7 New Facts About What Your Colleagues Are Really Like

Many life agents can sell securities. And many say they're still recommending long-term care insurance.

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Typical life and health agents who belong to the National Association of Insurance and Financial Advisors have told NAIFA that, in their world, sales commissions are still the dominant form of compensation.

About 83% of the NAIFA members who answered a NAIFA survey question about compensation said that sales commissions are their primary form of compensation.

Roughly 40% said they are collecting fees based on assets under management, and about 10% said they are earning a salary. But, in spite of all of the media reports about financial professionals moving away from commission-based compensation models, only about 30% said they have seen any shift toward fee-based compensation over the past five years.

(Related: New York Best Interest Standard Violates Law: NAIFA-NY)

NAIFA has reported those figures in a summary of survey responses from 694 NAIFA members.

About 650 of the survey participants answered the questions related to compensation.

Here are seven other facts about the NAIFA member survey results:

  1. All of the survey participants said were licensed to sell insurance products.
  2. 64% of the participants said they were licensed to sell securities.
  3. 42% of the participants said their typical client has less than $100,000 in liquid assets.
  4. They do sell life insurance: About 95% have recommend term life insurance in the past 12 months, 80% have recommended whole life, and 71% have recommended universal life.
  5. They aren’t as interested in health insurance: 25% have recommended group health insurance, 31% have recommended individual health insurance, and 45% have recommended Medicare supplement insurance.
  6. They still have a high level of interest in disability insurance and long-term care insurance (LTCI): 68% have recommended disability insurance in the past 12 months, and 70% have recommended LTCI.
  7. They may be a little less interested in selling annuities than in selling LTCI: Only 63% of the survey participants said they have recommended fixed annuities in the past 12 months.

— Read NAIFA Puts Tom Michel on Track to Top, on ThinkAdvisor.

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