Annuities Are Not Bought, They're Sold (Forbes)

Consumers aren’t exactly crawling over each other to buy annuities, but these products still seem to thrive. If demand is not the explanation, then perhaps desire to sell them is. Brokers and selling agents stand to collect a sizable commission in return for each annuity sale. Two quotes taken directly from a firm’s sales manual illustrates how sales-focused annuity sales folk can be: “The first step in the process is to get people to accept the idea of an indexed annuity without really knowing. The quality of the close is dependent upon the fact that the client doesn’t know where you are taking them until the very end.” “The objective is to take away the surrender period argument against annuities. Hammer them on that and repeat it…”