We engineer the plan that outlives you. Most agents just sell a policy.

Strip the jargon and it's one thing: a permanent life insurance policy with a savings account bolted to it, where the savings account grows based on a stock index without being invested in the market.

You pay a premium. Part covers the insurance. The rest goes into cash value. That cash value gets credited interest based on how an index — usually the S&P 500 — performed that year. Your money is never actually in the market. The carrier just uses the index as a measuring stick.

That distinction is the whole product. It's why a market crash doesn't cut your credited interest below the floor — though policy charges still apply — and it's why you don't get the full gain in a boom.

Two numbers define your crediting, and they're set by the carrier, not by you.

That's the deal: you trade the big up years for never having a down year. Nobody's giving you anything — you're buying protection with upside.

This is the part illustrations bury on page 14. Every dollar splits three ways:

In year one, slice 3 is small. That's not a scam — it's how the product works. Charges front-load, then flatten while cash value compounds. It's why an IUL funded for three years and abandoned is a bad deal, and why one funded for twenty-five is a different animal entirely.

You don't withdraw it. You borrow against it.

The cash value stays in the policy and keeps getting credited. The carrier lends you money using that cash value as collateral. Because a properly structured policy loan generally isn't taxable income, there's typically no 1099 while the policy stays in force. When you die, the outstanding loan is deducted from the death benefit and the rest goes to your family income-tax-free.

That's the mechanism behind every "tax-free retirement income" pitch you've heard. It's real. It's also the part that goes wrong most often.

If you're on the right-hand list, Connor will tell you. An IUL sold to someone who can't fund it lapses, and a lapsed policy is worse than no policy at all — you paid for years and walked away with pennies.

• The guaranteed column. Every illustration has one. It shows the policy assuming the carrier does the worst it's legally allowed. If that column collapses, the design is fragile.
• The guaranteed minimum cap — not the current cap. The current one can move.
• The funding schedule in writing. What you owe, for how many years, and what happens if you skip one.
• A MEC test showing your premium stays under the limit.
• Illustrations at two rates. If it only works at 7%, it doesn't work. Ask to see it at 5%.
• Who reviews it, and when. A loan-funded policy needs eyes on it every year. Ask who's doing that in year twelve.

None of the above tells you what your policy would do. That takes your age, your health, your income, your timeline — and a real carrier illustration, not a slider.

Fifteen minutes with Connor: he'll run it across 20+ carriers, show you the guaranteed column alongside the projected one, and tell you honestly whether this is your move or whether you'd be better off somewhere else.