Multi-Select 4 review

Yes, with a caveat. As a standalone 4-year MYGA, it's a good annuity — the rate is credited in full for the whole term, there's no base contract fee eating into growth, and the carrier is solidly rated (A.M. Best A). The caveat is that this rating is relative to the broader MYGA market and to this product's own use case. Compared to its siblings in the same Multi-Select family, the 4-year rung isn't the strongest choice unless a 4-year horizon is a hard requirement.

Someone buys Multi-Select 4 because they want a known, locked return for a defined and relatively short period — often to bridge toward a specific need (a home purchase, a required minimum distribution start date, retirement in a few years) rather than to lock up money for a decade. The 4-year term is short enough that it doesn't demand the same commitment as a 7- or 10-year MYGA, while still beating typical CD rates and money-market yields at the time of writing. The lack of a base contract fee means the full stated rate is what actually accrues.

I think this fits a buyer in their late 50s to 70s who wants principal protection and a guaranteed, tax-deferred rate over a shorter horizon — someone who doesn't want a decade-long lockup but also doesn't want the volatility of an indexed or variable product. It works for both qualified (IRA) and non-qualified money, especially for someone approaching an RMD start date who wants the account to mature close to when withdrawals begin. It's a weaker fit for someone with no particular reason to prefer 4 years specifically, since the same carrier's 5- and 6-year versions currently pay more.

You're buying a guaranteed interest rate, not a market-linked product. There's no index, no cap, no participation rate to interpret — Oxford Life credits 5.10% on the full accumulation value every year for 4 years, full stop. The Minimum Guaranteed Surrender Value (MGSV) sets a floor of 1.00% annual growth if you ever surrender early, which is a standard MYGA backstop, not an extra bonus. What you're not buying is upside beyond the stated rate, and you're not buying unrestricted access to your money during the surrender period without a penalty.

The core feature is the fixed crediting rate: 5.10%, guaranteed for the entire 4-year term, with no rate banding by premium size disclosed in the current profile. At the end of the 4 years, a 30-day penalty-free window opens where you can surrender the contract or renew into a new guarantee period at whatever rate Oxford Life is then offering. If you don't make an election during that window, the contract automatically renews for another 4-year term at the then-current renewal rate — this is a structural feature carried over from the 2014 agent guide and there's nothing in the current materials suggesting it has changed. Anyone holding this contract to term should put the renewal decision on a calendar, since a passive auto-renewal locks you into whatever rate is current at that time, which may or may not be competitive.

The optional Guaranteed Lifetime Withdrawal Benefit (GLWB) rider is worth understanding even if you don't plan to elect it at issue, because it's structured differently than most income riders. There's no roll-up or step-up that grows a separate "benefit base" over time. Instead, the lifetime withdrawal percentage itself increases the longer you defer — for a single-life owner issued at age 60, for example, the payout factor rises from roughly 4.16% in the second policy year up toward 18.24% by year 31 and beyond, per the payout tables in the GLWB brochure. It costs 0.50% of account value annually (capped at 3.00%), charged whether or not you ever take a withdrawal, and can't begin paying before age 60 with at least a 1-year wait. Because there's no benefit-base bonus and no roll-up to inflate a headline number, this rider is more honest than some — but it's also a real, ongoing cost that only pays off if you eventually turn income on.

You're trading 4 years of full liquidity for a locked rate. In year 1, only interest can be withdrawn penalty-free; starting in year 2, up to 10% of account value per year is available without a surrender charge (with up to two withdrawals per year allowed, per the agent guide). Anything beyond that triggers the declining surrender charge schedule below, and because a market value adjustment (MVA) applies, the penalty on larger withdrawals can move up or down with prevailing interest rates rather than being a flat percentage. Built-in waivers for nursing home confinement, terminal illness, and home health care can eliminate surrender charges entirely if the qualifying event is first diagnosed more than a year after the policy date, though these aren't available in every state and typically require 90 days of confinement or care to qualify. RMD amounts that exceed the standard free-withdrawal allowance are also protected from the MVA, which matters for retirees using this contract as part of a required-distribution strategy.

There's no annual contract fee, mortality and expense charge, or administrative fee on the base contract — the policyholder earns interest on 100% of the accumulation value, which is a genuine positive relative to products that layer a base fee on top of rider costs. The only fee in play is the optional GLWB's 0.50% current annual charge (maximum 3.00%), and it only applies if you elect the rider. The real tradeoff isn't a fee — it's opportunity cost. At 5.10%, the 4-year rate lags the same carrier's 5-year (5.20%) and 6-year (5.55%, the peak of the whole Multi-Select ladder) versions by 10 and 45 basis points respectively as of the current profile. For a buyer who doesn't have a hard reason to need money back in exactly 4 years, that's a real cost of choosing the shorter term.

Legal Entity: Oxford Life Insurance Company

A.M. Best Rating: A