Reliance Standard Secure Growth & Income Annuity – Stability with Income Potential

The Secure Growth & Income Annuity from Reliance Standard and a standard multi-year guaranteed annuity (MYGA) share the same foundational mechanics — declared fixed rate, full principal protection, tax deferral — but they differ primarily in their optional income infrastructure. A plain MYGA is typically accumulation-only: the declared rate grows the account value for the contract term, and at maturity the owner decides what to do with the proceeds — reinvest, withdraw, or convert to income through a separate transaction. The Secure Growth & Income Annuity is designed with the income conversion function integrated: the optional income rider can be added at purchase, allowing the accumulation phase to be followed immediately by a structured lifetime withdrawal phase without requiring a separate product purchase or annuitization decision at maturity. The comparison between the two structures is most relevant for buyers who are evaluating how to position the conservative accumulation sleeve of their retirement plan alongside a future income need. If income is 8 to 10 or more years away and the primary objective is purely to maximize the guaranteed declared rate for that period, a simple MYGA comparison against the Secure Growth & Income Annuity’s declared rate — at equivalent term lengths — determines which produces the better accumulation. If the income rider is part of the plan from the outset, the integrated design of the Secure Growth & Income Annuity may produce a more seamless outcome than a MYGA that requires repositioning at maturity. Understanding how annuities pay income for life — specifically the mechanics of guaranteed lifetime withdrawal benefits and how the income base calculation differs from annuitization — helps clarify which structure is better suited for the specific income conversion objective. For buyers who want to maintain maximum flexibility around the income decision at the 5 or 7-year maturity point, a laddering approach may preserve the option to evaluate the full income marketplace at each maturity rather than committing to one carrier’s income rider at the time of initial purchase.

AM Best’s A++ (Superior) is the highest rating category in the AM Best scale — above A+ (Superior, second-highest) and A (Excellent, third and fourth tier). Reliance Standard has maintained A++ continuously since 2021, when AM Best upgraded from A+ following improvements in balance sheet strength and enterprise risk management. As of November 2025, the A++ rating has been reaffirmed for the fifth consecutive year. In practical terms for a fixed annuity buyer: the guaranteed declared rate, the income rider obligations, and the contractual protections in the Secure Growth & Income Annuity are all backed by a carrier that has earned the highest independent financial strength assessment available in the insurance rating system. For a product that may hold retirement assets for 5, 7, or 10 or more years — and whose income rider may pay benefits for 20 or 30 years beyond the initial deposit date — carrier financial strength at the A++ level provides a meaningful margin of confidence. The vast majority of the fixed annuity marketplace operates at A-, A, or A+ levels; A++ carriers in the fixed annuity market are genuinely uncommon. Reliance Standard’s membership in the Tokio Marine Group — one of the world’s largest insurance organizations — provides the capital backing and corporate governance structure that supports the A++ designation. For buyers evaluating whether the Secure Growth & Income Annuity’s declared rate is competitive relative to lower-rated carriers that may offer slightly higher rates, the decision involves an explicit trade-off between rate and carrier financial strength — a trade-off that the A++ designation makes unusually favorable for the conservative buyer who is unwilling to accept carrier risk in exchange for marginal rate improvement. Understanding how to protect retirement funds as part of a complete portfolio provides the broader context for evaluating where annuity carrier strength fits within the full risk management picture.

