Product Specification#
Status: Draft, 2026-08-29 (access date for every citation: 2026-08-29).
Retrieval conditions — read this first. This specification was drafted with no document
retrieval of any kind: direct HTTP egress from the build environment was blocked by an
organisation network policy, and the session’s WebSearch budget was exhausted before this product
was reached, so the first draft rested on a research file (_research/basisrente.md) written with
no research channel — the authoring model’s own knowledge of German insurance law and practice,
disciplined by std and unverified tags. That policy has since been lifted and the citations
were re-verified against the primary documents. On 2026-08-30 the statutes and regulations this
product turns on were read as canonical XML at gesetze-im-internet.de, each with its amendment
status (Stand) recorded, and carrier Allgemeine Versicherungsbedingungen,
Verbraucherinformationen and Produktinformationsblätter were retrieved as PDFs and read. Of the
forty entries in sources.md, twenty now answer Retrieved: yes, seven record
part of what they cite as read and the rest as not, and thirteen are still Retrieved: no —
amending acts with no consolidated page of their own, a mortality table that is not published, two
carrier sites that answered with a script-injected index or an HTTP 403, and market statistics and
ratings that were not obtained. The re-verification changed things: the conversion basis of the
guaranteed Rentenfaktor, two carriers’ product names and the Kleinbetragsrenten-Abfindung
threshold are corrections to what the drafted text said, and they are marked where they fall. Read
a claim as sound where its entry says Retrieved: yes and as provisional where it does not — there
a delib citation is still a pointer, not a certificate: an R1 tag names the instrument the
claim must be checked against and does not assert that anyone read it, and the figure keeps its
unverified tag. Where a mechanic is certain and its level is not, this document ships a std
parameter with its rationale rather than a fabricated source tag.
Scope note. This is a standardized composite specification assembled for reference liability
cash-flow modelling of a German Basisrente (Rürup-Rente) — the Basisrentenvertrag of
§ 10 Abs. 1 Nr. 2 Buchst. b EStG, the privately written, funded member of Schicht 1 of the German
three-layer retirement architecture. It does not describe any single insurer’s product. The
composite was built from the statute and the market’s settled mechanics rather than from a
comparison of contracts, because when it was drafted the corpus held two carrier artefacts and neither
was a Bedingungswerk. It now holds four wordings — two carriers’ Basisrente AVB, the GDV’s Basisrente
and BUZ Musterbedingungen — and two filled-in Muster-PIBs, and the entries in sources.md say per
document what was read. The composite’s parameters were not re-derived from them in this pass;
where a retrieved document and a shipped level diverge, the entry and model.md say so. [S#] tags mark primary product documents and
[R#] product-specific regulatory and actuarial references, both numbered per
_research/basisrente.md and resolved in sources.md (numbering frozen); [REG-R#] refers to the
cross-product reference library references/regulatory-and-actuarial-references.md, whose own
numbering is distinct and also frozen. std marks a standardization introduced for the reference
implementation, each with a rationale and an argued plausible range where the research recorded one.
Out of scope. The Riester-Rente (Schicht 2, delib product 6) and the klassische private Rentenversicherung (Schicht 3, delib product 2) share this chassis and appear only as contrasts. The competing Schicht-1 vehicles of § 10 Abs. 1 Nr. 2 Buchst. a are not modelled, but they consume the same annual ceiling and that is treated below as a first-order fact about demand. The Fonds-Basisrente, betriebliche Altersversorgung, Gruppenversicherung, private Krankenversicherung and Sterbegeldversicherung are outside delib entirely.
Product overview and market role#
A Basisrente is an ordinary German life insurance contract governed by the VVG R14 R15 REG-R22, on a single life, which additionally satisfies the definitional conditions of § 10 Abs. 1 Nr. 2 Buchst. b EStG R1 REG-R39 and holds a certificate under § 5a AltZertG R9 REG-R43. It is not a separate legal species: everything true of a German deferred annuity is true of it — the same Deckungskapital recursion, the same Überschussbeteiligung, the same Rentenfaktor, the same DAV 2004 R basis — unless the § 10 conditions displace it.
The product is defined by prohibitions, not by benefits. Its accumulation and payout mechanics
are those of the delib klassische_rentenversicherung product. What makes it a distinct product, and
what a projection model has to get right, is a closed list of five things it may not do: the
entitlement must be nicht vererblich (not inheritable), nicht übertragbar (not transferable),
nicht beleihbar (not chargeable as security), nicht veräußerbar (not saleable) and nicht
kapitalisierbar (not convertible into capital) R1 REG-R39. Everything below follows from that
sentence, and three consequences change the shape of the projected cash flows:
There is no Rückkaufswert at any duration. The § 169 VVG surrender-value regime R14 REG-R28 is inoperative: the contract has a Deckungskapital like any other and there is no duration at which any part of it is payable to the policyholder as capital. This is the single most important thing a modeller coming from the delib endowment or Schicht-3 chassis has to unlearn.
Beitragsfreistellung is the only exit, and it is not a lapse. § 165 VVG’s right to convert to a premium-free contract with a reduced benefit survives intact R14; § 168 VVG’s termination right is disapplied by § 168 Abs. 3 Nr. 1, and the contractual termination carriers grant in its place produces no payment and turns the contract paid-up. The policyholder facing a cash crisis has exactly one lever, and the paid-up cohort is a large permanent part of the book, not a residue.
Death before Rentenbeginn pays nothing in the base design. Nicht vererblich means the entitlement forms no part of the estate and may not be directed by will R1; with no Hinterbliebenenabsicherung the reserve is released to the Versichertengemeinschaft as a mortality profit. Where the rider is present the permitted beneficiaries are closed and everything paid to a survivor must be paid as an annuity.
The layer is a tax wrapper, not a chassis. [S2] is the direct evidence: one large insurer sells the same design — the same premium split, the same selectable guarantee levels, the same Rentenfaktor machinery — as PrivatRente (Schicht 3), BasisRente (Schicht 1) and RiesterRente (Schicht 2), differing only in the wrapper. A Basisrente model should therefore reuse the Schicht-3 chassis with the constraint set bolted on.
What the buyer is buying is three things at once, and the model point makes no sense without all three. The Sonderausgabenabzug: from the assessment period 2023 the capped contribution is deductible in full R7 REG-R39, inside an annual ceiling — the Höchstbetrag — pegged since 2015 to the maximum contribution to the knappschaftliche Rentenversicherung R2 R20. Pfändungsschutz: a compliant entitlement is attachable only on the scale that applies to earnings, and savings into it are protected up to 6 000 € a year to the completed 27th year of life and 7 000 € thereafter to the completed 67th, subject to an aggregate ceiling of 340 000 € R12 REG-R40. And nachgelagerte Besteuerung on the way out R4 REG-R41. The protection is a by-product of the prohibitions, not an added feature — there is nothing to attach because there is nothing to realise.
Two buyer populations, and the model point table represents both. The self-employed person with no compulsory scheme — the buyer the product was designed for: the entire Höchstbetrag is free, the Pfändungsschutz matters as much as the relief, and the income is volatile, which is what the Zuzahlung structure is for. And the high-earning employee or partner using residual headroom as a late-career deferral vehicle, frequently by Einmalbeitrag, entering at 50 or later with a short deferment. In both cases the entry age is materially higher than for a Riester or Schicht-3 contract — the mid-forties rather than the early thirties unverified — because the product only makes sense once income is high enough for the relief to be worth the illiquidity. The commercial problem follows: the relief is real and large, but the contract is irreversible. That is not a defect; it is the consideration for the Pfändungsschutz and the relief.
Market size — the weakest material in this document. No statistic from the GDV, the BMF or any consumer or comparison source was established R22 [S16] (gap 3). The orders of magnitude, every one unverified general knowledge: of the order of two and a half million contracts in force against fifteen to sixteen million Riester contracts and falling; of the order of a hundred thousand new contracts a year on a declining count trend; an average contribution of two to four thousand euro a year against roughly eight hundred for a Riester contract. Its share of new business by premium is much higher than by count. Nothing downstream may cite a delib figure for the size of the Basisrente market. For context, the Altersvorsorgereformgesetz — Bundesrat consent 8 May 2026, new subsidised model from 1 January 2027 REG-R44 — closes Riester to new business and leaves the Basisrente untouched.
