This is the story of Dave. Who’s Dave, you ask? Dave is an imaginary person, completely made up. But some (or all) of his story might sound familiar to you.
Dave graduated from a good state college with a pretty good degree and a decent enough GPA, but he had to take out a lot of loans to get it done. His total college career cost him almost $40,000. And even with loans, he had to work during the majority of college. But he kept his nose to the grindstone, studied his ears off, and got that piece of paper that said he was ready to head out into the real world and find his fortune.
Trouble was, Dave’s fortune was a little harder to find than he’d been led to believe it would be. He knew there would be lean times and financial challenges, but he wasn’t quite prepared for the way that financial security always seemed to be just out of reach.
So Dave got a few part-time jobs while he continued to apply for careers in his field. The part-time jobs didn’t pay very well, but at least he had an income, and Dave could mostly keep up with his bills — that is, until his student loan deferment ran out, and the first loan payment came due.
Dave did what many Americans do: he got a few credit cards, and used them to buy groceries and pay what bills he could. But after several months of this, Dave realized he owed over $4,000 to his various credit card companies (just a little over the national average, in fact), which was only making his situation worse. He made the minimum payments on his cards, but the balances never seemed to come down. He began researching ways to reduce debt, but none of them seemed to work for him. Dave began to fall behind on his bills.
Then something extraordinary happened. On his way home from a double shift, Dave found a discarded lottery ticket on the sidewalk, and on a whim he decided to check the numbers. Dave had won $3,000,000. He thought his problems were solved.
Dave declined a lump-sum payment of cash for annuity payments, starting with a payment of $45,000 and increasing by 5% every year. Dave used that initial money to pay off his debt, put a down payment on a new car, update his wardrobe, and ultimately drop one of his part-time jobs. For a few months, Dave was comfortable, and he stopped watching every penny so carefully.
Eventually, though, Dave realized that he was still living outside his means. But now he was also stuck waiting for his next annuity payment, stretching his money every bit as tightly as he had before the lottery win, and once again racking up charges on his credit cards.
What was Dave to do?
Luckily for Dave (and for all of us struggling to keep our heads above water), he found a way to get his money on his terms, through a “cash for annuity settlement” program. “Cash for annuity” means you sell your annuity payments to a third party in order to receive the bulk of your money.
Now Dave has the money he had coming to him, the money he needs to take care of of his monthly expenses while also putting something away every month for investments and savings. Dave’s doing fine, and his future is bright.
Is a Dave a real person? Absolutely not. But a story doesn’t have to be real to express some real truths. If you find yourself in Dave’s shoes, whether through a lottery win, a lawsuit settlement, or any other situation that leads to an annuity payment, just remember Dave, remember “cash for annuity”, and remember that you’ve got options.
