This type of annuity receives a fair amount of seemingly scholarly press trying to justify including this product as part of a balanced portfolio.

FORBES: The False Promises of Annuities and Annuity Calculators

When you leave the company or retire, you transfer 401(k) assets to the pension plan, and the pension plan converts the rollover amount to an annuity that is actuarially equal to the amount you transferred, guaranteeing you additional lifetime payments in excess of your basic pension checks.

FORBES: How To Make Your 401(k) Last Forever: The Pension Rollover

The ruling also applies to special kinds of grantor trusts, such as a generation-skipping trust, which is designed to avoid taxes at the grantor's children's deaths, as well as a grantor-retained annuity trust, where the grantor can transfer any amount of property betting that it will grow faster than the payments he is required to receive back from the trust over a period of years.

FORBES: The IRS Grants A Wish

As Werness and his planner explained it to FORBES, Werness would get two things in return: ten years of monthly annuity payments from a reputable charity and a tax deduction for the full amount the charity netted from selling the house.

FORBES: The new giving game