Representative specification#
The representative design is a single-life, individual, klassisch (general-account)
Basisrentenvertrag on a monthly grid, certified under § 5a AltZertG, with a level laufender
Beitrag plus an annual Zuzahlung — both annual terms of the contract, the grid being finer than
the contract because the Rente is monthly — priced and reserved at the current Höchstrechnungszins on a
DAV 2004 R first-order basis, gezillmert toward the 25 ‰ cap, converting at Rentenbeginn into a
monthly lifelong annuity at max(garantierter, aktueller) Rentenfaktor, with no Kapitalwahlrecht,
no Teilkapitalauszahlung, no Rückkaufswert, no policy loan and no assignment. The one
commutation Schicht 1 does permit — the Kleinbetragsrenten-Abfindung REG-R42 — is left out of
the base run as a stated standardization (std), not as a prohibition; the distinction is
drawn out under The ban on capitalisation below.
Why klassisch rather than fondsgebunden. The market’s centre of gravity has moved decisively to fondsgebundene Basisrenten since the Höchstrechnungszins fell below 1 % R16 REG-R15 — a judgement that is unverified general knowledge unsupported by any figure in this corpus (gap 3). The composite nevertheless models the klassisch form: the Schicht-1 constraints are the subject of this product and are clearest against a general-account chassis whose reserve recursion the library already has, while the unit-linked machinery is carried by delib product 3 and the hybrid guarantee mechanics by delib product 4.
Product identity and issue rules#
Parameter |
Representative value |
Basis |
|---|---|---|
Design type and wrapper |
Individual single-life deferred annuity, general account (klassisch), profit-participating, certified Basisrentenvertrag; the policyholder and the insured life are the same person, because the annuity must be on the taxpayer’s own life |
|
Certification |
Zertifizierungsnummer issued by the Bundeszentralamt für Steuern under § 5a AltZertG, required for contracts concluded from 1 January 2010. A formal conformity check against § 2 Abs. 1 or 1a and § 2a AltZertG and nothing else, expressly not a quality mark: it says nothing about charges, investment quality or the provider’s strength. The number appears on the Produktinformationsblatt under § 7 Abs. 1 Satz 2 Nr. 3 |
R9 R10 R11 REG-R43; 1 January 2010 date unverified — not in the retrieved text |
Asset form |
(i) |
(i) std (1); (ii) [S7] [S16] — observed at five carriers; (iii) [S2] [S16] |
Lives basis |
Single life. A second life may enter only through the permitted Hinterbliebenenabsicherung |
|
Entry ages |
18 to the low sixties; no statutory floor or ceiling on entry, only on Rentenbeginn |
std (2) |
Earliest Rentenbeginn |
Completion of the 62nd year of life for contracts concluded after 31 December 2011; the 60th for contracts concluded on or before that date |
R1 R8 REG-R39 — § 10 Abs. 1 Nr. 2 Buchst. b aa and § 10 Abs. 6 EStG (3) |
Latest and representative Rentenbeginn |
No statutory ceiling; contracts commonly allow deferral past the statutory retirement age. Representative attained age 67 |
|
Annuity form |
Monthly, lifelong, on the taxpayer’s own life. No term-certain annuity, no Auszahlungsplan of the Riester type, no annuity on any other single life |
|
Anchor model cell |
Entry age 45, Rentenbeginn 67, conclusion year 2026, laufender Beitrag 6 000,00 € p.a. annual in advance with a 2 % Beitragsdynamik, Zuzahlung 4 000,00 € p.a., Rechnungszins 1,00 %, guaranteed Rentenfaktor 28,00 €, no riders |
std (5) |
Footnotes to std rows:
All three asset forms are sold, and the absence of a statutory Beitragsgarantie is what makes the third optional rather than mandatory R9 R10 REG-R43 — the sharpest structural contrast with Riester. A fourth form, an index-linked Basisrente, is plausible from one carrier’s tariff naming [S10] but was not established (gap 12).
No carrier’s entry-age or permitted Rentenbeginn range was established (gap 8): twenty named German life writers publish this and none was reached [S11]. The envelope is the market shape, not an observation.
The commissioning brief for the research file stated the pre-2012 floor as 63; the research file resolved it against 60, and § 10 Abs. 6 EStG settles it: “Absatz 1 Nummer 2 Buchstabe b Doppelbuchstabe aa ist für Vertragsabschlüsse vor dem 1. Januar 2012 mit der Maßgabe anzuwenden, dass der Vertrag die Zahlung der Leibrente nicht vor der Vollendung des 60. Lebensjahres vorsehen darf” R1. 63 corresponds to no threshold in this statute. The § 851c ZPO age condition is 60, not 62 R12 REG-R40 — “nicht vor Vollendung des 60. Lebensjahres” — different provisions, different histories, and a reader must not merge them (gap 10).
Age 67 sits above both statutory floors, matches the Regelaltersgrenze, and gives a 22-year deferment from the anchor’s entry age — long enough for the Zillmerung, the Beitragsdynamik and the compounded surplus to be visible at once.
Argued in full under Worked example in
technical-notes.md. In outline: entry at 45 is the research’s own reading of the buyer’s age distribution unverified; 6 000 € plus a 4 000 € Zuzahlung is about a third of the 2026 Höchstbetrag R2 unverified; 1,00 % is the Höchstrechnungszins for new business R16 REG-R15; and the guaranteed Rentenfaktor is std, because although one guaranteed level now exists in the corpus — 24,94 € per month per 10 000 € of capital at 67, on a 2025 contract, from one carrier’s Muster-PIB [S13] — a single point is not a range and no time series exists for this or any delib product (gap 4).
Benefit provisions#
Parameter |
Representative value |
Basis |
|---|---|---|
Old-age benefit |
A monthly lifelong annuity on the taxpayer’s own life, from Rentenbeginn until death, paid in advance — no German market convention on vorschüssig against nachschüssig was established (gap 21). Conversion rule: |
|
Garantierter Rentenfaktor |
Fixed at inception on the Rechnungsgrundlagen then in force, with a deliberate prudential margin. One carrier’s Basisrente wording computes it “auf Grundlage einer anerkannten Sterbetafel (DAV 2004R) sowie des tariflichen Garantiesatzes (Rechnungszins) von 1,25 Prozent p. a.” — the tariff’s own rate, which moves with the guarantee vintage, not an interest basis of 0 %, which was a Schicht-3 observation and is withdrawn. One market level exists: 24,94 € per month per 10 000 €, guaranteed, at 67 on a 2025 fund-linked contract. Representative here 28,00 € at age 67 |
mechanics R17 [S1]; level std (11), above the one observed level [S13] |
Aktueller Rentenfaktor |
The carrier’s then-current immediate-annuity tariff at Rentenbeginn; the higher of the two applies — a guarantee with upside |
|
Schlussüberschussanteil |
Allocated only at Rentenbeginn, because the contract has no surrender and therefore no early-exit trigger — a cleaner single-date cash flow than anywhere else in delib |
|
Death benefit, Aufschubphase, base design |
Nothing. The reserve is released as a mortality profit |
|
Death benefit, Aufschubphase, with the rider |
The Deckungskapital must buy a survivor’s annuity for an eligible survivor; with no eligible survivor, nothing is paid |
|
Death benefit, Rentenphase |
The annuity ends. With a Rentengarantiezeit, remaining instalments continue only to an eligible survivor and are not commutable |
|
Permitted survivors |
The spouse or registered partner, and children while Kindergeld or the Kinderfreibetrag runs. Nobody else — not a cohabiting partner, not a parent, not a sibling, not the estate |
|
Lump sums |
None, to anyone, at any time. No Kapitalwahlrecht, no Teilkapitalauszahlung, no death lump sum, no commutation |
|
Disability benefit |
Only through a BUZ written inside the same contract, subject to the 50 % rule. Its cash flows belong to delib product 9 |
|
Surplus in payment |
The declared Überschussrente, in one of konstante, teildynamische or volldynamische Rente. Representative: teildynamisch, a compounding annual uplift |
No Rentenfaktor level, range or time series was established anywhere in the delib corpus (gap 4). The argued plausible band for a klassisch tariff converting at 67 is 24 € to 34 € per month per 10 000 €, guaranteed factor at the bottom and current factor above it. The guaranteed factor is worth materially more here than on the Schicht-3 sibling: there a policyholder facing a poor conversion can take the Kapitalwahlrecht instead; here there is no alternative, so it is the only protection against a bad conversion. The § 163 VVG channel REG-R27 and the historic Treuhänderklausel, both narrowed by the courts REG-R36, apply as in Schicht 3; delib treats the guaranteed factor as fixed and records the channel as a model risk.
