Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Speaker A: 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. You 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.
[00:00:47] Speaker B: Hello and welcome, everyone, to the annuity Straight Talk podcast, episode number 120. My name is Brian Anderson. I'll be your host, sharing you with information that I've compiled over a 20, almost 21 year career.
Making sense of what doesn't make sense. Clearing the air, setting the record straight. Today's a big day because I got some good news to share. We're on the tail end of a big winter storm here in Montana. I think everybody in the country's getting something like it.
Not like this, but everybody's getting colder temperatures. I think it goes all the way south. I'm dressed up in my thermals, getting ready to go plow snow because the worst of it has passed. It's just going to be cold for a few days, and then I'm going to go out and I'm going to try to bust some drifts with a plow. I don't think it's going to happen.
Probably end up using a shovel. Anyway.
Let me share with you my screen. The big news, and I've been waiting to do this for the last couple of months, is that major investment firms are now recommending that people buy annuities. Boy, isn't that interesting. Seems like we had a lot of pushback from those guys in the past.
So I don't know, it's different. So I'm going to use my screen as a visual aid. If you're watching the video, say hi to me. It's not that big a deal, but everybody that's just listening know that there's a newsletter on this quick, easy read. Some people like it, go through it. In a few minutes, I'm going to go into a little more detail.
So again, doing this, I guess in another month or so it'll be 21 years.
I never expected this day to come. It's huge news for the retirement community. So I'm going to break it because I don't think it's being published anywhere. A lot of guys might have to eat crow. Wait a second. So it's not going to be published, but this is kind of, I got my ear to the ground, and that's one of the biggest benefits of picking my brain watching these videos is. It's not stuff. I'm not doing research online.
This is original content. I'm figuring this out by talking to people about their experiences all over the country and what they run into. I mean, if that's not important, again, I think it's a huge value that this is mostly original content. How often do I sit up? I might mention an article, but this is the first place you get a lot of this stuff. So in the past, investment managers all over the country, I'm talking about the big firms kind of split on the use of annuities, retirement. There's plenty of open minded people willing to admit that there's value in a lot of ways. We've talked about, I'm not going to talk about the technical numbers, the analysis of the whole thing right now. We've done that a lot in the past. We'll continue to do that through case studies. There are a lot of holdouts. So we're talking about risk management, whatever the risk is. Is it income, is it safety, portfolio volatility, all that stuff.
Long term care, legacy, you know who's nailed it for centuries is the insurance companies. And I kind of thought it would always be that way. There's always going to be a divide, and there's a reason why I think it's changing, not just because of interest rates. It caught my attention when I got somebody that called me and said this. So just about every management institution has annuities, but they are rarely used and the options they have are pretty limited. I've talked about that in the past, but in my experience, this is my experience, my opinion, the only time one of those big firms has offered an annuity or one of their advisors has offered an annuity is when there was a threat of money leaving management.
Somebody would go in, hey, I found this guy wants to take a piece of the money. I'm going to shift it out. And they'd say, oh, well, we sell annuities too. And I love that because there's a lot of other advisors. People steal my ideas all the time, and I've heard that on dozens and dozens of occasions.
And my response is obviously, well, why didn't they offer it in the first place if they think it's such a good idea? They just want to make the money. They don't want it to leave. So most of you guys, or a lot of you guys find this website because someone else introduced you to annuities. A salesperson got a hold of you, a dinner recommendation, went and had a nice dinner with some other people like you, but I've never heard it coming from one of the major firms.
So a few months ago, it was probably back October sometime, talked to a guy. So what happens when you guys. So a lot of people, you get introduced to it by someone else and then start researching, then find me.
This is the first time that happened. Came from a fidelity rep, said, hey, you should go buy an annuity. So the guy started doing research. In this case, it was like, yeah, take 20% your portfolio, purchase guaranteed income annuity. So this guy was shopping for low cost investment managers for his retirement assets.
Vanguard was the other contender. Between the two, he had done it all his life. He's getting ready to retire, I think just another month or two, but he'd done it all his life. Saved. He said, I just don't want to have to worry about it. I want somebody else to do it. Fidelity said, yeah, you should buy an annuity. And they gave him a couple of options because they've always had annuities and never lead with it. I don't know if anybody else is surprised by that. Come on. You got to admit, Vanguard, probably because they were competing for the other pool of assets. It was a nice portfolio, agreed that it was a good idea, but I don't think they really had what he was looking for, or the vanguard's kind of traditionally been maybe some real low cost, variable annuities, the tax shelter type. I've kind of talked about that in the past. If anybody's curious what I mean by that, you can ask me, but that's a variable. Annuities are created for tax shelters for wealthy individuals to invest in the stock market with non qualified money. Vanguard had those obviously underwritten by another insurance company. So these companies don't offer their own annuities. They have to have an insurance company that does it. That's why their options are limited, because it's a corporate decision. In a boardroom, they say, okay, well, who are we going to partner with? So they're stuck to those three recommendations where me, a broker, I can go around, shop around. Rates change all the time. Companies come in and out of being competitive. So this guy, I think probably he said, well, I wondered if annuities were good. And I was kind of surprised when Fidelity said, yeah, you should buy one of these. And they gave him a quote. So he started researching. He found me, told me about the numbers real quick, and I knew off the top of my head I hadn't crunched anything seriously yet an annuity was absolutely the right approach for a small portion of his assets, 20% he'd have income for life, and market fluctuations would never affect his lifestyle.
