Bonus Annuity Plus review

It depends on your time horizon. For a buyer who is certain they will leave the contract alone for 10 full years, the 21% bonus and broad index menu make it a reasonable accumulation vehicle. For anyone who values flexibility, wants lifetime income guarantees, or might need to exit early, the slow vesting schedule and 0.95% annual fee make it a hard product to justify against simpler, lower-cost FIAs.

The rational reason to buy this is the head start. A 21% bonus on a $100,000 premium means $121,000 begins compounding inside the contract on day one, which is a meaningful base for index crediting to build on over a decade. The secondary reason is the crediting flexibility — 17 indexed accounts across the S&P 500, Nasdaq-100, and a Societe Generale index give an allocator plenty of ways to position. For someone who was already going to park long-term money in a principal-protected annuity, the bonus can be a genuine advantage, provided they hold to term.

I think this is best for a buyer in their late 50s to early 70s with money they have firmly earmarked for the long term — retirement dollars they will not need to draw on for at least a decade. It suits both qualified and non-qualified money, and the RMD-friendly design helps if it is inside an IRA. It is a poor fit for anyone who wants guaranteed lifetime income (there is no income rider), who might need liquidity above the free-withdrawal amount, or who is fee-sensitive, since the 0.95% annual charge runs for the entire surrender period whether or not the index cooperates.

Strip away the headline and you are buying a principal-protected annuity with a large but conditional bonus. The 21% is credited to your account value at issue, but it is "non-vested" — it belongs to you on paper while it vests over the 10-year schedule, and if you surrender early you forfeit the portion that has not vested. You are also paying a 0.95% annual Enhanced Benefit Fee that funds the bonus, the free-withdrawal rollover feature, and an early Return of Premium surrender benefit. So the real trade is: a bigger starting balance and a wider crediting menu, in exchange for a decade-long commitment and an ongoing fee. It is not a market investment and it is not a simple no-fee FIA — it is a bonus contract with strings, and the strings are the whole point of reading the fine print.

The core feature is the premium bonus. At issue, Nassau adds 21% of your premium to your account value (15% for issue ages 81-85). That larger balance is what the index-crediting strategies grow from. But two mechanics govern whether you actually keep it. First, vesting: the bonus vests gradually across the 10-year surrender period, so an early exit surrenders the unvested slice. Second, the fee: the 0.95% annual Enhanced Benefit Fee is the price of the bonus, and over 10 years that is roughly 9.5% of account value in cumulative fees — which is why the headline 21% is better read as a net number than a windfall. Index credits themselves floor at 0%, so a bad index year cannot cut your principal from market losses, though the annual fee still applies. On the crediting side, you allocate among 17 indexed accounts plus a fixed account (3.20% as of the January 1, 2026 rate sheet). Most strategies are participation-rate based and uncapped; the one capped exception is the 1-year S&P 500 annual point-to-point account, capped at 6.25% on that same rate sheet. Rates reset and can change over the life of the contract.

The secondary feature is the depth of the crediting menu. Nassau splits its 17 indexed accounts into standard participation-rate accounts and "Enhanced Participation Rate" accounts that carry an extra 1.00% annual strategy fee in exchange for higher participation. That gives an allocator a real decision to make: pay more for a bigger slice of index gains, or keep it simple with the standard accounts. The Sunrise Smart Passage SG accounts add a wrinkle worth understanding — they set the best monthly return in each segment year to 0% before applying the participation rate, which quietly caps the upside on strong months. The flexibility is a genuine strength, but it also means this is not a set-and-forget product; the account you pick materially changes both your cost and your potential return.

This is a 10-year commitment, and the front of the schedule is steep — surrender charges start at 12% and stay there for three years before stepping down to 4% in year 10. On top of that, a market value adjustment (MVA — an adjustment that moves your surrender value up or down with interest rates) applies to withdrawals above the free amount. You get some breathing room: 5% of contract value is available free each year, and unused free-withdrawal percentage rolls over and can accumulate up to 25% if you have taken no prior withdrawals, which rewards leaving it fully alone. RMDs attributable to the contract are not hit with surrender charges, MVA, bonus recovery, or fees (with some year-one restrictions), which helps IRA owners. There are also nursing-home and terminal-illness surrender-charge waivers, but only for issue ages 80 and below, and even then the MVA, unvested-bonus recovery, and pro-rated fees can still apply. The honest read: treat this as money you will not touch, because touching it early is where the bonus and the fee both work against you.

The fee picture here is heavier than a plain FIA. The 0.95% annual Enhanced Benefit Fee is charged every year of the 10-year surrender period and is the mechanism that pays for the bonus — it is not optional. If you also choose Enhanced Participation Rate accounts, you add a 1.00% annual strategy fee on those allocations, deducted at segment end before the index credit is applied, and that fee can eat into account value in a flat or down index year. Stacked together, a buyer in enhanced accounts could be paying close to 2% a year. The trade is straightforward to name: you accept an ongoing fee and a slow-vesting bonus in return for a much larger starting balance and a wider crediting menu. Whether that math beats a lower-cost, no-bonus FIA depends almost entirely on holding the full 10 years — the bonus needs the full vesting runway to outrun the cumulative fee.

Legal Entity: Nassau Life and Annuity Company

Parent: Nassau Financial Group

A.M. Best Rating: B++

Worth naming plainly: Nassau carries a B++ from A.M. Best, which sits below the A-range ratings of most large annuity carriers. That is not a red flag for a principal-protected contract, but for a 10-year commitment it is a factor a careful buyer should weigh alongside the product features.