No carrier’s Überschussverwendung option list was established (gap 17); that verzinsliche Ansammlung and Bonusrente are the natural Aufschubphase forms — cash-paying systems sitting awkwardly with nicht kapitalisierbar — is the research file’s own inference. The payout-phase choice has a tax dimension it lacks in Schicht 3: the Rentenfreibetrag is frozen in euro, so every increase in the annuity is fully taxable.
Underwriting and rating#
Parameter |
Representative value |
Basis |
|---|---|---|
Underwriting of the main contract |
None in substance. A deferred annuity with no death benefit carries no anti-selection the insurer needs to underwrite; the annuity risk runs the other way |
|
Underwriting of the riders |
A Hinterbliebenenabsicherung and, decisively, a BUZ are fully underwritten, under the §§ 19 ff. VVG Anzeigepflicht regime |
|
Rating factors, main contract |
Entry age, deferment term, premium form and frequency, chosen Rentenbeginn, option set. Sex may not be a rating factor for contracts concluded from 21 December 2012 and is carried for reporting only |
|
Mortality basis |
DAV 2004 R, a Generationentafel — mortality by birth cohort, with the improvement trend inside the table rather than applied on top. First-order probabilities carry prudential margins and price the contract and the guaranteed Rentenfaktor; second order is the best estimate. The DAV tables are the association’s property, not public and not redistributed by delib |
|
Selection |
Lighter than a comparable Schicht-3 portfolio, because the contract cannot be surrendered or commuted, so a policyholder in poor health has no exit and nobody leaves the annuitant pool. No evidence for this was found; the direction is arguable from the product’s own structure, but no German experience study was reached, so it is a stated model risk rather than a parameter this document asserts |
|
Interest basis |
The Höchstrechnungszins: 1,00 % for new business from 1 January 2025, the first increase in about thirty years, recommended at 1,00 % for 2026 |
|
Guarantee vintages in force |
2,75 % (2004–2006), 2,25 % (2007–2011), 1,75 % (2012–2014), 1,25 % (2015–2016), 0,90 % (2017–2021), 0,25 % (2022–2024), 1,00 % (from 2025). The rate applies at conclusion and stays with the contract for its whole term |
Charges#
The charge structure is that of any German life contract and is not modified by the layer, with two Basisrente-specific points on top of it.
Parameter |
Representative value |
Basis |
|---|---|---|
Abschluss- und Vertriebskosten |
Financed by Zillmerung, capped at 25 ‰ (2,5 %) of the Beitragssumme by § 4 DeckRV, reduced from 40 ‰ with effect from 1 January 2015 by the LVRG. The rate used at conclusion applies for the whole term |
|
Acquisition-cost amortisation |
Charged to the Deckungskapital in five equal annual instalments over the first five premium-paying years, or over the premium-paying term if shorter; a Zuzahlung carries its own percentage charge in the year it is paid |
R10 R14 [S1] [S12] — VVG § 165 Abs. 2 with § 169 Abs. 3, restated in the GDV model conditions § 10 Abs. 1 and in one carrier’s wording at § 8 Abs. 1 (14); gap 8 closed |
Verwaltungskosten, % of premium (β) |
Representative 7,5 %; argued band 5 % – 10 % |
std (13) |
Verwaltungskosten, % of the Deckungskapital (γ) |
Representative 0,35 % p.a.; argued band 0,2 % – 0,6 % |
std (13) |
Stückkosten |
A fixed euro amount per policy per year, inflating |
std (13) |
Annuity administration |
A per-annuitant amount in the Rentenphase |
std (13) |
Effektivkosten, klassisch |
Argued band 0,6 % – 1,2 % p.a. |
std (13) (15) — no klassisch figure was retrieved |
Effektivkosten, other forms |
fondsgebunden with commission 1,0 % – 1,8 % p.a.; Nettotarif (fee-based) 0,3 % – 0,8 % p.a., a real and growing segment on this product |
the fondsgebunden band is now corroborated: an independent study puts realistic Effektivkosten for the fund-linked Basisrenten of five large carriers at 1,0 – 1,5 pp without a guarantee and 1 – 2,3 pp with an 80 % one [S16]. Read a Muster-PIB’s figure as a ceiling instead: on maximum charges the same products show 3,0 – 4,6 pp, and one retrieved Muster-PIB gives 1,77 pp and another 4,95 pp [S13]. The Nettotarif band is std (13) |
Charge data now in the corpus |
One carrier’s full published schedule [S13]: Abschluss- und Vertriebskosten 2,50 % der vereinbarten Beiträge (900,00 € on 36 000 €) plus 2,50 % on each Zuzahlung; Verwaltungskosten 7,00 % der eingezahlten Beiträge, up to 3,80 % p.a. of the fund including fund charges with a current burden of 1,10 %, and 1,50 % of the annuity p.a. in the payout phase; Versorgungsausgleich up to 500,00 €. Beside it, the two older figures — ≤ 0,95 € per 100 € of capital formed and an Abschlussprovision of 1 575 € |
the schedule is retrieved [S13]; the two older figures are [S2] and remain unverified, from third-party commentary rather than a tariff sheet |
Every charge level in this document is std, and none was re-calibrated in this pass. A charge schedule and an Effektivkosten figure have since been obtained — see [S13] and [S16] — so gap 2 is closed as a gap; what remains is that the model’s levels were constructed before those figures existed and have not been moved to meet them. Where they diverge is recorded in
model.md. The § 7 AltZertG Produktinformationsblatt exists precisely to publish a comparable total-charge number for this product, per quotation, and not one was reached. The bands are the reference implementation’s parameter set with its reasoning attached, not a market survey.Whether the AltZertG’s five-year spreading of acquisition costs reaches Basisrentenverträge was not established (gap 8) — § 1 imposes it on Riester contracts and what § 5a picks up is unresolved R10 REG-R43. The spread is adopted as std because it is the LVRG-era German market shape and because § 169 VVG’s independent five-year floor REG-R28 produces the same profile on every other German regular-premium contract. Note that § 169 VVG is itself inoperative here — it governs what must be paid on surrender — so the spread is adopted for its effect on the Deckungskapital, not because a surrender-value floor requires it.
The Beitragssumme is large on this product, so a 25 ‰ cap permits a large euro amount of acquisition cost, far above what the same percentage allows on a short contract. How Zuzahlungen enter the Beitragssumme for the cap was not established (gap 8); the composite excludes them and charges them a separate percentage, the conservative reading and std.
Termination and values#
There is no exit that pays money. That is the operative summary, and it is the first sentence of this section for a reason.
