If you’ve been in this business long enough, you already know this: taxes are not going down long term. Clients know it. They feel it. They may not articulate it perfectly, but they sense it.

That’s why Roth conversion conversations are no longer “advanced planning.” They’re becoming mainstream retirement planning topics.

Several of our key carriers now give us the ability to take a single premium of qualified funds and systematically convert those dollars internally into a Roth IRA over time. And this is where it gets powerful. And clients can tailor the conversion schedule.

Five years.
Ten years.
Or somewhere in between.

Instead of taking a massive lump sum distribution and getting crushed by taxes in one calendar year, they can stretch the tax burden out. Each year, they simply pay tax on the portion that was converted that year.

And the real beauty of this — what several carriers call the “mirrored contract concept.”

With this concept you have:

Contract A – The qualified account.
Contract B – The mirrored Roth account.

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The single premium goes into Contract A. Each time a distribution is made for conversion purposes, the funds move into Contract B — and that mirrored contract carries the same values, surrender schedule, and crediting strategies/rates.

Same chassis. Same structure. Just different tax status.

At the end of the five- or ten-year window — however the client designs it — the entire contract has transitioned from qualified to Roth. Now you’ve got tax-free growth potential and tax-free distributions down the road, without having taken the hit all at once.

We are actively working on client-facing marketing pieces to help you articulate this clearly. Because once a client understands the mirrored concept visually, the light bulb goes on. It stops feeling like a tax event and starts feeling like a controlled migration from taxable to tax-free. Look out for these pieces in the coming weeks.

Medicare considerations are important to note …

Large Roth conversions can impact a client’s Modified Adjusted Gross Income (MAGI), which can trigger higher Medicare Part B and Part D premiums due to IRMAA adjustments. That doesn’t mean “don’t do it.” It means planning it properly. Stretch it out intelligently. Coordinate it with income levels. Be strategic about timing and partner with a CPA on complex cases.

Additionally, annuity business right now is coming in at a record pace. And we are fortunate to have carriers offering premium bonuses north of 20% on 10-year surrender periods. We’ve got carriers locking S&P 500 annual point-to-point caps for the entire surrender charge period.

If you’re like me, you’ve had that call before:

“Joe, the market was up. My friends made money. Why didn’t my annuity credit anything?”

And you’re re-explaining caps, spreads, participation rates, volatility control strategies — and sometimes the client just hears, “It didn’t credit any interest this year.”

We can’t control how the S&P 500 performs. But with guaranteed cap structures locked for the entire surrender period, we can control the predictability of the cap rates. No renewal rate surprises.

And let me just say this plainly — I’m grateful. Grateful for the agents writing business with the Ohlson Group. Grateful to those participating in our lead program. Grateful to those working the Elevate workshops and actively writing business.

Agents who are working marketing plans — whether through leads, workshops, or refinancing outdated annuities — are seeing real momentum. This quarter is shaping up to be one of the strongest we’ve had. The old saying “app-tivity leads to activity” holds true.

And as we continue to layer in strategic conversations like Roth conversions — especially using tools like mirrored contracts — you jump from “annuity salesperson” to “retirement income expert.”

This May will mark my 20th year working with the Ohlson Group, and to say that time has flown by would be an understatement. Having had the privilege of working alongside my father — Ohlson Group founder Ray Ohlson — for so many years was more than special. It was a blessing.

After graduating from Ball State University, I had several ideas about what I wanted to pursue professionally. My main area of study was journalism. I love writing, and that love still lives within me today. That’s one of the reasons I enjoy writing these commentaries. I always aim to provide a positive message — and at least one nugget of value that might help you in your insurance career.

In May of 2006, I officially began my career with the Ohlson Group. I was young!
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But I wasn’t completely new to the business. The Ohlson Group opened its doors in 2003, and during my college years, I spent my summers interning in the office. My brother Nick — a few years older than me — was already working with my dad and Nick’s mentorship helped me gain confidence in my abilities. Those early summers gave me a clear-eyed view to what it meant to build something from the ground up: relationships with agents, partnerships with carriers, and a company centered around service.

Still, I looked young. Very young.

I may be one of the few people who was genuinely happy to see a few gray hairs show up in my mid-to-late twenties! At the time, I needed them. Some agents didn’t quite know what to make of me. Experience, I quickly learned, isn’t something you claim — it’s something you earn.

Twenty years later, I can say without hesitation that working alongside independent agents across the country has been one of the great blessings of my life. This business has never been about transactions to me. It has always been about relationships.

What you do in the field matters more than you may realize. What you sell is not a widget or a commodity. You are helping families complete dreams — protecting generations with tax-free life insurance benefits, preserving dignity through long-term care planning, and creating guaranteed income streams that function like personal pension plans.

You guide clients through Roth conversions that may significantly reduce future tax burdens. You help eliminate debt. And at our bread and butter, you safeguard assets in strategies that provide growth potential without market downside risk.

That is meaningful work.

Although we are still a couple of months away from my official 20-year anniversary, I’ll admit that I am getting a head start on the celebration. The reason is simple: 2026 has begun with tremendous momentum. We are seeing a record influx of business week after week.

If I sound like a broken record when I say that we can help you grow, it’s because after two decades in this business, I know growth is not accidental — it is pre-planned. We can build a clear marketing plan for you.
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We can review last year’s income and map out what it will take to reach your goals this year. We can talk realistically about budget, determine how many workshops per month you may need to run, and identify how many lead campaigns can support your production targets. We can even backfill the math and approximate what level of marketing may be required to reach the income you want.

​It continues to be a fast-paced year at the Ohlson Group. We’re seeing record numbers of new agent contracts coming in. The phones are ringing. The cases are coming across my desk. A lot of solid, regular-sized annuity cases — and yes, quite a few larger ones too. The money is out there. 

And it’s not hard to understand why.

We just had a losing week in the S&P 500. Geopolitical tensions are simmering. Domestic politics are noisy. Commodities are all over the place. AI disruption fears are real for a lot of industries. Consumer prices rose 2.4% in January — lower than expected, which is good news — but there’s still a sense of uncertainty in the air. Even with the Dow hitting record highs in recent weeks, everyday Americans aren’t feeling “calm.” They’re feeling cautious. And when people feel cautious, they look for safety.

That’s where we come in. We have fixed index annuities offering premium bonuses up to 23% on 10-year index products. We have MYGA rates that are higher than CDs and sitting near record highs for our industry. There is real value on the table right now for clients who want protection, predictability, and peace of mind.

And we’re not lacking opportunity. Our marketing systems are working for agents who work them. Whether it’s our Ohlson Group annuity lead program that we’ve been running successfully for years, or the Elevate no-dinner seminar program, we are not in any kind of shortage of prospecting tools. We have ways — proven ways — to get our agents in front of qualified annuity prospects.

Middle America — the family with $200,000 to $500,000 in savings — is often overlooked. They’re not big enough for the high-end brokerage firms to chase aggressively. But that money represents a lifetime of work. It needs to be protected. It needs to be handled with care. Those are our clients, and they are looking for a hand-up and that is where you become the hero.

To our agents that are writing business, thank you! To the agents who are reading this and have been looking at The Ohlson Group for a while - give us a call or schedule a meeting. We are well positioned  to get you to the next level in your practice - whatever that looks like.