Sell All or Part: Secondary Market Annuities
Secondary market annuities have been around for 15 years, allowing investors who need or want to sell annuities to do so. In “Don’t want that annuity anymore? You can sell it,” Vanessa Richardson of Bankrate discusses this market. J.G. Wentworth estimates that there are $50 to $100 billion of annuities annually that can be sold in the secondary market. They say that the past two years have really seen an increase in investor interest in these annuities. They get much more control over their annuities with the ability to sell them for a lump sum of cash or payments over time.
Annuities are usually used for retirement income purposes, with over $200 billion sold each year. In the secondary market, annuities are packaged together and sold to large institutional investors most often. Investors who want to sell their deferred or immediate annuities do so for many reasons. They may have inherited an annuity that wasn’t what they desire in investment terms, changed their investment or tax goals, had a financial emergency, or realized they are not happy with their annuity. The secondary market is also good for people who don’t want to sell all of their annuity because you can sell part of it and keep the remaining payments.