Parameter |
Representative value |
Basis |
|---|---|---|
Rückkaufswert |
None, at any duration. § 169 VVG is inoperative because the entitlement may not be capitalised. There is a Deckungskapital; there is no duration at which any part of it is payable as capital |
|
Stornoabzug |
Not applicable — no surrender payment exists for a deduction to be made from |
|
Kündigung |
§ 168 Abs. 1 and 2 VVG do not apply to a certified Basisrentenvertrag whose Verwertung is excluded (§ 168 Abs. 3 Nr. 1). Carriers nonetheless grant a contractual termination and word it as a conversion: it produces no payment and turns the contract premium-free. A single-premium contract is not terminable at all |
|
Beitragsfreistellung |
Exercisable at any time, effective at the end of the current premium period; converts to a premium-free entitlement to a reduced annuity computed from the Deckungskapital reached |
|
Mindestversicherungsleistung |
The reduced benefit must reach a threshold agreed in the contract. No carrier’s threshold was established |
|
Status of a paid-up contract |
Still a Basisrente: still certified, still protected, still taxed on the Besteuerungsanteil, still payable only as an annuity from the statutory floor age |
|
Policy loan, assignment, sale |
Prohibited — nicht beleihbar, nicht übertragbar, nicht veräußerbar. The German life secondary market, which exists for Schicht-3 endowments, cannot touch this product |
|
Transfer to another provider |
Unresolved. The market understanding is that a transfer to another Basisrentenvertrag of the same person is tax-neutral, but the conditions live in the BMF guidance and could not be established |
R18; gap 13; must not be asserted |
Versorgungsausgleich |
The one permitted transfer: on divorce, pension-sharing law splits entitlements acquired during the marriage, and the receiving spouse’s entitlement remains subject to the same prohibitions. The mechanism was not established and delib does not model it |
R1; gap 14 |
Widerruf and expiry |
The 30-day life-assurance withdrawal right applies as to any German life contract REG-R23. There is no expiry: the contract runs from conclusion to the death of the annuitant, with no maturity date and no maturity value |
Contractual mechanics#
Each subsection states one operative rule in this document’s own words — nothing here is quoted from an instrument — and says what it does to a cash-flow model.
The five prohibitions, taken one at a time#
The rule: the entitlements arising under the contract must be not inheritable, not transferable, not chargeable as security, not saleable and not convertible into capital R1 REG-R39.
Limb |
What it forbids |
Modelling consequence |
|---|---|---|
nicht vererblich |
The entitlement forms no part of the estate; on death capital does not pass to heirs |
With no rider, death before Rentenbeginn pays nothing; the reserve is released as a mortality profit |
nicht übertragbar |
Assignment to a third party |
No assignment decrement, no third-party interest; the only permitted transfer is the Versorgungsausgleich |
nicht beleihbar |
Pledge, mortgage, borrowing against |
No policy loan — delib’s retired name |
nicht veräußerbar |
Sale of the contract |
No secondary market, no sale decrement |
nicht kapitalisierbar |
Turning the entitlement into capital |
No Rückkaufswert, no Kapitalwahlrecht, no Teilkapitalauszahlung. The prohibition has one express statutory exception, the Kleinbetragsrenten-Abfindung of § 10 Abs. 1 Nr. 2 Satz 3 EStG REG-R42, which this model does not implement (std) |
The prohibitions bind the insurer’s product design, not merely the policyholder’s rights. A contract offering any of these features is not a Basisrentenvertrag, cannot be certified R9, and attracts no relief R3 — a condition of the tax status of the whole contract, which is why the model carries these as structural absences rather than switched-off options. What nicht vererblich does not mean: it does not forbid a payment on death, only that the entitlement is not part of the estate and may not be directed by will. A death benefit is permitted inside the narrow channel below, provided it is itself paid as an annuity.
Certification under § 5a AltZertG, and what it does not import#
The rule: certification by the Bundeszentralamt für Steuern is a condition of the relief, not of the contract’s validity R3 R9 REG-R43. It is a formal conformity check and each certified tariff receives a Zertifizierungsnummer. § 2 Abs. 2, or a provision to that effect, states expressly that certification is not a seal of quality R10: it is a tax fact, not a value judgement, and every delib document repeats that.
What § 5a does not import from § 1 is as important as what it does. The Riester Beitragserhaltungsgarantie — at least the paid-in contributions and Zulagen available at the start of the payout phase, with up to 20 % of contributions left out of account where they secure biometric cover REG-R43 — has no Schicht-1 counterpart. A Basisrente may be sold with a 100 % Beitragsgarantie, a partial one, or none at all. That omission is why the two subsidised layers diverged so sharply after the interest-rate collapse: Riester writers had to hold a nominal guarantee that became unaffordable at a 0,25 % Höchstrechnungszins and withdrew; Basisrente writers dropped the guarantee and kept selling. The drafting mechanism is unverified; the substance is settled.
The regime also carries the § 7 AltZertG pre-sale obligations R11 REG-R43: a standardised, quotation-specific Produktinformationsblatt carrying the Effektivkosten and a Chancen-Risiko-Klasse from CRK 1 to CRK 5, computed by the Produktinformationsstelle Altersvorsorge on a common capital-market model the insurer does not control. delib does not implement the PIA simulation. That document’s field list was not established (gap 7), and how it interacts with the PRIIPs Basisinformationsblatt is unresolved (gap 6) and must not be asserted [S13] [S14] REG-R32.
The Höchstbetrag, the knappschaftliche peg, and the employee reductions#
The rule: contributions under § 10 Abs. 1 Nr. 2 letters a and b together — statutory pension,
Versorgungswerk, Alterskasse and Basisrente — are deductible up to a single annual
Höchstbetrag, doubled for spouses assessed jointly R2 REG-R39. Since 2015
Hoechstbetrag(year) = BBG_knappschaftlich(year) x Beitragssatz_knappschaftlich(year): the
knappschaftliche branch is used rather than the general one because it has both a higher
Beitragsbemessungsgrenze and a higher contribution rate. The inputs come from the annual
Sozialversicherungsrechengrößen-Verordnung R20, which has to be re-read every year for this
product in a way that is not true of any other delib product.
The ceiling is shared, and that is the constraint that bites. A Freiberufler in a Versorgungswerk, or a Handwerker with compulsory GRV membership, has most of it consumed under letter a; the buyer with the whole ceiling free is the genuinely non-insured self-employed person. And the ceiling moves every year, so the premium should too — which is why Beitragsdynamik and year-end Zuzahlungen are far more prominent here than on a Schicht-3 annuity.
Two further mechanisms operate on an employee and are routinely conflated R2 REG-R39. The GRV contributions consume the ceiling, employee and employer alike; the tax-free employer share is then subtracted from the deductible amount, never having been taxed in the employee’s hands:
base = min( GRV_employee + GRV_employer + Basisrente_contribution , Hoechstbetrag )
deductible = base x 1.00 # 100 % from 2023 [R7]
allowed = deductible - GRV_employer # the tax-free employer share [R2]
A third reduction applies to taxpayers with a non-contributory entitlement — Beamte, judges, soldiers, controlling shareholder-directors with a Pensionszusage — whose ceiling is reduced by a notional contribution computed on their remuneration R2 unverified, which is why the product is effectively closed to Beamte. None of this is a liability cash flow: the relief accrues through the tax system, never through the insurer, and its place in a delib model is upstream of the model point — it determines how large the premium is and why it is shaped the way it is.
The Rechnungszins, the guarantee vintages and the Zillmerung cap#
The rule: § 2 DeckRV fixes the maximum rate at which a German life insurer may discount its statutory Deckungsrückstellung for a contract carrying an interest guarantee, and therefore — through § 138 Abs. 1 VAG’s requirement that premiums be adequate to fund that reserve REG-R8 — the maximum rate at which a new tariff may be priced R16 REG-R14. The rate applies at the time of conclusion and then stays with the contract for its whole term, so a Basisrente book written since 2005 is a layered stack of guarantee vintages REG-R15 and an in-force model point carries its cohort’s rate rather than today’s. The Zinszusatzreserve REG-R17 and the § 139 VAG Bewertungsreserven test REG-R9 run on the HGB side of the balance sheet, and neither is a cash flow of this contract. The parallel rule on acquisition cost: § 4 DeckRV caps the Zillmersatz at 25 ‰ of the Beitragssumme, reduced from 40 ‰ from 1 January 2015 by the LVRG, and the rate used at conclusion applies for the whole term R16 REG-R16 REG-R20.
