate the complex market for annuities With Brian's assistance, hundreds of clients have achieved a profitable and secure retirement. I would know because Brian has answered many of my questions concerning annuities and retirement planning, so that you can benefit as well. Let's get started. Here's Brian.
Speaker 2 00:00:47 Hello and welcome everyone to the Annuity Straight Talk podcast, episode number 99. Getting up there, getting close to a hundred and the pressure's on to think of a good Century podcast. I'll figure it out somehow. I can get it out in time. Anyway, I appreciate you guys joining me. My name is Brian Anderson, founder and creator of annuity stray talk.com. Um, I've done the introduction before for anyone new. I wrote everything, researched everything, all my ideas. It is 100% my creation except for the website itself. I did need some help with organizing things and that's one of my challenges to this day is to organize things. Brought up this podcast, episode 99. You have to want an annuity. It makes so much sense to me and I'll try to develop the idea For anybody who's sitting there considering getting an annuity, it has to be your idea, not someone else's.
Speaker 2 00:01:43 And I know, I know nobody wakes up in the morning. Hmm, I'm retiring. I'll get an annuity. It comes into research and there's reasons for doing it. Uh, but I'm gonna show you the newsletter and uh, just a visual aid so you can go read it on the website. Same title on the newsletter page. If you're watching the video, if you're just listening to it, just, you can go to your computer later if you want to. But here's what it looks on like on the newsletter page. So on the top, you got the annuity newsletter, and then you got the annuity. Watch the video, listen to the audio, whatever it is. And then obviously the featured one is going to be right off the bat on the top. So I'm gonna click on that. I'll talk about why this idea came to me in a little bit, but it comes from something I heard a long time ago.
Speaker 2 00:02:29 I've heard it in in a lot of places. The idea, uh, of annuities are sold rather than bought. Nobody wants to buy one, they're just sold one. And I think it's a criticism that comes from financial journalists. Mostly. Journalists don't work for free. They're paid for investment managers, the magazines, all that stuff. It's all kind of like a knock to get. It's like, oh, these aren't important kind of things, right? Forums, you read financial forums. You get like a, an anonymous person on a screen. Motley Fool's a big one. Bogleheads is another one. I did a newsletter about the Bogleheads. I call 'em the Bobbleheads. And plenty of advisors who want to sell you something else, we will pick it up as well. So I'm not sure if you've heard it, but it used to be batted around a bunch. Wall Street Journal, Forbes Money Magazine.
Speaker 2 00:03:20 I've seen it in a lot of places. Now. You can take your advice from whoever you like, but a lot of the people handing out recommendations are hiding behind a screen. I'm here online, ready for good discussion, open to a debate with anyone who disagrees with me and happy to share thoughts and ideas. It all comes down to sales. What I'm trying to do here really is to organize information for everyone. I've talked about the numbers that I get with selling annuities. I sell annuities to a very small percentage of the people who find the website. I have a lot of advisors on the website. They like it. I've got at least one c e o of a major insurance company who listens to my podcast and reads my newsletter, several journalists as well. So it's not just for people who are looking to buy annuities.
Speaker 2 00:04:09 I can't monetize a lot of the traffic that comes to this website because they're not in the business to buy one. They're either selling it or they're just doing research and that's fine. I un certainly do understand the opposing viewpoints. I don't think it's black or white. Nothing is a hundred percent certain. There's a lot of cases for retirement where annuities are the best option and I don't care what anybody says, I'll prove it to 'em. I can also make a solid case or a solid argument for every single retired person to own an annuity. So many options and applications. There's so many different types of annuities, different ways to use 'em, that just about everybody can benefit from them in some way. But that doesn't mean everybody wants an annuity. Even some people I have, I have people that have more than enough money to spend.
Speaker 2 00:05:00 They'll never ever run outta money. And they like annuities. They want annuities. I know people who should buy an annuity 'cause they have barely enough money to retire. They can't afford any risk and they don't want one because they think they can do better elsewhere. They want to take the risk. That's up to them, right? It comes up a lot because so many advisors take a salesperson approach, retired person, you in particular maybe come into a seminar or into an office. They'll do anything to get you to buy their favorite product. A lot of what I see is people just, or advisors just selling, Hey, this is what I sell. This is what I like. You know, there's a lot of guys out there that do a really good job and offer options. You'd be hard pressed to find anyone who's ever talked to me where they didn't at least get an alternative option, right?
Speaker 2 00:05:46 That's, I'm all about alternative options. But you get that sales pitch, they find me and the first thing I gotta do is figure out whether they even want one. So slowly but surely, that has become my number one goal in the first question I ask. So I started thinking about this newsletter, uh, on a backcountry trip with a couple of friends at the end of June. Um, I mentioned this in episode 43, the best annuity training possible. I learned to work well with people of retirement age because I was a fishing guide in Montana and Alaska in my post high school collegiate years. And even for, uh, several years after that, in part, the guys that can afford to take expensive fishing trips are often 60 plus years old. They got money and they're retired. I wasn't trying to pitch 'em financial products. I didn't have the experience to do that at the time, nor did I know that what I, that was what I was gonna do with my life.
