My free dinner and sales pitch

[Totoro]

Quote:

Originally Posted by haha They know that in most cases the more they know, the fewer cars they sell. Can you imagine any of the data heavy denizens of this board selling anything? Ha

True for nearly any high ticket item. Diamonds, cars, houses, horses, boats (children?). Emotion, not content. Different skill set.

Couldn't sell one if my life depended on it.

[ETFs_Rule]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Amethyst Please. Let us not start comparing annuity sales pitches to rape. Not now. Not ever. Just NO.

Then let's not blame naive investors for going to a "seminar" hosted by someone who is trying to sell expensive, wealth eroding financial products.

[MichaelB]

Let's keep it friendly, folks.

[rayinpenn]

I went to a time share session once to get a free something (can't remember anymore). It was plain awful the units were pretty awful too. I didn't like timeshares then and I like them less now. I don't go to the risk free retirement workshops because the products sold just don't make financial sense. Am I so desperate for a free dinner to listen to nonsense? No, I am a firm believer that a really good deal sells itself.




Sent from my iPad using Early Retirement Forum.

[Ready]

Today was my appointment with my "financial advisor". He came over and spent about an hour with me. He asked me what he may be able to help me with, and we focused on alternatives to CDs and bonds for fixed income solutions. He described two different products:

1) A product with a 4% guaranteed return, and some upside to share in the market gains but with no loss of principal if the market goes down.

2) A product with a 1% annual fee that gives you a 25% premium over the gains on the above product, but again with no loss of principal.

I let him know I would like to review the fine print details of the program, and he said he would send me a copy of the contract for the Allianz 360 product for me to review.

I didn't find him to be particularly pushy. He could tell that I'm used to reviewing contracts and I understand financial investments fairly well. If he misrepresented anything, I think he figured out pretty quickly that I would figure it out after review the terms of the contract. He said he would be sending me the information in the mail.

We talked about how the benefits of his product compared to a strategy of rebalancing each year to take advantage of the swings in the stock market. He said rebalancing would likely product about the same results as the annuities he was describing. So at least he didn't try to make them sound better than my strategy.

I'm not really sure what to make of all this. Perhaps he kept it light because he figured I wasn't likely to fall for something that makes no financial sense?

[LOL!]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ready 1) A product with a 4% guaranteed return, and some upside to share in the market gains but with no loss of principal if the market goes down.

I used to work for a company that sold things. No one would buy any of our things unless we gave out of list of names/addresses/phone numbers of all previous people who had bought the same thing. We always gave out the list.

So can you get a list of people who bought one of these things in the past 5 years and find out how well the equity-indexed-annuity (aka fixed annuity)did for them?

Do these people even exist? After years of participating on internet forums, I have not read even once where folks had one of these products and ever got the stated return. Maybe something is guaranteed, but it always seems to be "before fees". After fees, there is nothing left for the client.

[MRG]

Quote:

Originally Posted by LOL! I used to work for a company that sold things. No one would buy any of our things unless we gave out of list of names/addresses/phone numbers of all previous people who had bought the same thing. We always gave out the list. So can you get a list of people who bought one of these things in the past 5 years and find out how well the equity-indexed-annuity (aka fixed annuity)did for them? Do these people even exist? After years of participating on internet forums, I have not read even once where folks had one of these products and ever got the stated return. Maybe something is guaranteed, but it always seems to be "before fees". After fees, there is nothing left for the client.

You don't have to find people. I Google "Allianz 360" all kinds of reviews popped up. None were particularly flattering.

Here's the first one that's not from allianz:
http://blog.runnymede.com/an-imparti...-benefit-rider

Many more just like it........

[Ready]

As MRG stated,

This article does a nice job explaining the problem with the Allianz 360 product:

An impartial review of the Allianz 360 Annuity with 360 Benefit Rider

When calculating the premium earned from the rise in the market, you get 25% of the benefit in the good months, but you get 100% of the downside in the bad months. So when the good and bad months are added up at the end of the year, you are lucky to get anything at all. And after deducting the 1.15% rider fee, you are likely only going to earn 2-3% per year.

