Product Description
Use annuities to build your own pension Will annuities work for you? Get the nitty-gritty on these financial tools Are you a baby boomer who’s about to retire? Are you concerned about your financial future? Relax. This plain-English guide will walk you through the ins and outs of using annuities to fund your retirement years. Find out what annuities are, whether they’re the right financial vehicle for you, and which of the many options might have your … More >>
5 responses to Annuities For Dummies
Annuities For Dummies by Kerry Pechter is a very readable guide to annuities that makes sense of a very complicated insurance product (and what insurance products are NOT complicated?) Pechter guides the reader through a brief history of annuities to a broad view of how they work, and on to specific facts about the various kinds of annuities available. The only slight criticism is that his presentation is a bit overly favorable toward annuities, bolstered by selective statistical examples, like the one on p. 21. Hypothetical retiree “Smith” was over-invested in bonds and cash, which do not provide protection against inflation. That is partly why hypothetical retiree “Jones” with his annuity and stocks did better. Was it the annuity or the stocks that made the difference? The logic behind the example is undoubtedly that without an annuity, Smith would want very secure investments, hence, bonds and cash. All in all, the book will help any reader make better choices regarding annuities. And it’s a fun read!
Rating: 4 / 5
“Annuities For Dummies”, by Kerry Pechter, is a wonderful book! Annuities can be wickedly complicated (and are often far more complicated than they ought to be), but Pechter’s explanation is uniformly clear and understandable. That, alone, would make his book unusually valuable. But it’s also accurate and fair, which makes it darned near unique among writings about insurance products by financial journalists.
I’m an annuity expert (co-author of “The Annuity Advisor” and author of numerous articles, in various journals, about annuities), and I found this book informative. (I wish I’d made certain points as clearly as Kerry does). I’ve recommended it to insurance agents and consumers and will continue to do so.
- John L. Olsen, CLU, ChFC, AEP
Rating: 5 / 5
This book is a no nonsense break through on understanding the mind boggling world of annuities of all kinds. The book is timely since this topic is now going to be of high interest given aging baby boomers. The book is well organized and an easy read. There is an unfortunate typo problem on the critical titling rules chart that left me searching elsewhere for the necessary answers. I recommend this chart be fixed before the book is republished.
Rating: 4 / 5
I recently purchased Annuities for Dummies and absolutely couldn’t put it down. This book tells you everything you need to know regarding annuities. No need to rely on an insurance salesman telling you what you need and charging you a fortune (high fees)for the advice. I was surprised in the later chapters of the book at some of the detailed investment/income strategies involving annuities. His discussion of immediate annuity strategies was particularly useful to me.
Rating: 5 / 5
This is a very informative, easy to understand, resource on annuities. Who wants to spend their free time reading about financial instruments?? But, in today’s economy you need to know the details from an impartial source and this helped me to understand the basics. If you want to learn the basics on your own time and not in a sales brochure, this one is worth buying.
Rating: 5 / 5
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