Speaker 2 00:06:42 But I learned how to carry a conversation with them. I learned how to, I know what like jokes they like. Everybody got a different sense of humor. I get learned to read people pretty well. And so I got really good at communicating with people that were 30, 40 years older than me. Now that I'm getting older, most people starting to retire only 20 years older than me. Some people 10 or 12. It also means that a lot of my friends are in your age bracket. 65, 70, 75. The two guys I went with on the trip, 1 75, 1 63, they've been friends for 40 years or something like that, maybe more. One of 'em just sold his business that he spent building for the past 45 years. And the other is about to retire as a p president of a large company in Montana. I'm not gonna tell you their names, they don't even know they're the subject of this.
Speaker 2 00:07:33 They don't even know where I was sitting there on a ho on my horse riding through the back country. Thinking about those guys. Both of them have been cr incredibly successful and happen to be accomplished outdoorsmen as well. These guys are bad asses. They can do anything. They've been a lot of places. They've done a lot of first things that nobody else has ever done going back into their teenage years when they were pushing the limits on different outdoor activities, hella skiing, kayaking, hunting, fishing. And it's a lot. It's a lot of fun to spend time with guys like that. We went into the Bob Marshall Wilderness by the time this podcast goes out. If you wanna go check out the newsletter, there's a few cool photos. You saw one of 'em that was on the featured photo on the beginning. Beautiful spot in the Bob Marshall Wilderness.
Speaker 2 00:08:21 And we had a really good time and it's so much fun to spend time with people like that. And it's the same thing as working with you guys because I learn a lot from every single one of you. Intelligent conversations with guys that can more than pull their weight on the 85 mile pack trip with horses and mules. That's a real treat. Makes me a better person in a lot of ways. I learn a lot of things and it makes for a very enjoyable trip 'cause I don't have to do all the work. I love taking my family and all that stuff, but I have to do all the work. So sometimes it's nice to have a break and that's one thing I've always wanted to do is be in a position where I can learn, learn something, uh, as many experiences as possible. It was great for me.
Speaker 2 00:09:05 These guys had it covered from various angles. I really enjoy spending time with them. We laugh, we joke, we talk serious stuff, intelligent stuff. Just lots of different benefits of doing that. And I'm grateful to be friends with them. So with each of those guys, I've talked about retirement and finances more than once and it always ends the same way. Both of them could use an annuity, but neither of them is suited for it. They're my friends. So I don't push it. I don't, I've never pushed it with any of you guys either. A couple of times I will give a nudge, Hey, you really need to do this. But that's the majority of the people that I talked to are not that way. So the guy who sold his business has more money than he'll ever be able to spend. He's in that category.
Speaker 2 00:09:45 Constant activity is what made him successful. He is the hardest working person I've ever met. His money needs to be invested in things that keep him going and keep him active and engaged because that's the type of person he is. Real estate development and building projects require cash to rest, withstand market cycles. And that's the type type of thing he likes. You cannot just go from working 14 hours a day all your life to sitting on the couch watching Oprah. I know there's no way he'll ever be a golfer. There's not enough adrenaline in it for him. He's gotta take some risks and he is gotta push the limits. And he is gotta work until he is dog tired so he can sleep. Now he's asked me directly, should I buy an annuity? I know I could talk him into putting a chunk of money into an annuity, but it doesn't suit him.
Speaker 2 00:10:31 And I told him, I said, yeah, but you're gonna be in there for a few years. And it's not, he's not into that asset distribution mode. He's got rental properties, he's got, he hates the stock market. So that's why maybe an annuity would work for him. But I can't represent that. He might not have some big idea or some big opportunity where he needs to get the money out in just a few years. It just doesn't work for him. He may think that, oh yeah, we're friends, he's a good buddy of mine. I'm not gonna steer him wrong. He may think he wants one or thinks that he wanna buy, but I know deep down inside he probably doesn't. He just isn't gonna pay attention, close enough attention to realize how well it's gonna benefit him. Now the younger guy, I've known him for less time, but I, I guess the first time I met him was about 15 years ago for the past 10.
Speaker 2 00:11:16 That was funny. He was there with me when I bought uh, my first mule Jitterbug my favorite. That's a cool side story. I'm never gonna cover that in the podcast, but it's fun hanging out with him at a a mule auction. <laugh>. So same story. Now he is been saying he wants to retire. I get the feeling he's serious this time. Probably hanging up in a year or so. I think he's training his successor. So he's an engineer geologist by background makes him a pretty technical guy. And portfolio performance over the past several years has shown that he's pretty dang good market analyst as well. He's done well enough that there's no need for him to rush into doing anything different than what got him here. And that's the case with a lot of you guys as well. Never rushed to make a big financial decision.