Yes — a 1035 exchange from an existing annuity contract into the Reliance Standard Secure Growth & Income Annuity preserves the tax-deferred status of any accumulated gain in the prior contract without triggering current taxable income recognition. The exchange is a direct carrier-to-carrier transfer in which the accumulated value and cost basis move to the new contract without a taxable distribution event. For buyers who hold older fixed annuities that have rolled to low renewal rates — common for contracts originally issued when rates were at multi-year lows and that have since declined from initial declared rates to minimum renewal rates — repositioning into a competitive new declared rate via 1035 exchange can meaningfully improve the accumulation trajectory over the next contract term. The analysis before executing any 1035 exchange requires comparing the projected maturity value of the Reliance Standard contract against what the existing contract is likely to produce over an equivalent period, accounting for any remaining surrender charges on the existing contract. Our resource on the annuity rescue plan evaluation process covers how to conduct this analysis honestly — including the scenarios where staying in the existing contract is the better decision. The cost of surrender charges on the prior contract must be recovered within the improved declared rate’s additional accumulation over the new contract period before the exchange produces a net positive outcome. A fixed annuity ladder approach — using the 1035 exchange to reposition only a portion of an underperforming contract while keeping the rest until its surrender period ends — can sometimes produce better net results than a full repositioning that maximizes surrender charge impact. Understanding the fixed annuity ladder strategy in this context shows how staggered repositioning can minimize surrender charge drag while progressively improving the overall declared rate of the conservative allocation.

Many conservative savers who are otherwise well-suited for a fixed annuity approach the product category with skepticism shaped by past negative experiences or common misconceptions about the industry. The most common concerns — lack of liquidity, complexity, uncertainty about what happens at death, and whether the carrier can actually honor its promises — are all directly addressable through contract review rather than category avoidance. The Secure Growth & Income Annuity addresses the liquidity concern through the standard 10% annual free withdrawal provision that provides ongoing access to a meaningful portion of the account value without surrender charges after year one. The complexity concern is addressed by the product’s fundamental simplicity — it is a declared-rate fixed annuity, not an index-linked product with crediting formulas and participation rates, making it among the most straightforward annuity structures available. The carrier concern is addressed by Reliance Standard’s A++ AM Best rating — the highest available designation — which provides the strongest independent third-party validation of financial strength of any carrier in the annuity marketplace. The death benefit concern is addressed by the contract’s beneficiary designation provisions, which pass any remaining account value directly to named heirs outside of probate. The comprehensive question of whether annuities are worth it in a specific situation depends on the buyer’s income needs, liquidity requirements, timeline, and tax situation — but for conservative savers who can clearly articulate a need for guaranteed declared-rate growth, principal protection, tax deferral, and optional lifetime income, the Secure Growth & Income Annuity addresses all four simultaneously in a structure backed by the highest-rated carrier in the marketplace. Reviewing the full picture of annuities designed for conservative investors helps frame the specific product within the broader category so the evaluation is grounded in realistic expectations rather than either excessive enthusiasm or unfounded skepticism.

The tax deferral inside a non-qualified fixed annuity like the Secure Growth & Income Annuity adds two distinct planning dimensions that a CD or taxable bond earning the same nominal rate cannot replicate. The first is accumulation efficiency: the full declared rate compounds each year without a tax payment reducing the compounding base. For an investor in the 32% federal bracket, a 5% declared rate inside the annuity compounds at the full 5% annually, while a 5% CD generates approximately 3.4% in net after-tax compounding — and that 3.4% compounds forward rather than the gross 5%. Over a 7-year period, this compounding differential produces a meaningfully larger accumulation balance inside the annuity versus the taxable CD at the same nominal rate. The second dimension is income timing control: unlike a CD or bond that generates a 1099 each year regardless of whether income is needed, the annuity’s gain recognition is deferred entirely until withdrawal — allowing the investor to control when ordinary income is recognized, in what tax year, and at what tax rate. For retirees managing taxable income around Social Security taxation thresholds, Medicare premium surcharge thresholds (IRMAA), or Roth conversion windows, the ability to choose when annuity gains are taken as income — rather than having them force-recognized annually — provides meaningful tax planning flexibility that taxable savings vehicles cannot offer. Understanding how annuity distributions are taxed — the exclusion ratio for non-qualified contracts, the LIFO treatment for partial withdrawals, and the ordinary income character of all gains — ensures the tax planning advantage is correctly modeled rather than overestimated. For qualified IRA-funded contracts, the marginal tax deferral advantage disappears since the IRA already defers, but the principal protection, declared rate certainty, and optional income rider functions still apply regardless of funding source.