Personal Choice Annuity 10 review

Depends heavily on what you value. If you have $2,500 to $500,000 of money you genuinely will not touch for 10 years, don't need interim withdrawals, and are comfortable with a B++ carrier and a modest death-benefit structure, the rate makes this competitive. If you want any real-world flexibility built in — the ability to take a withdrawal without planning ahead, or a guarantee that your heirs get full account value if you pass away in year three — you'll end up paying for it through rate reductions that erode the headline number.

The rate is the draw. At 6.25% guaranteed for the entire 10-year term, Personal Choice Annuity 10 sits near the top of the current MYGA market, and the $2,500 minimum premium opens that rate to buyers who don't have the $25,000-$100,000 many MYGA issuers require. For someone who has already decided on a full 10-year commitment and doesn't expect to need access to the money, locking in a strong rate without a large upfront check is a real advantage.

A buyer in their 50s through mid-70s (issue ages technically run 0-90, but the practical buyer is a retirement-focused adult) with non-qualified or IRA dollars they can commit for the full decade, no anticipated need for withdrawals, and who is comfortable holding a B++-rated carrier rather than insisting on A- or better. It's a poor fit for anyone who might need even modest access to their money in the next several years, or who wants their beneficiaries to receive full account value without conditions.

You're buying a 10-year interest-rate lock from an insurance company, not a bank CD, though the two get compared often. Sentinel Security credits 6.25% for the full term (with a 1.0% minimum guaranteed floor after any future reset), and in exchange you give up access to that money — the base contract has no free-withdrawal provision at all, and if you surrender early you'll pay a surrender charge (starting at 9% and declining to 5% by year five, but then holding flat at 5% through year ten) plus a market value adjustment. The "optional rider" structure is the part that catches people off guard: features you'd expect to be included standard on a modern MYGA — a basic annual withdrawal allowance, a full-value death benefit, an RMD waiver — are all separate add-ons here, each priced as a reduction to your credited rate rather than a flat dollar fee.

The core feature is simple: a single fixed-rate account crediting 6.25% (as of the brochure's 3/23/2026 rate date) for the entire 10-year guarantee period, with a 1.0% minimum guaranteed rate as a floor. There's no indexed or variable component — this is a straightforward interest-rate contract, the only crediting strategy offered. What's less simple is that the rate you actually receive depends on which optional riders you elect at issue, since each one is priced as a rate reduction rather than a separate fee: adding free withdrawal access costs 0.08%, an RMD waiver costs 0.16%, a terminal illness/nursing home waiver costs 0.15%, and a full-value death benefit costs 0.35%. Stack a few of these together and the effective rate drops meaningfully below the advertised 6.25%.

The optional Death Benefit Feature rider is the one worth understanding closely. In the base contract, what your beneficiaries receive at death is the Cash Surrender Value — meaning if you die during the surrender-charge period, the payout can be reduced by the same surrender charge and MVA that would apply if you'd surrendered the contract yourself. That's a meaningfully weaker standard than most MYGAs, which typically waive surrender charges at death by default. Electing the rider (a 0.35% rate reduction) converts the death benefit to full contract value with surrender charges and MVA waived. Sentinel Security makes this rider mandatory for issue ages 86-90, which signals that the carrier itself treats it as a necessary protection for older buyers rather than a nice-to-have.

This is where Personal Choice Annuity 10 differs most from typical MYGA structure. The base contract includes no penalty-free withdrawal provision whatsoever — none of the standard annual allowance that's common across the category. To get any free access, you have to elect the optional Preferred 10% Free Withdrawal rider (0.08% rate reduction) at the start of a guarantee period, which then permits one withdrawal per year starting in contract year two, up to the greater of 10% of account value or the RMD amount. A separate Accumulated Interest Withdrawal rider (also 0.08%) allows withdrawal of accumulated interest only, starting in year one. Absent either rider, any withdrawal during the surrender period triggers the full surrender charge shown below. That schedule runs 9%, 8%, 7%, 6%, then 5% for years five through ten — meaning the charge doesn't continue declining after year four, it just holds at 5% until the term ends, a longer effective tail than many 10-year peers that step down toward 1-2% in the final years. MVA applies on top of the surrender charge. Given the design, buyers should treat this money as fully inaccessible for the term unless they specifically elect and pay for the liquidity riders.

Sentinel Security doesn't charge stacked, separate rider fees the way many carriers do — instead, every optional feature reduces your credited interest rate by a fixed amount, so there's no line-item fee to point to, but the cost shows up in a lower rate. The menu: Preferred 10% Free Withdrawal (-0.08%), Accumulated Interest Withdrawal (-0.08%), 72(t) Free Withdrawal (-0.05%), RMD waiver (-0.16%), Terminal Illness/Nursing Home Care (-0.15%), and the Death Benefit Feature (-0.35%). A buyer who wants a reasonably complete package — free withdrawal, an RMD waiver, and the full death benefit — would be looking at roughly 0.59 percentage points off the 6.25% headline rate, landing closer to 5.66%. That's still a respectable MYGA rate, but it's a meaningfully different number than the one on the rate sheet, and it's worth running the math on which riders you actually need before assuming you'll earn the advertised 6.25%.

Legal Entity: Sentinel Security Life Insurance Company

Parent: A-Cap

A.M. Best Rating: B++