Speaker 2 00:11:58 I say that to everybody. One of the things that big projects he wanna works on in work on in retirement. His son's been, is old enough and he's been working for a few years and has a really good business idea. Got it going. And he said, yeah, I might provide a backstop for him and go to work for him part-time, whatever it is. I'd like to make sure he gets on his feet. And that's one way that some people can leave a legacy. He's gonna help his son get well established. He's a sharp kid, only met the kid once, but he, he was a good kid now and now he's successful young man and doing good things. So based on his portfolio, absolutely an annuity can help him in some way. But he hasn't made the mental transition to protecting assets. There's several different ways to protect assets and what he's done to this point has suited him so far.
Speaker 2 00:12:40 So I'm not gonna try to change his mind. He doesn't wake up in the morning thinking, oh I need an annuity. He's not gonna go to a dinner seminar. Neither of these guys are. So this is not to say that business owners and engineers don't buy annuities. I've sold lots of annuities to both people. I love engineers, I love business people. Why? Because they come to a conclusion with these guys. Their personal preferences and lifestyle do not match with a set and forget asset. They both have been very active and managed money. I'm not gonna say they are cheap, but I'm sure they've been accused of that. Gotta rib your buddies, right? It's the same deal for any of you. Lifestyle and expectations have to indicate an annuity is the right asset to use. And if you don't know anything about annuities, then you're not gonna know how to make that connection.
Speaker 2 00:13:26 I'm trying to help you make that connection because when you do, it's a more solid yes or no, right? I don't mind when someone sees a proposal and says, no, that's great. Yes is awesome too 'cause I get to make some money and to pay for all this stuff and I can afford to keep doing this 'cause I like it. But it's the wishy-washy, the maybes. The people haven't figured out what their goals are. You have to want an annuity. Too many people get caught up in the negative comments about annuities and what someone else says Shouldn't matter when it comes to your retirement. It is your money. I could say plenty about like one this morning. Oh, the investment managers don't like it 'cause you make a big commission. And I could run the numbers and say 10 year, even a 10 year index annuity, like fixed annuities, don't pay a whole ton.
Speaker 2 00:14:12 Index annuities pay better. An investment manager is gonna make twice as much money over 10 years as I will with an annuity commission. The only difference is that investment management fees come out of your pocket. Annuity commissions do not. So do you even want an annuity? Like I said, it's gonna be one of the first questions I ask in most of the meetings going forward. I've noticed it as a consistent theme. What do you think about this product? And I started saying, and then you gotta back things up and do education. Learn everything you can so you can decide if you can align your expectations and goals and your lifestyle up with a product that will suit you and do everything you want. That's when you figure out if you do it. A lot of people don't know what they want. And if you haven't realized yet, that is likely the most valuable part of this uh, site.
Speaker 2 00:15:04 You can answer almost any question about annuities. And almost everybody here who comes here is only here because another advisor tried to sell them. One, I encourage you to use this site to learn about the types of annuities and how they can be used. Ask me if you need help finding something. Don't let all my work go to waste. Use it for your benefit regardless of what's in it for me. I do not care. I appreciate those who have put the trust in me to give me business and will be forever grateful. I never would've got to 99 episodes if I wasn't making a living. And I'm humbled by that and I'm grateful. But you should be able to determine whether you want an annuity. And if you do, I'll make sure you buy the right one. That's what I'm here for. So this has been episode 99.
Speaker 2 00:15:51 You have to want an annuity. I hope it makes sense to people. You've gotta understand and uncover the reasons. This is a tremendous resource for doing that. Ask me if you need to find something. Hey, do you have anything on this? I've a few people ask me about stuff that's not on here that I haven't decided, whether it's a whale podcast or a newsletter, I'm gonna work through it. But if you see something, do not be afraid to ask me. I'm not gonna throw a sticky annuity at you and make you buy it just 'cause you ask a question. So anyway, please remember to follow on your favorite podcast platform or annuity. Comment, subscribe, helps the numbers, gets us out to more people. I've heard a lot of people say, I can't believe you're not more popular. Well, I don't know what the deal is with that, but I do the best I can and I've had some great relationships come out of it. And I'm grateful again for everything uh, you guys have done to, uh, keep this going. Thanks again for stopping by for episode 99. I'll be back with 100 next week and I look forward to it and I'll see you then. Okay, bye. You
Speaker 1 00:16:52 Have been listening to Annuity Stray Talk. The proceeding information is for informational and educational purposes only and does not represent tax, legal or investment advice. Reviews expressed by guests on this program are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of annuity, straight talk or its partners. No information presented today should be acted upon without meeting with the qualified and licensed professional. It's important that you read all insurance contract disclosures carefully before making a purchase. Decision guarantees are based on the financial strength and claims paying ability of the insurance company.