Without reading this article, I think I would have had a difficult time discovering this "catch", even if I had read through the entire contract. Of course, I would never invest in anything without pouring over the internet to get feedback on it first.

In any case, it's been a great learning experience for me so far.

[ETFs_Rule]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ready Today was my appointment with my "financial advisor". He came over and spent about an hour with me. He asked me what he may be able to help me with, and we focused on alternatives to CDs and bonds for fixed income solutions. He described two different products: 1) A product with a 4% guaranteed return, and some upside to share in the market gains but with no loss of principal if the market goes down. 2) A product with a 1% annual fee that gives you a 25% premium over the gains on the above product, but again with no loss of principal.

Where do I begin?
This "financial adviser" you are working with is nothing more than a SALESMAN. This is the most EXPENSIVE free advice you will ever get.
Not surprisingly he is urging you to buy insurance products like index annuities. The Ugly Truth about Equity Index Annuities
This salesman is also being highly deceptive about fees. These insurance products have all sorts of hidden fees that he will never talk about. Also he is trying to confuse you into thinking that "income base" is return on investment. Your actual return on investment will wind up being between about 2 and 5%.

Ask this guy about investing in Vanguard index funds and watch his face turn blue.

Quote:

He said rebalancing would likely produce about the same results as the annuities he was describing.

He should be arrested for fraudulent representations. Show him this chart and tell him to shove it. http://www.yourinvestmentadvise.com/images/quiz-3.jpg

2 - 5% expected returns from index annuities moving forward http://www.retirementthinktank.com/w...xed-annuities/

[prudent_one]

Our insurance guy tried to pitch me on converting my IRA to one of their annuities. The 4-page color glossy brochure sounded pretty good. I asked how many pages the actual contract was. He thought it was about 40 or 50. I said then I'm out, there's no way I can understand a 40 page contract and I don't invest in anything I don't fully understand. He started to say something but I politely cut him off and said not a chance, I won't buy anything that needs a 40 page contract, I don't care what it is. I actually think that was an objection he hadn't encountered before.

[MRG]

Ready,

Thanks for starting a great thread and sharing your experience. I'd always wondered how these salespeople convinced others to buy their products. I don't have the patience or tolerance for a dinner or have someone in my home.

Reading how this FA spun a bad product into something that sounds ok was interesting to me too. I too may not have picked up on the bad points by reading the details, too much confusion in the details. Thanks for sharing! I learned a lot.

[Amethyst]

Or what? You'll continue to compare a free-dinner seminar selling a shaky investment product, with being forced to have sex? Are you saying that men and women who are raped, are only raped because they are naive or greedy?

You can legitmiately hate annuities, without comparing their sale to a violent crime. You can legitimately defend the people who fall for sales pitches, without comparing them to lifetime sufferers from rape-related injuries and PTSD.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ETFs_Rule Then let's not blame naive investors for going to a "seminar" hosted by someone who is trying to sell expensive, wealth eroding financial products.

[Bestwifeever]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ready Today was my appointment with my "financial advisor". He came over and spent about an hour with me. He asked me what he may be able to help me with, and we focused on alternatives to CDs and bonds for fixed income solutions. He described two different products: 1) A product with a 4% guaranteed return, and some upside to share in the market gains but with no loss of principal if the market goes down. 2) A product with a 1% annual fee that gives you a 25% premium over the gains on the above product, but again with no loss of principal. I let him know I would like to review the fine print details of the program, and he said he would send me a copy of the contract for the Allianz 360 product for me to review. I didn't find him to be particularly pushy. He could tell that I'm used to reviewing contracts and I understand financial investments fairly well. If he misrepresented anything, I think he figured out pretty quickly that I would figure it out after review the terms of the contract. He said he would be sending me the information in the mail. ...

What will happen next--I imagine he will call you for a follow-up visit or telephone meeting after giving you time to review the contract? You will have to keep us posted on his answers to your questions about the product.