Überschussbeteiligung — unchanged by the layer, with two differences#
The rule: the policyholder is statutorily entitled to a share of the Überschuss and of the Bewertungsreserven unless participation is expressly excluded R15 REG-R24. A Basisrente participates on exactly the same terms as any other German life contract — the layer changes the tax and the exits, not the surplus machinery: the four surplus sources, the RfB, the MindZV minimum allocation of 90 % of the investment result net of the Rechnungszinsen, 90 % of the risk result and 50 % of the cost result REG-R18, the RfBV REG-R19 and the annual declaration at the balance date all apply unchanged.
Two things are different, and both follow from the prohibitions. First, the Überschussverwendung options are narrower in the Aufschubphase: cash-paying systems sit awkwardly with nicht kapitalisierbar, so verzinsliche Ansammlung and Bonusrente are the natural forms — the research file’s own inference, not a sourced fact (gap 17). Second, the Schlussüberschussanteil has no early-exit trigger: a Basisrente has no surrender, so it is allocated only at Rentenbeginn, a cleaner single-date cash flow than anywhere else in delib. No declared rate specific to a Basisrente was established, and the market-average rates in sibling delib files are Schicht-3 and endowment figures that must not be relabelled.
The conversion at Rentenbeginn#
The rule R17 [S1]:
monthly_annuity = Kapital(Rentenbeginn) / 10 000 x Rentenfaktor
Rentenfaktor_applied = max( Rentenfaktor_garantiert , Rentenfaktor_aktuell(Rentenbeginn) )
Three things happen at Rentenbeginn on a German deferred annuity and only two survive into Schicht 1: the capital is converted at a Rentenfaktor; the Überschussverwendung system for the payout phase is fixed; and the Kapitalwahlrecht is exercised or allowed to lapse — which does not exist here R1. That third absence is what makes the guaranteed factor load-bearing: the policyholder bears conversion risk with no way out, so it is this product’s most valuable guarantee, and a specification that treats the conversion as the Schicht-3 one has missed the product. For the model the conversion is a single-date event: the whole fund, including the terminal bonus, leaves the Deckungskapital and becomes an annuity obligation, with no election switch, no take-up assumption and no notice-period parameter — three simplifications that are consequences of the ban rather than modelling choices.
The annuity in payment, and the Besteuerungsanteil#
The rule: benefits from a Basisrentenvertrag are sonstige Einkünfte taxed on a Besteuerungsanteil fixed by the calendar year in which the annuity begins — the Kohortenprinzip — the taxpayer’s age, income and contribution history being irrelevant to the percentage R4 REG-R41. The schedule: 50 % for annuities beginning in or before 2005, rising two points per cohort year to 80 % for 2020, one point per year for 2021 and 2022, and half a point per year from 2023 after the Wachstumschancengesetz R6, reaching 100 % for 2058. Selected values, every one now read off the statutory table in § 22 Nr. 1 Satz 3 Buchst. a Doppelbuchst. aa Satz 3 EStG R4: 2023 82,5 %; 2024 83,0 %; 2025 83,5 %; 2026 84,0 %; 2040 91,0 %; 2058 100,0 %. The table is in the statute itself, not in an administrative schedule, and the whole of it was read; the internal consistency check — 82,5 + 35 × 0,5 = 100,0 and 82,5 + 17 × 0,5 = 91,0 — is no longer the only corroboration available.
Der Rentenfreibetrag ist ein Euro-Betrag. The untaxed complement is computed once, in the first full calendar year of receipt, and is then frozen for life R4 REG-R41. So every subsequent increase in the annuity is fully taxable, a volldynamische Rente is taxed at an effective rate climbing towards 100 % of the increment, and the choice of Überschussverwendung system in the payout phase has a tax dimension it lacks in Schicht 3, where the Ertragsanteil percentage is what is frozen. A delib model does not compute tax: the Besteuerungsanteil belongs here, not in the projection, and its role is to explain the economics and justify the model point.
Beitragsfreistellung against Kündigung — the exits#
The rule: § 165 VVG gives the policyholder of a contract with periodic premiums the right at any time, for the end of the current premium period, to demand conversion into a premium-free contract with a reduced benefit, provided the reduced benefit reaches a Mindestversicherungsleistung agreed in the contract R14 REG-R28. This right survives intact and is the product’s only real exit. § 168 VVG’s termination right does not survive — an earlier drafting of this document said it did, and the statute contradicts it. § 168 Abs. 3 Nr. 1 reads: “Die Absätze 1 und 2 sind nicht auf einen für die Altersvorsorge bestimmten Versicherungsvertrag anzuwenden, 1. wenn die Vertragsparteien bei einem nach § 5a des Altersvorsorgeverträge-Zertifizierungsgesetzes zertifizierten Basisrentenvertrag die Verwertung der Ansprüche gemäß § 10 Absatz 1 Nummer 2 Satz 1 Buchstabe b des Einkommensteuergesetzes ausgeschlossen haben” R14. The outcome the documents describe is nonetheless what happens, because carriers grant a contractual termination and word it as a conversion: the GDV model conditions say a Kündigung “wandelt sich der Vertrag ganz oder teilweise in einen beitragsfreien Vertrag mit herabgesetzter Rente um … Ein Anspruch auf die Auszahlung eines Rückkaufswerts besteht nicht” (§ 9 Abs. 3) [S12], and one carrier’s wording says the same at § 7 Abs. 1 [S1]. Where the statutory disapplication shows on the face of a contract is the single-premium case, which that carrier declares “auf Grund der gesetzlichen Restriktionen … über die gesamte Vertragsdauer nicht kündbar”. The AVB wording is no longer unverified — two were read — and both also allow a partial termination or premium-freeze above an agreed minimum annuity, which this model does not carry.
Why this matters more here than anywhere else in delib. Elsewhere Kündigung and Beitragsfreistellung are two exits competing for the same policyholder; here there is only one. The Beitragsfreistellung rate should therefore sit above a Schicht-3 lapse rate at short durations — the buyer’s income is volatile by construction and going premium-free is free of penalty and reversible — and below it at long durations, because there is no realisable value to tempt anyone out. That shape is std; no Beitragsfreistellung rate or market Stornoquote specific to the Basisrente was established (gap 3).
The ban on capitalisation — Kapitalwahl, Teilkapital and the Kleinbetragsrente#
The rule: nicht kapitalisierbar forbids a capital election outright, subject to the one de-minimis exception set out at the end of this section R1 REG-R39. There is no Kapitalwahlrecht — the policyholder has no election at Rentenbeginn. There is no Teilkapitalauszahlung either: a Riester contract may pay up to 30 % of the capital as a lump sum at the start of the payout phase R23 REG-R43 unverified — that 30 % is an AltZertG condition that was not read; a Schicht-3 contract may pay 100 %; a Basisrente may pay nothing. A third absence follows: the § 20 Abs. 1 Nr. 6 EStG regime never engages — the Unterschiedsbetrag and the 12/62 rule REG-R45 are Schicht-3 mechanics that reach a Basisrente at no point in its life.
The Kleinbetragsrente is the one de-minimis exception the ban carries, and Schicht 1 has it. For a Riester contract § 93 Abs. 3 EStG permits commutation of a Kleinbetragsrente at the start of the payout phase without loss of the subsidy, where the monthly annuity would fall below a threshold expressed as a percentage of the monthly Bezugsgröße of § 18 SGB IV R23 REG-R42 — a de-minimis rule that exists because administering a trivially small lifelong annuity costs more than it pays. The threshold is 1,5 %: § 93 Abs. 3 Satz 2 Nr. 1 EStG defines a Kleinbetragsrente as one which, on an even annuitisation of the whole capital available at the start of the payout phase, “eine monatliche Rente ergibt, die 1,5 Prozent der monatlichen Bezugsgröße nach § 18 des Vierten Buches Sozialgesetzbuch nicht übersteigt”, aggregating all of the taxpayer’s contracts at that provider. The 1 % that competed with it in an earlier drafting is the older figure and still stands in the GDV model conditions of July 2025 [S12]; the statute as amended in 2026 reads 1,5 % R23. Schicht 1 is not excluded from it. The Kapitalisierungsverbot of § 10 Abs. 1 Nr. 2 Buchst. b EStG is qualified by § 10 Abs. 1 Nr. 2 Satz 3 EStG, which permits the combination of up to twelve monthly payments into one and the commutation of “eine Kleinbetragsrente im Sinne von § 93 Absatz 3 Satz 2 oder 4” — Satz 2 oder 4, not Satz 2 and 3, which is what an earlier drafting of this document said; the older cross-reference survives in the BMF-Schreiben R18 and in a 2015 AVB that pins the 2009 text [S1]. So a certified tariff may pay one at the start of the payout phase, no earlier than the age floor, without forfeiting relief, and § 93 Abs. 3 Satz 4 extends the same treatment to an annuity pushed below the threshold during the payout phase by a Versorgungsausgleich. Which amending statute made that extension was not established and stays unverified. Reading Buchst. b alone gives the opposite answer — that Schicht 1 admits no de-minimis exception whatever — and that answer is wrong, because Buchst. b is not the whole of Nr. 2. So a Basisrente entitlement of two euros a month need not be paid as two euros a month for life. Two retrieved wordings show both halves of the market practice: one carrier’s AVB offers an Abfindung [S1], and the GDV model conditions draft it as the insurer’s right and not the policyholder’s, and separately allow up to twelve monthly annuities to be combined into one payment where the annuity is small [S12].