The result was going to be far more portfolio growth. And I want to put emphasis on this would completely eliminate any other retirement concern a person might have. Is that your goal? Do you want to eliminate every single retirement concern you might have when you're 62, 65, 70? Never worry about it again. Let that sink in. It's a rhetorical question. And you get a hold of me and make an appointment if you want to talk about that. So I've been fighting against these companies and the journalists they sponsor for a dang long time.
I've got the major firms on my side. Then the only opposition is going to be the independent holdouts that are too stubborn to change their ways. And that's speed bumps to me, honestly.
Now, fidelity is not the only one that has changed. Schwab has done the same thing. I've heard a couple coming from there as well. Now, those two companies have. I'm not talking about. Okay, so you got broker dealers. I'm talking management firms. Fidelity, Schwab, Vanguard, like your Merrill lynch, your Raymond James. Those companies, they're called broker dealers. Those guys will sell anything that they can make money on. They've always had annuities. They don't usually sell them because they want managed assets. And you know why? There's more money to be made in managed assets than there is in annuities. Point blank, plain and simple. There's no debate. So I'm just telling you about the first one I heard, and I've had probably a half a dozen of them since. Even Edward Jones. I heard a couple of people, Edward Jones is selling fixed annuities, mygas. And I even talked to a couple of Edward Jones. Yeah, we don't even have annuities. I didn't think. They do have some variable, those guys. Edward Jones is a broker dealer, but they're actually coming out. Yeah, you should buy this. You know why Edward Jones is doing it? Because bonds got crushed in the past couple of years and they're getting heat for it. So they're probably saying, oh, you know what, maybe it is a good idea to go buy a myga so you don't have to worry about a fluctuating value.
It's kind of changing now. You have to remember that retirement asset distribution is a science that is relatively new.
When I started this website in 2008, there was nothing available.
There was no consensus at all. And what you had is you had a lot of people grabbing at your money. Hey, I know how to do this. This is the way to do it. And the big firms, those big heavyweights, they didn't want anything to change, even though all of you guys are coming into retirement with a bunch of assets and even inheriting some of the largest estates that are out there, which is, what is it, the World War II generation? I don't even know what that one's called, but the one before the baby boomers. But we're seeing a shift from major firms, and that's big news that many of you might not realize. And it's kind of funny. I wasn't grabbing in anybody's money. I just kind of pursued a path that made sense, where I thought I could add value. That led me to being kind of the annuity expert or continuous annuity student. That was really the plan. Now, if my voice cracks a little bit, I also had a bit of a sinus infection this week, so I was being a little bit of a baby, trying not to squeak too much or clear my throat.
So I don't mind saying, you know what? Maybe I was right all along. Maybe this is going to make things easier for you. It'll make things easier for me, too. And this is one thing I tell to investment advisors and consumers alike who are maybe hesitant to use annuities in retirement planning. Now you can just protect assets and park money. You can get an income stream. We can do legacy planning, pick your problem, and annuities can be a part of that solution. Sometimes all of the solution rates being better means that the solutions are more obvious. It's obvious why the annuity improves it. The fundamentals haven't changed at all. It's always made things better. It's just like now it's slapping you in the face. You got to be crazy enough to do it.
The correct solution is mostly the same, no matter the environment. And that's why academic research on the topic has been settled for decades. This has been documented for a long time. Large brokerage firms know they're going to lose money if they don't get out in front of it. A lot of them are opening up to new products, different products. They realize that there's value.
They realize that consumers want those products, and so they're doing everything they can to stem the bleeding to some extent, and they'll all be fine. Ken Fisher is probably never going to fold, but that's okay. He works for some people, he's great for some people. But regardless of the motivation of others. For me, it's been very satisfying to sit in this position for the past couple of years. I've had fun doing it.
It's always good to change someone's outlook for the better, to give them more security. It's always been good when the deals are incredible. It's even more satisfying and it's kind of like you look at it. It's as if the past 20 years of work and study and determination has prepared me to capitalize at this point in time.
So don't let that lesson escape you because it could be your time to capitalize too. Now is a good time to retire. Now is a good time to lock in annuity rates, annuity income protection. All those components are fabulous.
So this is quick and easy. I wanted to make it simple for you guys. Easy message the tide is turning. Recommendations are changing. We're all coming together to a consensus and it's for your benefit. I want to thank you guys for joining me for episode number 120, management companies now recommend annuities. Feel free to or actually please share this with your friends.
Hit the thumbs up. Like it? Comment if you've got something to say, subscribe on your favorite podcast platform or on YouTube. Share it with your friends. It's good information trying to help good people make good decisions.
I thank you guys for joining me. I'm looking forward to another good 2024 and helping people find the right result for their retirement. This has been episode 120. I'll see you next week for episode 121. Okay, thanks guys. Have a great day. Bye.
[00:13:58] Speaker A: You have been listening to annuity straight talk.
The preceding information is for informational and educational purposes only and does not represent tax, legal or investment advice.
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