How to best set up single immediate premium joint annuity

MollyG

I bought a SIPA joint contract from NY Life. We'll get a fixed amount of money a month for the rest of our lives, for however long we live, even if one of us dies. However, if we both die, no one gets the residual, if one even exists at that point in time. There is no inflation adjustment rider either. We bought the contract using tax deferred monies. To account for this within Quicken, I simply created another IRA account, named it NY Life and transferred the contract purchase amount to that account. Having had to sleuth for missing monies for my in-laws, we wanted a clear audit trail - the notes field makes it clear that there are no beneficiaries once we are both dead even if this account shows a balance. Our first annuity payment starts in March. Should I simply transfer each payment to our checking account from the NYLife IRA account I set up? Eventually, I will hit a zero balance, or even go negative - G-d willing, many years from now. The distributions should show up correctly as taxable in the tax reports which I think is all that is important from an accounting standpoint. There is nothing to download or track - the value is irrelevant - and I've excluded it from the net worth reports. That said, I'm truly winging it…Is there a better way to do it?