Two of the three things this section used to leave open are now settled. Combining monthly payments is expressly permitted: § 10 Abs. 1 Nr. 2 Satz 3 EStG allows a contract to provide that “bis zu zwölf Monatsleistungen in einer Auszahlung zusammengefasst werden”, the BMF-Schreiben repeats it at Rz. 16, and the GDV model conditions implement it as an insurer’s right below an agreed monthly amount R1 R18 [S12] — so the compatibility question of gap 19 is answered and the answer is yes. Consolidation before Rentenbeginn is possible where the contract allows it: a direct transfer to another certified contract within the same product group is tax-free under § 3 Nr. 55d EStG R18, one carrier grants it free of charge on three months’ notice [S1], and two others exclude it on their PIBs [S13] — so it is a contract term, not a right. Minimum premiums remain unverified: no carrier’s minimum was retrieved.
The modelling consequence is a decision rather than a deduction, and is std. The reference
implementation does not implement the commutation branch: at Rentenbeginn every model point,
model point 10 included, converts its whole capital into an annuity. Three reasons, in order of
weight — and the first two have since been answered, so the decision now stands on the third alone.
The threshold level is no longer contested: § 93 Abs. 3 Satz 2 Nr. 1 EStG puts it at 1,5 % of the
monthly Bezugsgröße R23. Whether a Basisrente AVB offers the Abfindung, and on whose election, is
no longer unestablished either: one carrier’s wording offers it [S1] and the GDV model conditions draft
it as the insurer’s right, not the policyholder’s [S12] — which is itself a reason a projection
model cannot simply assume it is taken. The Abfindung remains a contract term, not an automatic
statutory consequence. And the mechanic is already carried once in this library, on Riester_DE_S,
where the § 93 Abs. 3 threshold is native, is computed rather than assumed, and a model point trips
it. This is a named model risk, not a claim about the law: a Basisrente model asked to value a
book of very small contracts needs the branch, and a delib user adding it should take
Riester_DE_S’s is_kleinbetrag() / commutation_pp() pair as the pattern. Model point 10 — 300,00 €
a year, the market’s minimum recurring premium — is the boundary case that would trip it, and in the
base run it projects a small annuity.
Pfändungsschutz, insolvency and means-testing#
The rule: § 851c Abs. 1 ZPO makes claims to benefits attachable only as earnings from employment where all of the following hold — the benefit is granted at regular intervals, for life, and not before the completion of the 60th year of age, or only on Berufsunfähigkeit; the claims may not be disposed of; the designation of third parties other than survivors as beneficiaries is excluded; and no capital payment other than on death has been agreed R12 REG-R40. § 851c Abs. 2 protects amounts saved under such a contract up to 6 000 € a year for a debtor from 18 to the completed 27th year of life and 7 000 € from 28 to the completed 67th, subject to an aggregate ceiling of 340 000 €, with three tenths of any excess Rückkaufswert protected on top R12 REG-R40. Those amounts are re-set every fifth year on 1 July in the Pfändungsfreigrenzenbekanntmachung, which is why any printed figure has a shelf life — and why the practitioner ladders this library found contradicting each other did so.
The four requirements of § 851c Abs. 1 are the same four features § 10 Abs. 1 Nr. 2 Buchst. b demands — three instruments, one product description. Whether a Kleinbetragsrenten-Abfindung clause disturbs § 851c Abs. 1’s “no capital payment other than on death” condition was not established unverified; nothing in this model turns on it, because the model has no such clause. Two cautions: the age condition in § 851c is 60, not 62 (gap 10); and the annual savings allowances can now be printed, because the statute was read: § 851c Abs. 2 Satz 1 gives 6 000 € to the completed 27th year of life and 7 000 € to the completed 67th, with the 340 000 € aggregate ceiling R12. The two-band and age-graded ladders the summaries disagreed about are the current and the superseded forms of the same provision; the amounts are re-set every fifth year, which is why no printed figure keeps (gap 9, closed). § 12 SGB II and § 90 SGB XII exempt from means-testing old-age provision whose realisation is contractually excluded R13; taken with § 851c that is the market’s insolvenzfest and Hartz-IV-fest claim, and the principal non-tax reason a self-employed person buys the product. § 851d ZPO was retrieved and is not what this document assumed — it makes monthly benefits out of steuerlich gefördertes Altersvorsorgevermögen attachable as earnings, the Riester counterpart of § 851c, and reaches a Basisrente only through VVG § 168 Abs. 3 Nr. 2 R13 R14. The two SGB addresses stay unverified — neither book was retrieved — and so does the ~18 % social-insurance figure (gap 21); the direction is not in doubt.
Riders and options#
In scope and parameterized in the model, off in the base run. Hinterbliebenenabsicherung (survivor’s annuity): the permitted beneficiaries are closed to the spouse or registered partner and to children while Kindergeld or the Kinderfreibetrag runs — in practice to the 18th year, or the 25th while in education R1 unverified on the ages, which are § 32 EStG’s and were not retrieved; what § 10 Abs. 1 Nr. 2 Buchst. b aa Satz 3 does say, and was read, is that the orphan’s annuity may run only for as long as the child qualifies under § 32. And everything paid to a survivor must be paid as an annuity R1, which converts the two familiar German death-benefit designs into something different:
Design |
In Schicht 3 |
In Schicht 1 |
|---|---|---|
Beitragsrückgewähr in the Aufschubphase |
Premiums paid, or the Deckungskapital, returned as a lump sum to any named beneficiary |
The same amount must buy a survivor’s annuity for an eligible survivor; with no eligible survivor, nothing is paid |
Rentengarantiezeit in the Rentenphase |
Remaining instalments continue to any named beneficiary, often commutable |
Remaining instalments continue only to an eligible survivor, and are not commutable; with none, payments cease |
Spouse’s / survivor’s annuity |
An optional rider on a freely chosen life |
The natural form here, because it is the only form that fits the channel |
The consequence for a model is a conditional probability, not a benefit. The value of any Hinterbliebenenschutz is the value of the benefit multiplied by the probability that an eligible survivor exists at the moment of death. On a contract taken at 45 and running to 67 the child channel has usually closed long before Rentenbeginn, so in practice the cover is a spouse cover. That probability is std with no evidence behind it and is one of the more consequential std choices in the whole delib library. The cover also costs annuity: the sibling delib corpus’s Schicht-3 illustration put a 10-year Rentengarantiezeit at roughly 0,5 % of the annuity, 20 years at 2,6 % and 30 years at 8,0 % — unverified, Schicht-3 figures, not transferable, and no Basisrente-specific cost was established. The composite carries the Rentenfaktor reduction as a std table keyed by the option, anchored on those figures.
Rentengarantiezeit is a guaranteed payment period measured from Rentenbeginn, representative values 0, 10 or 20 years, payable only to an eligible survivor and never commutable R1.
