Wealth2k

In developing The Income for Life Model v.2.0, it was Wealth2k’s goal to address six areas that we believe are essential components of a competitively-advantaged solution for retirement income distribution:

1. A time-tested financial model (time-segmented, “laddered” asset allocation)
2. The inclusion of advisor-centric communication technology that educates investors in a confidence-building manner
3. An illustration engine that allows for the flexible design of suitable income-generation frameworks using strategic product combination
4. The capacity for compliance officers to manage the entire program in real-time across complex distribution networks
5. An online process to determine an investor’s true need for guaranteed versus non-guaranteed retirement income
6. A “cross -religion” illustration framework that blends guaranteed outcome elements with time-segmented asset allocation

The technology underlying The Income for Life Model makes it possible for each of these dimensions to be successfully addressed. Click here to view a prerecorded presentation in which Wealth2k Founder, David Macchia, explains each in detail.

Financial Model

Time-segmented asset allocation is the investing core of The Income for Life Model®. This provides a balanced combination of safe and risky assets combined with period certain guaranteed income. [top]

Communications

The compliant communications tools backing The Income for Life Model® are proven effective in helping financial advisors educate investors. Experience shows that they make a difference in the advisor's ability to attract and retain clients. They also provide a helpful context for the selection of diverse financial products.

Financial advisors ability to project their retirement income businesses to greater numbers of prospects is greatly enhanced by the technology Wealth2k provides. Notable among the communications tools advisors find most valuable are personalized micro sites that stream The Income for Life Model movie to prospects and clients. Many advisors have secured new clients because of the micro site technology and multimedia presentation.

For advisors who prefer seminar marketing, The Income for Life Model provides a compliant seminar module including invitations, pre-approach letters, fact-finder and follow-up letters. In addition, a host of brochures rounds out the collection of marketing tools. [top]

Illustrations

Illustrations for The Income for Life Model® are provided by web-based modeling software that incorporates a new level flexibility in the design of laddered income strategies. The illustration software can model lifetime guaranteed income sources within the larger laddered strategy framework.

Compliance Management

No competing retirement income solution offers the depth of technology innovation and transparent, real-time management that The Income for Life Model makes available to broker-dealers. The key to this management capacity is Wealth2k's proprietary Traject™ communications network. Built to recognize the complexities of financial services compliance and distribution, Traject enables The Income for Life Model® to be confidently distributed across large networks of distributors. [top]

Retirement Income Risk Assessment

Assessing an investor’s risk tolerance is a standard component of investing strategy for accumulation.  But when it comes to retirement income, an investor’s tolerance for retirement income risk is seldom assessed in a formal manner.

The Income for Life Model provides a solid answer for retirement income risk assessment through a component called TNT-Time, Need, Tolerance™.  A 15-question online profiling process, TNT gets at an investor’s emotional capacity to tolerate investment volatility and losses in terms of how retirement income might be impacted.

The “TNT” profiling process creates both a “Guarantee Factor” and a Volatility Factor” for each investor. These factors help financial advisors assess, within ranges, the percentage of retirement assets that should be committed to guaranteed income vehicles (lifetime annuity or variable annuity with GMWB), versus how much money should be committed to long-term risky investing. The process also helps advisors determine the rates-of-return model which is most suitable for a given investor.
One of the significant benefits that emerges from the “TNT” profiling process is the creation of vital context for the selection of a guaranteed income vehicle such as a variable annuity for an income rider. In this way, the variable annuity is repositioned away from being the “solution” for retirement income in favor of becoming a vital component of a larger, more strategic solution for income-generation.[top]

"Cross Religion" Framework

The Income for Life Model illustration system allows advisors to create proposals that include guaranteed outcome elements alongside the time-segmented, “laddered” strategy. The system will produce output showing the appropriate dollar amount invested in, say, a variable annuity, thus creating proposal output in harmony with the results of the “TNT” profiling process.

The proposal output makes it easier for investors to understand what’s guaranteed in terms of retirement income and what’s not. It also allows them to see how the resulting retirement income plan has been designed with their individual needs in mind.[top]