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Annuity Pros and Cons: Should You Trust Who Google Trusts

Stan Haithcock
May 26, 2022
Annuity Pros and Cons: Should You Trust Who Google Trusts

The Annuity Circle of Trust

When you go to Google and type in annuity pros and cons, Google just lists everybody? Who do you trust? Do you trust who Google trusts? Who are those people that show up? How does that all work? And how do you filter to find the right person, et cetera? I'm glad you found me because I shoot it straight. I tell the facts about annuities and no sales pitch, even though I'm the top agent here.

So we're talking about Google. And I was reading this morning before we went to the Stan the Annuity Man Will Do, Not Might Do studios about one of the founders. And they have so much money they're off the grid on some island in the Pacific Ocean. But Google kind of controls things from the standpoint, if you're just searching around, if you're typing in some questions in that Google bar, annuity pros and cons, and boom, all these people show up on the first page. If you don't know how all of that works, it's a very good thing for Google. Google gets paid a lot of money. The companies that show up there have done it a couple of ways, but most have paid a lot of money to be there. So when you type that in, they've paid a lot of money to be on that first page.

I recently just typed in annuity pros and cons to see who showed up, and it was pretty interesting. Most of the companies were consumer companies, like Investopedia and those types of people. And that's fine. They're giving general information about annuities, et cetera. But a lot of it is so general that it doesn't help anything. When looking for annuities, you're looking for specific answers to your specific questions about your specific circumstance. So how do you get there? Should you trust those places? It's not bad to research any topic, especially annuities. But read as much as you can.

The 30,000 Foot View

Unfortunately, I have found that many financial journalists and many of these generic sites give you a 30,000-foot view of annuities. And a lot of it's very uninformed. What sets me apart is that I've been doing financial services for a long time with all the major firms, Dean Witter, Morgan Stanley, Paine Webber, and UBS, before I became the mythical Stan the Annuity Man. But I understand where annuities fit, where they don't fit, how you should use them, what they're designed for, and what they're not designed for.

You're looking for a specific solution for a specific need that you think you need to solve contractually.

And a lot of the information you're getting on these Google pages, I think a lot of it's written by these bots. A lot of these companies, it's automated type stuff. We have the Fun With Annuities podcast that comes out every week. It's me. It's me and my decades of experience understanding how these products work. I'm not saying you trust me. You really shouldn't trust anything but the contract because annuities are contracts. So be very careful out there because, like any sales environment, you will hear what people think you want to hear to get you to buy something. That's not the case with me.

But Google does a good service by providing the information. What I tell you is to go deeper than page one. Go to page two and page three because people like me; I’m not spending money, hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars, to be on that first page. It's more important to me to spend the money on videos, great studios, shooting the videos, my editors, and the people producing my podcast to get real content to make an informed decision on your terms and timeframe.

Now, what we're trying to do with these videos is when you type something in, whether it's index annuity or immediate annuity or inherited annuity, or what does Dave Ramsey say about annuities, or whatever it is you want to type in, we are trying to be proactive and make videos that answer those questions. If you don't see me popping up on a video on the Google search, shoot me an email at [email protected].

What I want you to understand is what is for profit. Some of the people showing up might not have the best intentions. You need to get down in the weeds. You need to see the policy. You need to understand the quotes. You need to know how it will fit and help your situation. You go Investopedia, or maybe an article pops up by Smart Asset or Credit Karma. They’re not experts. They’re not experts. They're not experts.

Pros and Cons

Let's talk about annuities’ pros and cons because that's what I typed in originally to the Google bar. And all this stuff popped up, and I'm thinking, man, that's something we need to address. Annuities are not for stock market growth, in my opinion. No offense to the variable annuity people out there. I just think you can buy mutual funds and do better. Annuities are transfer risk contracts. The pros are you can transfer risks. You can solve for principal protection. You can solve for a lifetime income. You can solve for legacy. You can solve for long-term care or confinement care.

The cons are their contracts, and you have to understand the contracts and every single contract on the planet has benefits and limitations. Every single type of annuity out there has benefits and limitations. And if it sounds too good to be true, it is every single time with the annuity category, regardless of what type of annuity.

You can’t say that I hate all annuities or love all annuities. There are many different types of annuities. There are pros and cons to annuities, and when I typed that into the Google space bar, I didn't get the pros and cons. I got annuity 101 and all this stuff, but that's not what you're looking for. You're looking for a specific solution for a specific need that you think you need to solve contractually. That's where we come in.

Never forget to live in reality, not the dream, with annuities and contractual guarantees! You can use our calculators, get all six of my books for free, and most importantly book a call with me so we can discuss what works best for your specific situation.

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