[Tailgate]

Quote:

Originally Posted by audreyh1 I can't imagine spending any time on this stuff at all, especially if you are still working!!!! I have so many better things to do than go out to some dinner presentation (I can afford to take myself out to eat) and then to have them visit my house and sit through a pitch? Arrrrgh!!! I realize not everyone is the same, but I just had to say this. Life is too short for such crap!!!!

+1000

[MichaelB]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Amethyst You can legitmiately hate annuities, without comparing their sale to a violent crime.

I think everyone can agree with that. How about we move past this and focus on the thread topic?

[Ready]

Quote:

Originally Posted by audreyh1 I can't imagine spending any time on this stuff at all, especially if you are still working!!!!

I can appreciate your perspective here. For me, it always bothered me that I don't really understand how these complex annuity products work. I know that everyone "thinks they are bad", and that sales people tend to puff the products, but the engineer part of my brain wants to know exactly how they work, and how the sales people puff the products to make them look better than they are. Going through this exercise is beginning to give me a greater understanding of the pitch versus the reality.

If at the end of this exercise, I can help another person who is getting pitched similar products to understand what they really are, I will feel like I accomplished something through all of this.

And if someone else is thinking about buying an indexed annuity, and happens to find this thread during an internet search, and the information helps them to make a better informed decision whether to purchase, then I think we will all have contributed to something positive here.

[Ready]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bestwifeever What will happen next--I imagine he will call you for a follow-up visit or telephone meeting after giving you time to review the contract? You will have to keep us posted on his answers to your questions about the product.

He promised to send me the ten page contract in the mail and then follow up with me to answer any questions I have. But I have a sneaky suspicion that it just may not ever show up. I suspect he concluded there are easier targets out there, and I am probably just a waste of his time.

[ERD50]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ready ...I know that everyone "thinks they are bad", and that sales people tend to puff the products, but the engineer part of my brain wants to know exactly how they work, ...

I've never done a deep dive into the details either, but the engineer in me says that if someone is going to offer me a product that offloads my risk onto them, I will need to pay for that risk reduction. TNSTAAFL.

And from what I've read from so many sources, these are high fee products (which is why they are pushed by salespeople). The customer pays those fees. And they are complex, and I like transparency.

It's a bit like someone offering to show me a perpetual motion machine. I know it can't work, do I want to spend any time listening to their explanation? Maybe for twisted 'entertainment', but I generally have better things to do.

-ERD50

[Meadbh]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ready I can appreciate your perspective here. For me, it always bothered me that I don't really understand how these complex annuity products work. I know that everyone "thinks they are bad", and that sales people tend to puff the products, but the engineer part of my brain wants to know exactly how they work, and how the sales people puff the products to make them look better than they are. Going through this exercise is beginning to give me a greater understanding of the pitch versus the reality. If at the end of this exercise, I can help another person who is getting pitched similar products to understand what they really are, I will feel like I accomplished something through all of this. And if someone else is thinking about buying an indexed annuity, and happens to find this thread during an internet search, and the information helps them to make a better informed decision whether to purchase, then I think we will all have contributed to something positive here.

If you want to know exactly how annuities work, a corporate finance textbook would be a more objective source. There is even a book on "Annuities for Dummies" which many reviewers have found helpful.

Annuities For Dummies: Kerry Pechter: 9780470178898: Amazon.com: Books

I think forum members are expressing concern because, by seeking information from an annuity salesman, you are making yourself vulnerable to his sales pitch.

[Independent]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ERD50 It's a bit like someone offering to show me a perpetual motion machine. I know it can't work, do I want to spend any time listening to their explanation? Maybe for twisted 'entertainment', but I generally have better things to do.

I find it easy to believe that some people with the time enjoy the challenge of figuring out why it doesn't work.

When I was a math grad student, there was a professor (not math) at that university who was convinced he had found a way to trisect an angle with a compass and straight edge. He insisted that he should have the opportunity to show his method to some of the math people, and the math dept was beginning to get concerned that he was trying to publish stuff with "Professor at ___ University" on it. So they set up a session, and it was fairly well attended. I'm sure most of the people there expected a complex proof with a subtle error that would require some effort to discover. It's like solving a sudoku puzzle or whatever.