I do not know if Florida law or regulations prohibit joint ownership of an accumulation annuity. So I don’t know if your “inability” to purchase an annuity with joint ownership was because you overlooked something, or because Florida prohibits it. If you’re interested in pursuing your question, I’d suggest that you ask the agent(s) from whom you purchased the annuities.OK so I now have 4 Annuities set up ~ a 3/4/5/6 year. 3 different companies. So far so good.
But I noticed when signing up, here in FL, I could not open a Joint account / Annuity contract, I had to to be the sole owner, I could only make my wife the Primary Beneficiary.
Questions
1. Did I miss something?
2. If I expire before the contracts mature, can my wife retain the contracts until maturity ... Or will she be forced to cash them out?
- I assume no penalty due to death benefit
- but I assume she'd have to pay taxes on the growth to that point
3. If indeed these contracts cannot be held jointly, would it be better to open a few in her name if she does not need the cash and can hold till maturity?
However, joint ownership has been discussed before in this thread. I strongly suggest that you read this post and the embedded link on this topic, which strongly suggests that joint ownership is not optimal - viewtopic.php?p=7013581#p7013581
To your questions -
—- 1 - Answered above
—- 2 - Yes, I believe that your spouse can step in as owner after your death and that reporting of taxable income would continue to be deferred until she made a withdrawal. If she chose to take the death benefit rather than step in as owner, the vast majority of MYGAs pay out the full accumulated value as a death benefit, and only a few pay out the surrender value as a death benefit. Further, if she chose to take the death benefit, the cumulative earnings on your contract would be reported to her as taxable income. Your contract will give you the definitive answers to these questions.
--- 3 - Answered above
Post back with questions.
Statistics: Posted by Stinky — Sat Jul 06, 2024 4:00 am