Chris Hansen Correspondent • Profile

America's seniors have always been a sales target -- now more than ever, because they control more than $15 trillion.

In an effort to get a slice of that pie, some independent insurance agents, representing big insurance companies, are selling a relatively new kind of investment to people like Leo Stulen.

Leo Stulen: Here, you know, they're selling something to somebody who's got one foot in the grave and the other one on a banana peel.

When he was 72 years old, Leo bought something called an "equity indexed annuity." It's a legitimate investment for some people, and sales have soared because insurance companies market them as a safe place to put your money.

What are they? They're called "indexed" because they're tied, in part, to the stock market. If stocks go up, you gain some.

But the best part is if stocks go down, the insurance company guarantees you won't lose.

Leo Stulen: It would never get lower than what it was right then.

Chris Hansen: You could never lose money?

Leo Stulen: Never lose.

And they're called "annuities" because they're really insurance contracts. You pay a premium and the insurance company promises to make payments to you in the future.

But there are two important things Leo Stulen says he wasn't told, things that some experts say make this a horrible investment for many seniors.

First, the annuity would lock up most of his money for more than a decade, which is longer than he might live.

And, what's worse, if he needed to withdraw his cash early, he would pay stiff surrender penalties.

And that's exactly what happened when his wife had a medical emergency.

Leo Stulen: They say, “Well, if you draw it out early it's a substantial penalty.” And I say, “Oh.” We got took.

At the time, Leo Stulen had about $40,000 in the annuity -- his entire life savings. And because of the surrender penalty, he lost 15 percent of it, or $6,000. He got back less money than he put in.

He says the loss forced him to sell his home.

Leo Stulen: There's times where -- what are we going to buy? Pills or food? Because we were short of money.

He's not the only senior who's heard the pitch.

Dateline is about to show how some insurance agents can take advantage of you.

Join us in a ground-breaking hidden-camera investigation, as we go behind the scenes to uncover the techniques they use: inside sales meetings -- where we catch the questionable pitches; inside training sessions -- where we discover agents being taught to scare seniors; and, finally, inside senior's homes to reveal the tricks some agents use to puff their credentials to make a sale.

You're about to see what happens when we catch them in the act.

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