Berufsunfähigkeits-Zusatzversicherung (BUZ), and the 50 % rule. § 10 Abs. 1 Nr. 2 Buchst. b
permits, inside the same contract, cover against Berufsunfähigkeit and against verminderte
Erwerbsfähigkeit R1 REG-R29, and the premium for it is deductible inside the Schicht-1
Höchstbetrag at 100 % R2 R7. The 50 % rule: the contributions qualify only if more than
half of the total contribution is attributable to the old-age provision, so the supplementary covers
together must stay below 50 % of the total. The statutory address is settled, and it is not
§ 10 Abs. 1 Nr. 2 Buchst. b: the statute requires only that the cover be ergänzend, and the 50 %
test is administrative — BMF-Schreiben v. 24.05.2017 Rz. 38, “Die ergänzende Absicherung ist nur dann
unschädlich, wenn mehr als 50 % der Beiträge auf die eigene Altersversorgung des Steuerpflichtigen
entfallen”, measured on the actual total premium payable, with rider surplus allowed to reduce the
rider’s share R18. The GDV’s BUZ model conditions carry it as a contract term: “Die
Zusatzversicherung ist so gestaltet, dass stets mehr als 50 % der Beiträge auf Ihre Hauptversicherung
entfallen” [S12]. Two allocation rules follow from the same circular and matter to a model point: a
Beitragsbefreiung on disability counts to the old-age side (Rz. 39), and so does a survivor’s annuity
funded solely out of the residual old-age capital (Rz. 41) — the design one retrieved carrier wording
uses [S1]. Hence a standalone Basisrenten-BU does not exist, the rule caps the achievable
disability annuity for a given total premium — exactly the legislator’s intention — and it is a
hard constraint on a model point, buz_prem_share < 0.50 being an invariant the test module
asserts.
Why anyone does this, and what it costs. The premium for a selbständige Berufsunfähigkeitsversicherung (delib product 9) falls into sonstige Vorsorgeaufwendungen under § 10 Abs. 1 Nr. 3a EStG, whose small ceiling is in practice already exhausted by health and long-term-care contributions, so it is effectively not deductible at all; the same cover as a BUZ is deductible in full inside a much larger ceiling. The counterweight is the tax on the benefit: a BU-Rente from a Basisrentenvertrag is taxed with the full cohort Besteuerungsanteil R4 REG-R41, not at the Ertragsanteil of the abgekürzte Leibrente from a standalone SBU unverified (gap 16). The buyer is trading relief now for a heavily taxed benefit later, at a moment — disability — when income has collapsed and the marginal rate may be low. That is the whole of the BUZ-versus-SBU argument, stated here as a trade rather than an advantage. Further constraints, now read in the GDV’s BUZ model conditions [S12]: the rider forms a unit with the main contract and cannot be continued without it, and “Spätestens mit dem vereinbarten Rentenzahlungsbeginn endet die Zusatzversicherung” (§ 9 Abs. 1); a Rückkaufswert out of the rider is never paid to the policyholder but raises the main contract’s benefits (§ 9 Abs. 3); and the rider can be made premium-free only together with the main contract and only above a minimum annuity (§ 9 Abs. 5). A premium waiver is the normal companion cover, and the BMF-Schreiben allocates its premium to the old-age side R18. No carrier’s own BUZ wording was reached [S5]; gap 18 is closed by the model conditions instead.
Beitragsdynamik and Zuzahlung are contractual options rather than riders and are on in the base run, because they are the shape of the product’s premium.
Out of scope. Everything a Schicht-3 or Riester contract offers and this one may not: the
Kapitalwahlrecht, the Teilkapitalauszahlung, the policy loan, assignment, the secondary-market
sale, and any death lump sum. These are not switched-off options; they are structural absences,
and the model carries no cells for them. The Kleinbetragsrenten-Abfindung is deliberately not in
that list: Schicht 1 has it REG-R42, and its absence from the model is a std decision
recorded in model.md rather than a prohibition. It is the one absence in this model that German law
does not compel, and it is labelled that way everywhere it appears.
Variations across insurers#
An honest variations table for this product is almost entirely a record of what could not be compared. Two carriers produced any artefact at all and neither produced a term; presenting a rich table here would be a fabrication, so what follows is the real state of the evidence.
Feature |
CosmosDirekt [S1] |
Allianz [S2] [S3] |
The other nineteen carriers [S4]–[S11] |
|---|---|---|---|
Basisrente wording located |
yes — and read: LA 1079 A (klassisch) and LA 1100 A (fondsgebunden); LA 936 A and LA 1099 A were not located |
no; the chassis is evidenced by a product page, the specimen quotation was not re-found |
one read: Alte Leipziger pm 2401, Tarif FR70 [S4] |
Edition date |
10.15 for both wordings |
specimen dated by its path to 02/2025 unverified; the product page was read 2026-08-30 |
pm 2401 – 06.2026 |
Asset form |
both: general account and Anlagestöcke |
hybrid: Sicherungsvermögen plus Spezialfonds |
fondsgebunden |
Guarantee level published |
no |
yes — 60 / 80 / 90 % of premiums paid, 80 % standard, quoted from the carrier’s own page |
80 % on the guarantee variants named at [S16] |
Rentenfaktor basis published |
yes — DAV 2004 R at the tariff’s Rechnungszins, 1,25 % p.a. on the 10.15 wording |
expressed as a minimum annuity amount |
a guaranteed Rentenfaktor of 24,94 € at 67 is on NÜRNBERGER’s Muster-PIB [S13] |
Charge figure published |
the Muster-PIBs, yes; the levels are template placeholders |
yes — 1 575 € Abschlussprovision; ≤ 0,95 € per 100 € of capital formed unverified |
yes — NÜRNBERGER’s Muster-PIB carries a full schedule and Effektivkosten of 1,77 pp [S13] |
Layer sold on a common chassis |
not established |
yes — PrivatRente / BasisRente / RiesterRente are one design |
not established |
Produktinformationsblatt obtained |
Muster-PIB yes, individual PIB no |
no |
Muster-PIB yes for NÜRNBERGER and WWK [S13] |
A range table needs two observations of one parameter, and this corpus now has two or three of several. What the drafted version had was one: at least two Basisrente tariff wordings maintained in parallel at one carrier [S1] — what a tariff family looks like when klassisch, fondsgebunden and vintage editions coexist. Everything else a variations table would normally carry has no observation at all: entry ages, minimum premiums, maximum Zuzahlung, permitted Rentenbeginn range, Rentengarantiezeit durations, survivor-cover forms, BUZ terms, Effektivkosten, guarantee levels beyond one carrier, Mindestversicherungsleistung, fund universes. Twenty named German life writers whose Basisrente documents exist were not reached and not one contributes a single fact [S11] (gap 1). They are named so a checker knows where to go, with nothing attached beyond what each is named for: Alte Leipziger (AL_RoyalBasisRente, repeatedly at the top of independent ratings) [S4] R24; NÜRNBERGER (a principal Berufsunfähigkeit writer, and so the natural place to look for a BUZ written inside a Basisrente — the single most valuable document this corpus could not reach) [S5]; Volkswohl Bund [S6]; LV 1871 (the best-known fondsgebundene Basisrente with an open fund and ETF universe and no Beitragsgarantie, marketed as MeinPlan Basisrente) [S7]; Swiss Life, whose host refuses this environment [S8]; Continentale, whose fund-linked tariff is BasisRente Invest [S9]; Stuttgarter, whose tariff is BasisRente performance+ — no index-safe Basisrente tariff was found, so the index-linked possibility of gap 12 now has no tariff name behind it at all [S10]; and the carriers of [S11], for which nothing whatever was established.
