Based on your financial expertise, provide your response or viewpoint on the given financial question or topic. The response format is open.

Payment default penalties on annuities
I don't know how annuities work it's all smoke and mirrors to me. This is a huge red flag to me. I would ask the agent what the penalty is to cancel this contract, and see ho much you can get back. If done right, you should be able to transfer these funds to an IRA or other pretax account.  To be clear, I'd make a similar remark if you said your were in a S&P ETF or any investment you don't understand. "Appropriate investment" means little if the investor has no understanding of what they are buying.  Update in repose to comments -