Attack of the Living Annuity Salesmen?

[chinaco]

Forget what they are trying to sell for a minute. How many insurance agents have you ever talked with and found them to appear sharp.

My expereince has been very very few. Most have little financial knowledge. Every once in a while I meet one that is pretty smart.

Most I have met are not the sharpest knife in the drawer. Not a surprise. It is difficult to sell the stuff.

Annuities are often misrepresented. For that matter so is life insurance.

[chinaco]

When interest rates are down (and thuse CD rates)... banks push annuities (arrangement with Insurance co) as an alternative to CDs.

Right now, there is a huge amount of money flowing into annuities.

Since a deferred fixed annuity is based on longer term investments (and are guaranteed)... the rate is higher than short-term investments.

People get sucked in. It happens when rates are low as sure as the sun shines.

[brewer12345]

Originally Posted by chinaco

Forget what they are trying to sell for a minute. How many insurance agents have you ever talked with and found them to appear sharp.

The garden variety ones, I would agree. The ones that deal with the HNW crowd, I would say otherwise. But their expertise tends to be very specialized (estate planning, etc.).

[donheff]

Originally Posted by brewer12345

Maybe I am just "tetched in the haid," but it seems to me that we are being overrun by greasy pumpers of all flavors of annuities. These guys are all salespeople and it shows: glossing over inconvenient facts, pointing out all the good stuff, trying to take advantage of group approval effects, etc.

I was outa town having fun so I'm a little late but I agree that we are getting some "greasy" pitches. The last guy (that disappeared) was like a drive by shooting - but what the heck did he expect to get from it all. I have a low level continuing interest in SPIAs or DIY versions of the same as a "spending floor assurance vehicle." But I don't like the attitude of these sales critters.

[ERD50]

Originally Posted by donheff

The last guy (that disappeared) was like a drive by shooting - but what the heck did he expect to get from it all.

I get the impression these guys don't invest much time checking out the forum. They see 'retired' and 'forum' and they are thinking 'happy hunting grounds'.

It would be interesting to see what responses they got on some more generic forums. Probably quite a few hits...

-ERD50

[REWahoo]

Originally Posted by ERD50

I get the impression these guys don't invest much time checking out the forum. They see 'retired' and 'forum' and they are thinking 'happy hunting grounds'.

Some (OK, at least one) take the opposite approach. They do enough reading to understand many here don't care for annuities and manage to get in a few shots before they are banned 'beamed up'...