What varies, on the reasoning rather than the evidence. Four dimensions can be stated as ranges because they follow from the statute and the market’s structure rather than from a comparison:
Dimension |
Range the market is understood to show |
Status |
|---|---|---|
Asset form |
klassisch · fondsgebunden ohne Garantie · fondsgebunden mit Beitragsgarantie at 60 / 80 / 90 % of premiums paid · possibly index-linked |
[S2] [S7] [S16] — all three forms observed, the fund-linked pair at five carriers at once; the distribution across them is still unverified (gap 3) |
Guarantee vintage in force |
2,75 % down to 0,25 % and back to 1,00 %, by conclusion year |
REG-R15; a structural certainty, not a carrier variation |
Distribution |
Predominantly brokers and independent advisers; the fee-based Nettotarif segment is more developed here than on most German life products |
|
Charge level |
The Effektivkosten bands of the charge table above |
std, argued not observed (gap 2) |
What does not vary, and why. The five prohibitions, the age floor, the ban on Kapitalwahl and commutation, the absence of a Rückkaufswert, the closed list of permitted survivors, the 50 % rule and the Besteuerungsanteil cohort table are statutory R1 R4 R8 R23 REG-R39 REG-R41, and no carrier can vary them and remain certified. That is unusual in this repository: elsewhere a delib composite argues a representative choice against an observed spread, whereas here the product’s defining features are the ones no insurer may choose, and the std parameters are confined to levels — charges, the Rentenfaktor, the surplus path, the behavioural rates.
Regulatory context#
Tax — the layer. The Alterseinkünftegesetz of 2004, effective 1 January 2005, built the three-layer architecture, introduced nachgelagerte Besteuerung for the first layer and created the Basisrente so that the self-employed — who have no access to the statutory scheme — would have a vehicle with the same tax treatment R5 REG-R38. It responded to a Bundesverfassungsgericht decision on the unequal taxation of Beamtenpensionen and statutory pensions unverified as to the year and the case, and followed the report of the commission chaired by Bert Rürup. No Bundesgesetzblatt citation is given for the AltEinkG, the Wachstumschancengesetz R6, the Jahressteuergesetz 2022 R7 or the Jahressteuergesetz 2007 R8, because none could be confirmed (gap 23).
Tax — the two amendments that softened the transition. The Jahressteuergesetz 2022 brought 100 % deductibility forward from 2025 to the assessment period 2023 R7; the Wachstumschancengesetz of 2024 cut the annual step in the Besteuerungsanteil from one percentage point to half a point, retrospectively for the 2023 cohort — which is why 2023 is 82,5 % and not 83 % — and moved the 100 % year from 2040 to 2058 R6 REG-R41. Both answered the Doppelbesteuerung litigation: two Bundesfinanzhof decisions of 19 May 2021, commonly cited as X R 33/19 and X R 20/19, both file numbers now confirmed, which held the system change and the architecture of the transition constitutional but accepted that a taxpayer who proves double taxation in his own case may have a constitutional claim to relief — “Eine solche doppelte Besteuerung ist nicht gegeben, wenn die Summe der voraussichtlichen steuerfrei bleibenden Rentenzuflüsse mindestens ebenso hoch ist wie die Summe der aus versteuertem Einkommen aufgebrachten Altersvorsorgeaufwendungen”, on the Nominalwertprinzip. On the facts the appeal failed, and the appellant was a Freiberufler who had paid at the ceiling since 1984 — this product’s own buyer R19. The proposition that later cohorts will be caught is not in the Leitsätze but follows from the method the court fixed; it is used here on that footing. It is a slowing of the transition, not a change of principle.
Tax — the remaining pieces, none of them a liability cash flow. A Hinterbliebenenrente is taxed in the survivor’s hands on the same cohort basis, with the cohort year determined by the start of that annuity — not established (gap 20). A private annuity is not a Versorgungsbezug, so a pensioner compulsorily insured in the Krankenversicherung der Rentner is generally not subject to health and long-term-care contributions on it while a voluntarily insured pensioner pays R13 REG-R46 unverified (gap 21) — a difference of the order of 18 % of the annuity.
Contract law. The VVG governs throughout REG-R22, with § 171’s halbzwingende character meaning the listed provisions may not be varied to the policyholder’s detriment. The operative sections are § 153 (Überschussbeteiligung, half-share in the Bewertungsreserven) R15 REG-R24; §§ 165, 168 and 169 (Beitragsfreistellung, Kündigung, Rückkaufswert — the last inoperative here) R14 REG-R28; § 163 REG-R27; §§ 154 and 155 REG-R25; §§ 8 and 152 (Widerruf) REG-R23; §§ 19, 37, 38, 157 and 158 REG-R30; and §§ 172–177 for a BUZ REG-R29. Certified contracts carry an annual statement under § 7a AltZertG [S15], whose interest for delib is that it names side by side the state variables a projection model must carry. The field list is now established and is the statute’s own: the use made of the contributions paid, the capital built up, the actual costs incurred in the past contribution year, the investment return earned, and — until the payout phase begins — the capital expected at its start after costs, projected on the contributions actually paid and the Wertentwicklungen of the individual PIB. The GDV model statement adds that the capital figure is a Gesamtkapital including allocated surplus, non-guaranteed Schlussüberschüsse and the non-guaranteed Bewertungsreserven-share [S12].
Prudential. The insurer is a Solvency II undertaking supervised under the VAG REG-R5 REG-R6, writing in the Lebensversicherung Sparte, with the Sicherungsvermögen and the prudent-person principle of § 124 VAG governing the assets REG-R7. Premium calculation runs under § 138 VAG REG-R8; the Überschussbeteiligung and the Sicherungsbedarf test under § 139 VAG REG-R9; the RfB under §§ 140 and 145 VAG with the MindZV and the RfBV beneath REG-R10 REG-R18 REG-R19. The statutory Deckungsrückstellung runs on the DeckRV REG-R14 REG-R16 REG-R17 and the HGB accounts on §§ 341–341o HGB and the RechVersV REG-R54; the Zinszusatzreserve exists in no other jurisdiction in this repository and is an HGB reserve. AnlV investment quotas do not bind this insurer — since 1 January 2016 they reach only small undertakings and domestic Pensionskassen and Pensionsfonds REG-R7.
Conduct and disclosure. The § 7 AltZertG Produktinformationsblatt with its individually computed Effektivkosten R11 REG-R43 sits on top of the VVG-InfoV product-level regime REG-R31; PRIIPs reaches the unit-linked and hybrid forms REG-R32; the IDD and § 34d GewO govern the distribution this product depends on REG-R33. A Basisrente is squarely inside BaFin’s conduct-supervision perimeter for capital-forming life products sold through commissioned intermediaries R21 REG-R35, and nothing Basisrente-specific was established from BaFin (gap 15).
Actuarial, professional, and comparative. The Rechnungsgrundlagen erster und zweiter Ordnung distinction and the DAV’s ownership of the tables are at REG-R47; DAV 2004 R and DAV 2004 R-Bestand are the annuity bases R17 REG-R49, DAV 1997 I / RI / TI the Berufsunfähigkeit family a BUZ would need REG-R50, and Destatis the only freely reusable German mortality series REG-R52. The DAV’s Fachgrundsätze and its annual Höchstrechnungszins recommendation govern the practice REG-R56. IFRS 17 applies to IFRS reporters and this is a direct-participating contract that would be measured under the variable fee approach REG-R55; nothing in this library implements it. Four houses are the market’s standing sources for comparative analysis in this layer — IVFP, Franke und Bornberg, Morgen & Morgen, Assekurata R24 REG-R53, the first publishing the best-known Basisrente rating — but not one rating, score, ranking or figure was established, and no downstream document may invent one.
Living texts. The Höchstrechnungszins is 1,00 % for 2025 and recommended at 1,00 % for 2026 R16; the Besteuerungsanteil for a 2026 cohort is 84,0 % R4; the Höchstbetrag for 2026 is 30 826 € R2 R20; the deductible share has been 100 % since 2023 R7; the full-taxation year is 2058 R4. Every one of those moves — the Höchstbetrag annually with the Sozialversicherungsrechengrößen-Verordnung R20, the Besteuerungsanteil annually by construction. A third has been seen moving: the Kleinbetragsrente threshold of § 93 Abs. 3 EStG read 1 % in model conditions of July 2025 and reads 1,5 % in the statute as amended in 2026 R23. Check all three, and every paragraph number in this document, before relying on anything here.